Loans to the Allies
237. Congress Votes Billions.Congress voted billions of money to be spent in various ways, and President Wilson loaned millions of dollars to England, France, and Italy. They in turn sent great men to talk with those who were managing our war preparations.
Never did a nation given to peace turn so quickly to war. Thousands of Americans in Europe had already been taking part for years. Some had joined the Canadian army or the Lafayette Squadron, part of the French air service. Others were working under the Red Cross or the American Committee for the Relief of Belgium.
Hoover as food administrator
Other measures necessary to "mobilize" the nation were quickly passed. The railroads were put under the control of a director-general of railroads, who ran them first of all in the service of the army. A fuel administrator decided what factories and businesses were most necessary in the war and in the life of the nation. Others had to limit their use of coal, or to close down entirely for a short time. Herbert Hoover, head of the great committee which had charge of feeding the starving people of Belgium, was made food administrator. On one hand, he decided how much food whole nations could buy of us. On the other, he helped Americanhousewives plan their daily meals to save the wheat, meat, and fat that were needed for the soldiers, because food would "win the war."
An army of millions
238. The Selective Draft.Millions of soldiers would have been America's share of the Allied fighting forces if the war had gone on longer. Congress decided that a "Selective Draft" would be the most fair and just method of raising these millions. All men between the ages of twenty-one and thirty, and later between nineteen and forty-five, had to be examined by "Draft Boards," and the proper number selected.
Great training camps built
Immense training camps were built, with railroad lines, electric light and water systems, and all the needs of a modern city. Many of these camps sprang up in a few months, ready to take care of fifty thousand men apiece.
239. The War's Nameless Heroes.All these great preparations at home were more businesslike than they were stirring and warlike. They meant a great change in the life of the whole nation. Workers were shifted from all kinds of small, unimportant peace-time tasks to a few gigantic businesses on which the success of the war depended. All the efforts of the nation were centered on saving goods, time, and money, and producing goods to carry on the war.
Not a war of great names
The "home front" did not give great honors to those who held it. But the war was fought to preserve the rights of free citizens, and it had the nearly united support of a whole people. There are few famous names in the fighting abroad, and few, too, at home. It was a war in which the average man was the hero. He did not expect medals for doing his duty in battle, or a high salary for doing his duty at home. But he did it, and unbelievabledeeds were accomplished—fleets built, factories multiplied, waste lands planted, two million men sent across the seas, and the war brought to a swift end.
The Burial of an "Unknown Warrior"
England had a great state funeral not long ago. It rivaled in ceremony the honors paid to dead queens and kings. Throngs followed the great procession to Westminster Abbey, where England's famous dead of all time are buried. A tablet was placed above the tomb of a hero whom a nation united to give its highest honors. The name on that tablet was "To an Unknown Warrior." In America, too, the deeds of the great number, in battle or at home, will always be nameless.
The spirit of heroism needed in peace
If each person, instead of looking straight ahead at the task to be done, had looked to see who else could do it, America's war program would have failed. It has been said that in a great nation any one person, by himself, is lost, and does not count. The chapter in American history just ended proves that when his country is in danger, each citizen can and must act as if the result depended on him. This spirit of patriotism among millions of those whom history will call nameless heroes brought victory in the war, and if it is still followed in peace, will bring "victories no less renowned."
An unparalleled war
240. The World's Greatest War.The war of 1914-1918 is the greatest history has ever known, because of the number of nations in it, the number of lives lost, the cost in goods and money, and the changes it has made among nations.
CARRIER PIGEONS, A MEANS OF COMMUNICATION AT THE FRONT
CARRIER PIGEONS, A MEANS OF COMMUNICATION AT THE FRONT
CARRIER PIGEONS, A MEANS OF COMMUNICATION AT THE FRONT
A record in shipbuilding
Its size is too vast for any one mind to picture it fully. The front-line trenches, with all their turns and twists, were six hundred miles long, nearly equal to the straight distance from Philadelphia to Chicago. Mountains ofmaterial had to be sent across to keep our soldiers well fed and warmly clothed, and furnished with the cannon and shells they must have to meet the enemy. Only about two out of three men in the army could fight, for the third man had to keep these mammoth quantities of supplies steadily moving toward the front. Ships were the thing our government needed most, since it was fighting so far away from home. American shipyards grew so rapidly that they broke all records for number of ships launched and swiftness in building them. The United States soon led the world in shipbuilding for this war.
