January 10, 1919. German Government turns to the Freikorps, Arabs take Medina, Rioting in Argentina.

The U.S. Bureau of Fisheries sat for a group portrait on this day in 1919.

This would prove to be a momentous day for post war Germany.

Faced with an ongoing and increasingly effective Communist rebellion in Berlin, which the German Army had not been able to put down, the German socialist government turned to the Freikorps and they went into action.

The arrangement had actually been made the prior day, January 9, and it signaled the beginning of a strange development in which the left of center provisional government was forced to seek the help of the paramilitary right, which was largely controlled and aided by the German army. The Freikorps was well equipped and indeed some units had adopted uniforms that were a bit more modern than the German Army's itself.  Large numbers of discharged lost Frontsoldaten had joined them and they were, at this point, a combat element that rivaled the Germany army in effectiveness.

They did not, as would soon be evident, rival the army in the degree to which they were controlled.

This latter fact means that in modern parlance the Freikorps is associated with what would become the German radical right. But the Freikorps as a revolutionary era institution was not new and dated back to Napoleonic times, which Germans had formed such units in opposition to Napoleon. They had a track record of being undisciplined at that time but were looked back upon heroically.  In some instances, Freikorps units in post World War One Germany made intentional associations with their earlier predecessors as a result.

Elsewhere, the Arab Revolt took Medina.

December 30, 1918. "Zero Weather" predicted for Cheyenne, Rosa Luxemburg urges a name change for the German Spartacus League in Germany, Goshen County Sheriff held on suspicion of murder.

While this blog still does not seek to become a century ago today in retrospective blog, as we're still tracking stories important to the our overall theme, and the end of World War One and the events flowing from it are part of that story, here we have one.

And it's one that jam packed with myths that are probably so thick that disabusing them is impossible.  The story of Rosa Luxemburg and the Spartacus Rebellion in Germany of 1919, which was coming to a head, by which we mean a bloody end.

Rosa Luxemburg, who is almost 100% incorrectly remembered by history.

With Germany in revolution and the Socialist government struggling to simultaneously put it down and to deal with the collapse of the state that had made the armistice with the Allies necessary, Rosa Luxemburg, misunderstood member of the German Spartacus League and one of its founders, urged the the consolidation of all of the non Social Democratic German radical Socialist parties into a new party to be called the Communist Party of Germany, somewhat ignoring the fact that there was already a radical left wing German party called the Communist Party which was a participant at the conference at which she was making the proposal.

Luxemburg, who will reappear here in a few days, is a quixotic figure.  She had long been a left wing figure in Europe and is romanticized today by the Communists pretty much for the same reason that movie fans romanticize James Dean. . . she died prior to her career really getting started and therefore can be all things to all people.

Luxemburg was a Polish Jew by ethnicity and a citizen of the Russian Empire by birth.  She'd grown up, before going to university in Switzerland, in Russian Poland and was the daughter of a father who was interested in liberal causes and a mother who was very religious.  She had no familial or perosnal history with Germany whatsoever but rather chose Germany as a place in which she wished to live sometime after obtaining a doctorate, very unusual for a woman at the time, in Switzerland.  She had obtained permission to live in Imperial Germany only by contracting a fraudulent marriage with Gustav Lubeck, the son of a long time friend, in order to circumvent German laws and she became a permanent resident of Germany sometime in the early 1900s.

In Germany she was a member, originally, of the Social Democratic Party which prior to World War One housed all of the left of center German political class and which was secure in its radiclalism by the fact that it didn't have a real chance to exercise power.  Probably not ironically, however, as she was a Pole, not a German, she was influential in that time in the formation of the Polish and Lithuanian Social Democratic Party.

Prior to World War One it can be argued that her politics evolved. She was a radical in her socialistic views but ran counter to almost all of those who would later lionize her. She was an opponent of Polish nationalism as she did not believe in Polish (or any) self determination, a policy that would run counter to Lenin's stated beliefs but which did fit conventional communist beliefs.  She was also, however, dedicated to social democracy and serious about not suppressing the votes of non socialist parties.  She came to be an open critic of Lenin and of the German Social Democratic Party.  By this point in time she was really a member of the Independent Social Democrats which were part of the first post war German coalition for a time until they pulled out due to their radical beliefs.  She opposed the Spartacus uprising in 1919 but naively supported none the less.  On this day, she proposed that the various parties of the left that were in the Spartacus League unite as the Communist Party of Germany, in spite of their already being a German communist party, and in spite of the fact that her views really did not match well with those that genuine communist held.

