The Short Soldiers of WWI

I missed getting a post up for Remembrance/Veterans’ Day, but since I’m thankful for the service of our soldiers past and present, this will have to serve for both holidays. But this post will be oddly specific since I’m writing in particular about very short soldiers.

The minimum height for soldiers in the British army during WWI was five-foot-three, with the average being five-five, but many potential recruits were turned away for being too short. I’m five-four and often have to ask for help reaching things on the top shelf at the grocery store, so these fellows who were turned away were pretty short!

Unfortunately, WWI dragged on, and the war machine demanded more men to be fed to the trenches.

In Britain, this led to two things: first, the formation of “Bantam Battalions” (referring to smaller breeds of roosters/chickens) for shorter soldiers, and second, a national push to improve the health care and nutrition of British children so they could grow up tall enough to fight. In fact, some young men grew as much as two inches in training when they had three square meals for perhaps the first time in their lives, which shows just how dire their nutritional situation had been.

I was curious if a similar situation existed in the United States, which entered the war late and never had to dig quite as deeply for recruits. Only about 25 percent of US men entered the military in WWI, and their average height was about 5’7″, which would have been tall for a British soldier. Was this because American men were taller, or because US military recruiters could afford to be more picky? I’m not sure. But it wasn’t until WWII, when a much higher proportion of the male population became involved in the military, that the US government realized that many Americans were suffering from malnutrition (especially following the Great Depression) and took an interest in improving the health of American children for the sake of national defense.

A US WWI recruit being measured. Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress.

I wonder if this lag in interest or awareness on the US government’s part is also why our health care coverage and availability lags behind most other wealthy, industrialized nations.

If you’re curious, here are several other statistics about American soldiers in WWI versus WWII:

The average age was 25 versus 26 (the “average” WWII soldier was married with at least one child; I don’t think that was the case for most men serving in WWI).

The average height was 5’7.5″ versus 5’8″

The average weight was 141 pounds versus 144 pounds (both groups tended to gain weight after enlistment and regular meals).

In WWI, 25 to 37 percent of recruits were rejected for being unable to read or write, while in WWII, the illiteracy rates were lower, perhaps 5 to 10 percent, and due to the need for soldiers, the military instituted literacy training for illiterate men.

39 percent of WWI soldiers were immigrants or the children of immigrants. Also, many of the Native Americans who served in WWI were not considered citizens and could not vote. I cannot find an equivalent statistic for WWII, but over a hundred thousand immigrants gained citizenship by serving in the military, and we cannot forget the amazing courage and loyalty of the first-generation Japanese Americans who enlisted to fight, sometimes from the confines of internment camps – the all-Japanese-American 442nd Infantry Regiment became one of the most decorated units in US military history.

The WWI armed forces were 10 percent African American versus 11 percent in WWII (Native American, Asian American, and other minority groups/people of color definitely played an important role in both wars, but I don’t have exact statistics).

The life expectancy for men in WWI was 47 years versus 63 years during WWII.

The Harlem Hellfighters from WWI. They would have served in a segregated unit, but unlike many Black soldiers who were stuck doing the most unpleasant menial labor, they fought and were highly decorated, though largely forgotten. Photo from census.gov

Daylight Savings Time

We all hate daylight savings time, right? The “fall back” one isn’t so bad because we get an extra hour of sleep, but we pay for it when we have to “spring forward.” Even my dog was cranky today because we wouldn’t feed her at what she knew to be dinner time, since we were all pretending it was an hour earlier. And Hawaii and Arizona don’t even bother with the time change, though the Navajo Nation lands within Arizona do, which just makes everything even more confusing.

I knew that daylight savings time started in World War I as a way to save fuel (an extra hour of daylight in the evening meant less fuel used to light homes). This was in the US and also in some European countries, many of which also still practice daylight savings today. Only a few cities in Ontario, Canada had experimented with it prior to WWI.

What I didn’t know was that we’ve been getting rid of daylight savings time and bringing it back on and off for the last 100+ years. The first round of daylight saving time ended with WWI. FDR brought it back for WWII and called it “war time.” When WWII ended in 1945, so did war time.

For a while, some parts of the US practiced daylight savings time, while others did not. So, a city might change its clocks while the surrounding countryside stayed on standard time. We can imagine the chaos this would have caused for businesses, travelers, and pretty much everyone.