The War Department was so anxious to keep our men warm and comfortable that it bought up all the wool in the country. The army had to have thirty-five million more pairs of woolen socks than were made for the whole nation in 1914. It used more woolen blankets in one year than the one hundred million people in the United States buy in two ordinary years.
Attacks carefully planned
241. A War of Science.Every movement in the war had to be planned as exactly as possible. This was a war of science, rather than a war of dashing adventure, as those in the past had been. Before attacks were made on the enemy, a barrage, or curtain-like rain of shells,was turned on his lines. This "curtain of fire" moved forward at a fixed rate, and the men walked behind it. They had strict orders to go only so many yards a minute, or their own guns would kill them.
Use of poison gas
Poison gas was one of the new weapons of this war. It caused almost one-third of our losses in 1918. Science produced new gases so rapidly that inventors had to be continually making new gas masks to strain out the deadly fumes. Over thirty kinds of gas were used during the war.
No one commander could be present at once on every part of the hundreds of miles of battle-lines, or even a small part of them. The war had to be carried on largely by telephone. The Americans strung one hundred thousand miles of wire in France.
THE TANK, A NEW WEAPON IN THE WAR
THE TANK, A NEW WEAPON IN THE WAR
THE TANK, A NEW WEAPON IN THE WAR
Pershing trained for his work
242. Pershing Heads the Army.The youngest of American generals, John Joseph Pershing, was put at the head of the American forces. The choice of Pershing was hailed everywhere as a wise one. A war so immense and mechanical needed a general who had studied the art of war thoroughly, as Pershing had. He had seen much actual fighting, and was the only American general who had commanded a division in actual war. He carried with him the love and respect of all national guardsmen. They would have followed him anywhere he wished to lead.
From a Photograph by ClinedinstJOHN J. PERSHING
From a Photograph by ClinedinstJOHN J. PERSHING
From a Photograph by Clinedinst
JOHN J. PERSHING
We have already heard how he had routed Villa's bandits in Mexico. He had also led a charge of colored troops against the Spaniards in Cuba, and had conquered a powerful savage tribe in the Philippines. Before he was sent to Mexico he had been governor of a province in the Philippines for four years.
Fights squarely
243. A Boy Who Was Made of Fighting Stuff.As a boy, Pershing was brave and modest, with the ability to stay by a hard task until he finished it. John was a hardy, active boy. He played at mimic war and attended school. He played "hookey," and got into fights with his fellows, but he was square. One day the father saw the signs of battle-torn clothes and a bruised face. "Been fighting? Never let any boy say that he has licked you," was the father's remark. John had expected a whipping.
At day school he was a plodder. But he did win a prize, a nicely bound volume of theLife of Washington. This was offered by the president of the school board. John's mother was there. The children clapped and called for a speech. "I'm sorry you didn't all win a prize. I'm going to grow up like Washington," he said.
Studies at West Point
In the 70's, when times were bad, John had to help earn the family living, and he did it by teaching some of the hardest schools in the district. He took theexaminations for West Point when he was twenty, and defeated his friend. "I'm sorry you could not win too," he said. At the end of his first year at West Point he was made class leader, a position won only by hard study.
Made a general by Roosevelt
After he graduated from West Point, honors and promotions came fast. Roosevelt had passed by eight hundred and sixty-two older officers to make him a brigadier general. At the beginning of the war he was major general, and later Congress promoted him to the full rank of general, a very rare honor, and the highest in its power to give.
Arrival in France
When Pershing, with a few officers and engineers first landed in France the news spread quickly. "The Americans have come." Their arrival meant that the United States would soon take part in the fighting in earnest. New life and fresh resolution came into the hearts of the war-tired veterans of France.
Germany's last great effort
244. The Great Danger in 1918.Russia had fought bravely for the Allies at the beginning of the war, but about the time the United States entered, a revolution drove the Czar from his throne. Russia was so upset by the revolution that after a year it gave up trying to keep its army at the front, and made peace with Germany. Hundreds of thousands of German soldiers were thus left free to attack the Allies in the west. Germany thought that if she could succeed in taking Paris before many Americans arrived in the trenches, the war would be won. It was her last chance to win.