Her role would not go well for her.

Locally, while Germany was aflame, there was going to be "Zero Weather" in Cheyenne, which didn't mean what it sounded like.  The Goshen County Sheriff was being held in connection with a killing and Congress was working on a bill for anticipated homesteading discharged soldiers.

Taking a look at those zones of Occupation, the Peace and what it meant. The Allied Occupation of Germany, 1918-1930.

 Painting of Canadian soldier on early occupation duty in Germany following World War One.

Recently, in another post, we posted the Allied areas of occupation following the Armistice in World War One.

It's worth taking a second look at:

December 27, 1918. The Collapse of the German Empire. The Rise of Poland. A League of Nations.

Contrary to what occurred after World War Two, the allied occupation following the Armistice of November 11 was quite limited in scope. This is also sometimes misunderstood. The occupation following the Second World War was intended to totally demilitarize and remake Germany.  The 1918 one was not, but instead was intended merely to prevent a resumption of the war with the West.  It was quite limited, but strategic, in scope.

Occupation zones following November 11, 1918.  'Armistice and occupation of Germany map', URL: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/media/photo/armistice-and-occupation-germany-map, (Ministry for Culture and Heritage), updated 15-Jun-2017

It's commonly noted that following World War One the various (Western) Allies occupied Germany, or that various units went into to Germany. That's true, but not that much was occupied, all things being considered, at least at first. But the story of the occupation is really convoluted and somewhat difficult to follow.

It's an important story, however, for what it didn't accomplish.

Immediately following the war, the Allies occupied the zones noted above.  The point, as noted earlier, was to recover territory lost to the Germans during World War One and the Franco Prussian War, to run the Allied lines up to the Rhine, and to throw bridgeheads over the Rhine in case it was necessary to resume offensive operations, although the chance of that occurring was slim and the Allies knew that, which is demonstrated by the commencement of a partial demobilization nearly immediately.  The zone assigned to the Americans for this, as also earlier noted, was surprisingly large and that assigned to the British was surprisingly small.  Belgium, whose army had to spend most of the war outside of its own country, occupied quite a bit, in relative terms.

In the interior of Germany, however, i.e., nearly all of Germany save those regions south of the Rhine, the German provisional government was left in charge, and the German Imperial Army was at its service.  That provisional government faced a titanic task, however, as Germany was in a state of early Russian Revolution style civil war, with Red soldiers, sailors and civilians openly challenging the government and fighting the Army in may location for control of the country and its future.  And, as noted above, an entire province of Prussia, Posen, rose up in a Polish rebellion against Germany in an ultimately successful attempt to separate that province from Germany and join it to Poland.  A second smaller revolution, because the territory is smaller, occurred in Silesia with the same goal after that one.  Meanwhile, thousands of German soldiers were stranded in regions they'd been sent to by the German Imperial government which were beyond Germany's borders and some of them were still engaged in combat against Red forces in the East under commanders who continued to basically act autonomously and seemingly under some sense that the Crown or at least an Imperial government would revive.

Contrast this to the end of World War Two in which the German government completely ceased to exist, its Army along with it, and 100% of German territory was occupied.

An element of this is that because the war ended in an armistice, rather than a surrender, it was unclear to both sides how long it would take to negotiate a peace.  It quickly proved to be the case that it was going to take a lot longer than supposed as arranging for such a peace was much more difficult than at first imagined.  The November 11, 1918 Armistice, therefore, actually ran only until December 13, 1918, at which time it was extended in recognition of that.  In the meantime, the Germans, by operation of the armistice, did in fact surrender their Navy which went, in large measure, to Skapa Flow. The surrender of the Navy was a further signal that whatever was going on in Germany and whatever it was capable of, it wasn't capable of resumption of a war against the Western Allies.  During this period the Allies occupied the areas shown above.