It was the 1960s when we got saddled with daylight savings time on a more permanent basis to settle the confusion. This was popular with sports equipment manufacturers, who hoped that people would play more sports if they had more daylight hours in the evening, and who continue to lobby for the continuation of daylight savings time. Some workers liked having more daylight time after work to spend outdoors or with their families, but for the most part, it remains unpopular with parents, teachers, farmers (who find that cows don’t adjust their milking schedule to daylight savings time), and pretty much everyone else.

During the energy crisis of the 1970s, the US and many other countries experimented with making daylight savings time permanent in the hopes of saving energy, but that caused problems with workers and school children having to leave home in the dark on winter mornings. Also, though daylight savings time does accrue a very small amount of energy savings in lighting, it may actually cause an increase in fuel use because of people driving more to evening activities. So, we moved back to the clock switching.

The days we spend on standard time are shrinking, though, moving late enough in the fall to allow trick-or-treaters to enjoy the extra hour of daylight and earlier in the spring (perhaps to avoid major religious holidays like Easter?). Maybe we’re heading toward doing away with it once more – this time for good.

Photo courtesy of maxmann

The Eleventh Hour of the Eleventh Day of the Eleventh Month…

One hundred years ago – November 11, 1918 – an armistice treaty brought a cease fire to “the war to end all wars.” For the soldiers and other volunteers serving, and for the nations across the world, it wasn’t really an end, but a chance to begin the healing process as best as they were able. I can’t say it better than John McCrae, though I like to think now that the torch represents the freedoms bought for us by past generations:

In Flanders Fields (1915)

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Remembering the Lost Generation

I’m disappointed to see how little attention the media and local civic organizations are giving to the centennial of the US entering The Great War. The WWI generation has been called the Lost Generation, and with good reason. After enduring WWI and the Great Depression, this generation and “their” war were overshadowed by their children fighting in WWII and the horrors of that war.

Yet the WWI generation of Americans also answered the call to go to war, often as volunteers. Many of the women who volunteered had to pay their own way – sacrificing money, time, and sometimes even their lives to nurse, drive ambulances, entertain, and feed and care for soldiers. We might think of the men and women who volunteered as naive, but by the time America entered the war on April 6, 1917, the fighting had dragged on for almost three years, and many of the young people who served had at least an idea of the gruesome conditions that awaited them.

For a giveaway of No Peace with the Dawn, a novel about how World War I changed the lives of one group of young Americans, see my Facebook page.

I think this poem by British poet Rupert Brooke, who died in the war, is a fitting memorial to all those who lost their lives in the Great War:

The Dead (1914)

These hearts were woven of human joys and cares,
Washed marvellously with sorrow, swift to mirth.
The years had given them kindness. Dawn was theirs,
And sunset, and the colours of the earth.
These had seen movement, and heard music; known
Slumber and waking; loved; gone proudly friended;
Felt the quick stir of wonder; sat alone;
Touched flowers and furs and cheeks. All this is ended.

There are waters blown by changing winds to laughter
And lit by the rich skies, all day. And after,
Frost, with a gesture, stays the waves that dance
And wandering loveliness. He leaves a white
Unbroken glory, a gathered radiance,
A width, a shining peace, under the night.

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World War I Centennial Commemoration

The United States doesn’t make as much fuss about World War I as most European countries, but the “Great War” still had a lasting impact on the United States. April 6th will mark one hundred years since the US entered the war. Some museums and historical societies will be holding events to commemorate the centennial, and my co-author Jeff Bateman and I will be at the Utah State University Museum of Anthropology April 1st at 12:30 to talk about the impact of the war on Utah and Cache Valley specifically.

Though April 1st isn’t the exact centennial of America’s entry into the war, it’s significant in Utah, at least, because it’s also General Conference weekend – when members of the LDS faith gather from across Utah and the world to listen to advice from their church leaders. April 6, 1917 was also the Saturday of General Conference weekend. War was declared while LDS church leaders and members gathered in the historic Tabernacle at Temple Square. Though the speakers did not officially announce the war over the pulpit, they did talk about the conflict that Christian soldiers would face of trying to fight while maintaining charity toward all men.

The President of the LDS Church, Joseph F. Smith, said: “…I exhort my friends, the people of our country, especially of this intermountain region, to maintain above all other things the spirit of humanity, of love, and of peace-making … I want to say to the Latter-Day Saints who may enlist, and whose services the country may require, that when they become soldiers of the State and of the Nation that they will not forget that they are also soldiers of the Cross, that they are minister of life and not of death; and when they go forth, they may go forth in the spirit of defending the liberties of mankind rather than for the purpose of destroying the enemy.”