The First Prolongation of the Armistice did not suffice to be long enough to establish a new peace, and on January 16, 1919, it was extended again.  This allowed the negotiations on a peace treaty to commence on January 18, 1919.  As is well known, the treaty that was arrived upon, while I frankly think it was a good and just one under the circumstances, was regarded by the Germans as harsh for a number or reasons we'll touch on when the time comes (maybe).   The Germans at first refused to sign it and the German government then in power fell over the issue of signature. The new German government asked for certain clauses to be withdrawn indicating that if they were, they'd execute the treaty.  The Allies, in turn, gave the new German government 24 hours to indicate acceptance or face a resumption of the war.

That threat was not an idle one.  In June 1919 Germany was still in the midst of a revolutionary crisis which its army had not been able to put down, Posen had de facto separated, and the government remained highly unstable.  The German Army, while not impotent, was obviously in extremely poor condition, suffering attrition by desertion, relying upon militias, and with no remaining industrial base to call upon. Faced with the threat of complete occupation, the Germans capitulated on June 23, 1919.

By that time the armistice that had ended the war itself was in its third prolongation, which ran to January 10, 1920.  The formal agreement ending the war (not entered into by the United States) allowed the armistice to end and a new phase of occupation to commence.

The Treaty of Versailles allowed for the ongoing Allied occupation of the Rhineland, specifically providing:

Article 428

As a guarantee for the execution of the present Treaty by Germany, the German territory situated to the west of the Rhine, together with the bridgeheads, will be occupied by Allied and Associated troops for a period of fifteen years from the coming into force of the present Treaty.

Article 429

If the conditions of the present Treaty are faithfully carried out by Germany, the occupation referred to in Article 428 will be successively restricted as follows:

(i) At the expiration of five years there will be evacuated: the bridgehead of Cologne and the territories north of a line running along the Ruhr, then along the railway Jülich, Duren, Euskirchen, Rheinbach, thence along the road Rheinbach to Sinzig, and reaching the Rhine at the confluence with the Ahr; the roads, railways and places mentioned above being excluded from the area evacuated.

(ii) At the expiration of ten years there will be evacuated: the bridgehead of Coblenz and the territories north of a line to be drawn from the intersection between the frontiers of Belgium, Germany and Holland, running about from 4 kilometres south of Aix-la-Chapelle, then to and following the crest of Forst Gemünd, then east of the railway of the Urft valley, then along Blankenheim, Waldorf, Dreis, Ulmen to and following the Moselle from Bremm to Nehren, then passing by Kappel and Simmern, then following the ridge of the heights between Simmern and the Rhine and reaching this river at Bacharach; all the places valleys, roads and railways mentioned above being excluded from the area evacuated.

(iii) At the expiration of fifteen years there will be evacuated: the bridgehead of Mainz, the bridgehead of Kehl and the remainder of the German territory under occupation.

If at that date the guarantees against unprovoked aggression by Germany are not considered sufficient by the Allied and Associated Governments, the evacuation of the occupying troops may be delayed to the extent regarded as necessary for the purpose of obtaining the required guarantees.

Article 430

In case either during the occupation or after the expiration of the fifteen years referred to above the Reparation Commission finds that Germany refuses to observe the whole or part of her obligations under the present Treaty with regard to reparation, the whole or part of the areas specified in Article 429 will be reoccupied immediately by the Allied and Associated forces.

Article 431

If before the expiration of the period of fifteen years Germany complies with all the undertakings resulting from the present Treaty, the occupying forces will be withdrawn immediately.

The occupation clause massively offended German sensibilities, but it was just under the circumstances.  Germany's own terms it dictated to the Russians in 1917 had been massively more harsh and Germany had shown a pronounced aggressive territory apatite.* A fifteen year occupation (until 1934) was designed to give the Allies space to defend against renewed German hostility and a defensive position on the banks of the Rhine while it was hoped a newly democratic Germany might join the democratic family of nations, a hope that would ultimately fail.**

The occupation did not go smoothly.  The United States Senate refused to ratify the Treaty of Versailles and the war against Germany was technically brought to and end in 1920 by declaring the war at an end.  The U.S. participated in the occupation but brought almost all of its combat forces home by December 1919, leaving a force of 16,000 men behind. That force, in the context of American  history, was not inconsequential but it was also partially administrative and also partially engaged in efforts to locate American graves left behind by the fighting.*** The British, the other major non continental power, went from eleven divisions as originally formed in 1919 to just over 13,000 men by 1920.****

In 1923 Warren G. Harding ordered the return of the remaining American soldiers, pulling the U.S. out of Europe entirely.  French and British soldiers remained, and in fact British soldiers had been called upon by the German government to put down Red revolutionaries, something that reflected the desperate condition the German government was in and the British willingness to prolong its fighting engagements, as it had done in Russia.  That same year the French occupied the Ruhr, which they were allowed to do under the Treaty of Versailles, in response to the German governments default on repatriation payments.  The French remained until 1925 in a move that proved to be highly unpopular to the Germans, but which (while this is contrary to the normal view), was likely justified under the circumstances.

The Allied occupation of the Rhineland concluded earlier than the Treaty of Versailles called for as under the subsequent Locarno Treated the time had been shortened until 1930.  That subsequent treaty was an effort to work towards the repair of German and French relations.  Rather obviously, no matter what the goal was, it failed to ultimately achieve that goal.

Much ink has been spilled since 1945 arguing that the Versailles Treaty, including those provisions that allowed for occupation of Germany (and in particular the Ruhr) were far too harsh and responsible for World War Two.  In retrospect, however, they weren't harsh enough.  Germany had acted barbarously in its behavior and goals in World War One and yet in spite of that, the Allies chose to call the fighting off before they'd entered German soil.  In November 1918 the Allies were advancing at a rapid pace and open field warfare had returned.  It was known to the Allies that the rank and file of the Germany navy had revolved against the Crown and the Germany navy was not only a nullity, but a new armed internal force against the German government which the German government was not only having to call upon its army to suppress, but which was becoming successful in recruiting rebellious soldiers against the government as well.  Austro Hungaria was disintegrating and no longer remained any sort of support to Germany at all.  The Allies were planning for a war that would go into the spring and summer of 1919 and result in a complete German defeat.  Their error was in thinking it would take that long.  While the Germans were still fighting in November 1918, there's very little reason to think that they would have been doing so in December 1918, or January 1919.  Had the Allies refused German entreaties for an armistace, the Allies would have entered a Germany aflame in revolution in the winter of 1919.  While that would not have been pleasant, the result would have been a complete and total German defeat.

By agreeing to enter into an armistice when they did, the Allies acquiesced to two late state German war aims; 1) the German state, such as it was, was preserved over a country that, while in revolution, still existed; and 2) the Prussianized German Imperial Army continued to exist uninterrupted.  Both of those goals would suffer some modification due to the Versailles Treaty, showing how weak the Imperial Army had become, in that its size was severely limited (and the Navy was likewise controlled), and Germany had to give up Posen and part of Prussia to Poland. Be that as it may, most of Germany never had an Allied soldier set foot on its ground, the German army continued to exist with a straight de facto lineage back to early Prussian times, and the Germans could credibly maintain that they hadn't been fully defeated. Maintaining that maintained a fiction, the Allies had saved Germany from total defeat as a desire to end the bloodshed was so strong that they were willing to give up complete victory for an early end of the war even if that meant preservation of a German state with a Prussianized German army.

Allied zones of occupation after World War Two.

That lesson was so strong for the Germans that in formulated their efforts late in World War Two.  Historians have often wondered why Germany kept on fighting after its defeat was so apparent in the Second World War.  But taking into account that World War Two was only about twenty years distant from World War One, and that the German Army of World War Two retained many senior officers who had been in the German Imperial Army, there was every reason for the German military leadership to suppose that the Western Allies at least would agree to a negotiated peace to end the bloodshed early a second time.  Indeed, there was pretty good reason for them to suppose that the Western Allies, and maybe the Soviets as well, would entertain a repeat of the negotiations that brought the fighting to an end in 1918, meaning that if the German military deposed the Nazis, as they had effectively done with the Kaiser, surely the Allies would negotiate in a fashion that would leave the army and country intact.  That hope proved delusional as the Allies had learned their lesson the second go around.