A lot has changed in the last 100 years, but that challenge – to stand up for causes we believe in without giving in to hate towards those who oppose us or hold a different view – remains a problem that we still struggle with today.

Makeshift music in World War I

The Great War epitomized the dark side of the modern, mechanical age, turning warfare into a grinding machine spitting out broken men and women in unprecedented numbers. A theme that emerges over and over from World War I is the attempt of individual soldiers, nurses, doctors, refugees, and others to keep their humanity intact in the face of such horror. One of the ways they did this was through music.

It’s hard to imagine many traditional instruments made it to the front or survived conditions there very long, but people are endlessly creative. The Museum of the Great War in Meaux, France, has these examples of homemade musical instruments used on the Western Front:

They used helmets, canteens, and scrap wood – along with an impressive understanding of how to lay out the strings and frets – to make music in the midst of war. I like to think it helped them think of better times, past and future, and hold on to their humanity while the world around them fell apart.

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Japanese in World War I Utah

One of the reasons I’ll never run out of writing ideas is that every time I work on a project, I come across new awesome stories that don’t quite fit with the current project. The Japanese who fought in World War I are an example of that. As I was scanning lists of Utah veterans who fought in “The Great War,” looking for character names for No Peace with the Dawn, I came across one from Brigham City, Utah that stood out from the Williams, Johns, and even the Alonzos and LaMonds that pop up in Utah: Moichi Kuramoto.

My co-author Jeff Bateman and I were interested in including minorities as we wrote about Utah’s experience in the Great War, but Mr. Kuramoto didn’t quite fit with the story we were telling, so all he gets is a brief cameo. Still, here is what I was able to find about him, using census and war records, and general research on the Japanese who came to Utah.

Moichi Kuramoto was born in Hawaii. His parents probably moved there to work in agriculture, then made their way to California in the early 1900s, where anti-Asian sentiments were burning hot. Some Japanese had already come to Utah to work on the railroads after the Exclusion Act prevented more Chinese from emigrating, and they were followed by their countrymen who wanted agricultural jobs. I would guess Kuramoto’s family was among these. Though nativism and racial prejudice were everywhere at this time, the Japanese seem to have not been discriminated against as severely as other groups in Utah, such as the Greeks.

Moichi Kuramoto was drafted from Perry, Box Elder Country, Utah, according to his draft registration card. His being drafted was illegal, since he would have been denied American citizenship at the time (this also affected other groups in WWI, such as some Native Americans who served). Nevertheless, he answered the call. He doesn’t seem to have gone overseas during the war, serving instead as a private in a Depot Brigade in New York, which helped to train and equip troops going “Over There.” Perhaps the army didn’t quite know what to do with Japanese draftees? They wouldn’t have served in segregated units at any rate, since those were reserved for African Americans – all other racial groups were integrated.

The 1920 U.S. Census shows that Kuramoto survived the influenza epidemic that ravaged the East Coast training camps, and was married and farming in Payson, Utah. Again following him through census records, he and his large family moved to California during the Great Depression (a very difficult time for all farmers in Utah), and were still living there in 1940. If, like me, you know the history of the Japanese in California during WWII, you probably feel the same sick sense of foreboding I did as I read through the records.

Kuramoto died in California in April 1941, early enough to miss Pearl Harbor, but his wife, Ichiyo, and his Utah- and California-born children were imprisoned in Rohwer War Relocation Camp in Arkansas. On one hand, I was relieved that this veteran was spared the ordeal of being imprisoned, but on the other, I hurt for his widowed wife and her children, who had to suffer doubly from his lose and the lose of everything else. At about the time his family was sent to live behind barbed wire as potential enemy aliens, his military veteran headstone was delivered to the Lodi Cemetery in California where he was buried.

Kuramoto’s wife and children returned to California after World War II to pick up what was left of their lives, but I can only imagine their thoughts toward the country that could illegally draft Japanese in one war and imprison them in the next. And while Kuramoto’s death saved him the humiliation of being declared an enemy of the country he had served, I wonder about other Japanese veterans of WWI who ended up in relocation camps.

The Battle of the Somme, Summer 1916

We’re not thinking much about World War I this weekend in America as we watch fireworks and enjoy our barbecues, but July 1st marks the 100 year anniversary of the beginning of the Battle of the Somme in Europe. The U.S. didn’t know it in 1916, but they were less than a year away from being dragged into the horrors of the Great War themselves.