Nonetheless its important to note that the apologist for Imperial Germany who maintain that the horrors of World War Two were brought about because of the defeat of Imperial Germany in the Great War, or alternatively because of the "harsh" peace imposed upon the Germans to end that war, really miss the point entirely.  It's true, of course, that Imperial Germany did not engage in anti Jewish genocide in 1914-1918, but Germany's actions in the East certainly fit well as a prelude to what happened in the Second war and at least Ludendorff was open about his desires to depopulate regions of the East and resettle them with Germans.  And in France and Belgium the Germans in fact acted with barbarism.  By 1914, when the war commenced, and indeed much earlier dating back to the late 19th Century, the seeds of totalitarianism were already well planted in the soil of autocratic monarchies and struggling to burst forth.  It's no accident that the three most autocratic European imperial states, Russia, Austro Hungaria, and Germany all saw communist revolutions following the war and that their fragile democracies collapsed.  Had Imperial Germany been victorious in 1914 and acted in accordance with the desires of its monarch and military, there's plenty of room to suppose that its' history would have at least followed that of Imperial Japans, whose monarchy was effectively deposed and controlled by its military following World War One.

Looked at realistically, therefore, the real act of failure was that the Allies did not, in the fall of 1918, inform Germany that the end had come and there was no hope for anything other than a complete surrender. That would not have occurred, however, in no small part due to Allied fatigue and the unrealistic hopes of Woodrow Wilson.  So that is retrospectively hoping for too much, most likely.  If that had occurred, however, a more democratic Germany may have survived, or alternatively a series of German states which would have been prevented from combining.  Beyond that, the second act of failure was not acting more aggressively to bring that sort of goal about in the treaty that brought a formal end to the war.

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*Those who argue the treaty was too harsh seemingly forget Germany's behavior during the war, and in particular its behavior late war in the East.  They likewise seemingly forget that Imperial Germany had come about by uniting the various German independent states under the Prussian Crown following the Franco Prussian War even though the Prussian Crown had expressly rejected taking a constitutional position over a united Germany as a result of the 1848 revolutions.

**Hence the large zones for Belgium and France, both of which had been directly invaded in 1914 and, for France, also in 1870.  The small British zone simply kept them in the game. The big American one reflected its large late war contribution.

***Americans had traditionally made poor occupation troops in general except in Central America, where professional forces in the form of Navy and Marine detachments had been used in that fashion. The Army's prior experiences were limited to the Mexican War, the post Civil War American South, and the Philippines, none of which had gone very well.

Moreover, while all of the occupation troops were largely conscripts, the view of the average American didn't suit their being occupation troops very well.  This is perhaps reflected by a report of a Savannah Georgia newspaper from June 1919, at which time Georgia National Guardsmen who had served in the army of occupation were returning to Georgia.  That reported noted that they were returning with a significant number of German brides a large number of whom were pregnant, indicating that the marriages, or at least the relationship, had a bit of a history.  Keeping in mind that southern Germany was largely Catholic it would be reasonable to assume that the pregnancies were almost all post marriage which means that the relationships with American troops had started nearly as soon as the Army had entered Germany.  Friendly relations between Germans and Americans were such a problem that American commanders were issuing orders trying to prevent it nearly immediately while at the same time Germany villages started to incorporate occupying Americans servicemen into  significant village events, such as the celebration of Christmas.  While its' popular to note that the Germans did not take to the occupation well, it's also important to note that much of the hostility to the occupation was actually outside of it.

****While the United Kingdom had a pronounced colonial history it had traditionally  had a very small standing army and it also had to rely upon conscripted soldiers in the war. The UK began to repatriate combat troops almost instantly when the armistice was signed and like the United States its troops were poorly suited for occupation duty.  Additionally, the UK had large overseas commitments it retained and it went right into a domestic revolution of its own in Ireland. Finally, a lot of "British" troops were in fact Canadian, New Zealanders, and Australians, none of whom were going to be willing or able to stay for a long occupation.

December 27, 1918. The Collapse of the German Empire. The Rise of Poland. A League of Nations.

Polish soldiers digging trenches in their 1918-1919 war against Imperial Germany.

The final stages of the collapse of Imperial Russia saw huge numbers of Polish troops join forces with any Russian rebels and the establishment of a defacto Polish state from Polish lands that had been under the crown.  Indeed, not only did this occur, but Polish forces and rebels soon were engaged in combat with Ukrainian forces and rebels over what was Polish and what was not.

On this day, in 1918, that spread to Germany.

The collapse of the German war effort in World War One is such an important historical event that most histories of World War One simply end with that and treat the German Revolution as a bit of an epilogue.  Histories of World War Two tend to treat it as a prologue.  But what should be evident from reading these posts is that Imperial Germany didn't really end on November 11, 1918, or even before that when the Kaiser abdicated shortly before, but rather Imperial Germany sloppily turned the reins of government over to a provisional socialist government that found itself with a major domestic revolution on its hands from the hard left and the old Imperial Army with which to put it down.  It was trying desperately to do so.  