Over one million young men were killed or wounded in the summer of 1916 at the Somme. More than 19,000 British soldiers were killed on the first day alone. There were 25,000 British casualties on July 4th. These are such staggering numbers it might make us numb to the destruction, but each of those million men left behind love ones and hopes and dreams–one million homes in mourning, one million empty spots at dinner tables. The losses reached around the world, from Germany, France, and Britain, to South Africa, India, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia.

The Battle of the Somme mixed primitive tanks and cavalry charges (while the Red Baron circled overhead), machine guns and gas, trench warfare and bloody charges over the top, all in a fifteen mile strip of land. Through all this, in 141 days, the British lines advanced only seven miles. German officer Friedrich Steinbrecher said: “Somme. The whole history of the world cannot contain a more ghastly word.”

 

Photos courtesy of wikimedia

No Peace with the Dawn Cover Reveal!

We have a cover for No Peace with the Dawn (November 2016)! I really appreciate the work Michelle May Ledezma at Cedar Fort did on getting Reed’s U.S. Marine Corps uniform right. Marines don’t fight in their stylish blue dress uniforms, and in the Great War, they ended up having to wear Army uniforms in a lot of cases. Jeff will probably share more about this on his blog, but the Marines really got a raw deal from the U.S. Army when they went over to France, yet World War I–and the Battle of Belleau Wood in particular–ended up being pivotal in Marine Corps history and identity. It was a ridiculously nasty fight, but the Marines pushed the Germans back and stopped their march to Paris, possibly saving the city and the Allies’ war effort. Semper fi indeed!

Were there actually any Utahns at Belleau Wood during World War I? I’ve read a book that claims there were, but I’m not sure about the evidence for that. Maybe more research will turn up the answer, though if anyone knows–or had a family member who was there–I’d love to hear about it.

 

 

The things that unite

I have been a delinquent blogger again this month, but in researching my latest project about WWI, I came across this speech made by President Woodrow Wilson in May of 1915 to a group of newly naturalized citizens shortly after the sinking of the Lusitania. One of the things I love about history is how, no matter how much things have changed, some challenges and some truths remain the same. I was struck by the enduring power of these words one hundred years later:

“My urgent advice to you would be not only always to think first of America, but always, also, to think first of humanity. You do not love humanity if you seek to divide humanity into jealous camps. Humanity can be welded together only by love, by sympathy, by justice, not by jealousy and hatred. I am sorry for the man who seeks to make personal capital out of the passions of his fellow men. He has lost the touch and ideal of America, for America was created to unite mankind by those passions which lift and not by the passions which separate and debase.

We came to America, either ourselves or in the persons of our ancestors, to better the ideals of men, to make them see finer things than they had seen before, to get rid of things that divide, and to make sure of the things that unite. It was but an historical accident no doubt that this great country was called the “United States,” and yet I am very thankful that it has the word “united” in its title; and the man who seeks to divide man from man, group from group, interest from interest, in the United States is striking at its very heart.

It is a very interesting circumstance to me, in thinking of those of you who have just sworn allegiance to this great Government, that you were drawn across the ocean by some beckoning finger of hope, by some belief, by some vision of a new kind of justice, by some expectation of a better kind of life.

No doubt you have been disappointed in some of us; some of us are very disappointing. No doubt you have found that justice in the United States goes only with a pure heart and a right purpose, as it does everywhere else in the world. No doubt what you found here didn’t seem touched for you, after all, with the complete beauty of the ideal which you had conceived beforehand.

But remember this, if we had grown at all poor in the ideal, you brought some of it with you. A man does not go out to seek the thing that is not in him. A man does not hope for the thing that he does not believe in; and if some of us have forgotten what America believed in, you, at any rate, imported in your own hearts a renewal of the belief. That is the reason that I, for one, make you welcome.

If I have in any degree forgotten what America was intended for, I will thank God if you will remind me.

I was born in America. You dreamed dreams of what America was to be, and I hope you brought the dreams with you. No man that does not see visions will ever realize any high hope or undertake any high enterprise.

Just because you brought dreams with you, America is more likely to realize the dreams such as you brought. You are enriching us if you came expecting us to be better than we are…

The example of America must be a special example. The example of America must be the example not merely of peace because it will not fight, but of peace because peace is the healing and elevating influence of the world and strife is not…

We cannot exempt you from work; we cannot exempt you from the strife and the heartbreaking burden of the struggle of the day – that is common to mankind everywhere. We cannot exempt you from the loads you must carry; we can only make them light by the spirit in which they are carried. That is the spirit of hope, it is the spirit of liberty, it is the spirit of justice.”