Contrary to what occurred after World War Two, the allied occupation following the Armistice of November 11 was quite limited in scope. This is also sometimes misunderstood. The occupation following the Second World War was intended to totally demilitarize and remake Germany.  The 1918 one was not, but instead was intended merely to prevent a resumption of the war with the West.  It was quite limited, but strategic, in scope.

Occupation zones following November 11, 1918.  'Armistice and occupation of Germany map', URL: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/media/photo/armistice-and-occupation-germany-map, (Ministry for Culture and Heritage), updated 15-Jun-2017

Indeed, the occupation zones were actually frankly anemic and basically were simply sufficient for the Allies to create a strong defense on the south bank of the Rhine with bridgeheads over it, in case of a resumption of the war.  That this was highly unlikely was obvious by the behavior of the Allies themselves, who immediately began to repatriate their soldiers and sailors to their homes and discharge them.  While I disagree with those who insist on the Versailles Treaty being the date that ended all doubt, this map gives them a point.

Cheyenne readers on this learned that Wyoming Guardsmen would definitely be overseas for awhile.

Wyomingites in the 91st Division would be remaining overseas as well.  On the positive side, it seemed that American troops were getting along well with German civilians.

As does the behavior of Germany itself, within its borders.  The German Army was very active, where it could be, but it couldn't be everywhere, and it was effective everywhere it was.

On December 24, the German Army had been defeated in a street battle with Berlin by Red Sailors and Kreigsmarine and soldiers who had gone over to the Reds.  Lots of significant towns were in the hands of Red revolutionaries who intended to form a communist government.  The provisional socialist government Weimar was struggling to retain power and not go down in a Red revolution.

On this day, the Poles added to their troubles.

The Posen region of Imperial Germany, a major coal producing region of the state, had always really been Polish. The German Empire had been just that, and like the Austrian Empire it included people who were not German by ethnicity within its borders, although not nearly to the same extent that was the case in the Austro Hungarian Empire.  Included in that were regions of what had been Poland and which were among its oldest possessions.

Prussian province of Posen, Polish regions in yellow.

The Poles had been subjects of conquest by neighboring Prussia back into Medieval times. In more recent times the Germans had participated in the dismemberment of what remained of Poland.  The Poles, in spite of a late German effort, had never been absorbed by the Germans who had always looked down upon them.   With the Poles reforming their country out of the Polish regions of Russia, it was inevitable that Poles in Posen would attempt to break away and joint them.

What wasn't inevitable was that it would work, but it did.  The Polish rebels were largely successful in a two month long war with Germany which saw them seize control of most of the region.  On February 16, 1919 with a renewed armistice involving the Poles and the Germans imposed by the Allies.  The Versailles Treaty would settle the territorial question in favor of Poland.

Cartoon in the New York Herald, December 27, 1918.  This cartoon is only quasi clear.  It was celebrating the concept of a League of Nations, but are the little dachshunds republics made up of a dismembered German state?

On that treaty, the British were very strongly backing a League of Nations, and that was starting to get some press, and some discussion in the United States, where views were initially quite favorable.

Training in the US kept on in other places, exploring the newly learned and newly acquired.

Christmas 1918

I want to note, right from the onset, that I don't want to have this blog be one of those websites that attempts to relate every Christmas to the historical event or events that the blog focuses on, although given the focus of this blog on the period generally from the late 19th Century up until around 1920, more or less, that would be more tolerable and even interesting.  What I mean is, I don't want this to become the "Christmas is about World War One" day, which it isn't.*

Charles Russell's 1918 Christmas Card, Christmas Meat.  The "meat" is a play on words.  This 1918 card (which I found on the net, and which is past any copyright protectection, whohc is why I put it up) does not depict a scene from the Frontier West like some might suspect, but depicts a contemporary scene from 1918 in which one cowboy is bringing a deer, i.e, meat, to an old cowboy at a line camp who was probably living by that time of the year on canned beans for the most part.  Isolated line camps would remain a feature of Western ranching until after World War Two when the 4x4 truck changed ranching.

Still, as this year finds us winding down some of the stores we started tracing on a century removed daily basis, or on a focused basis as well, this would be a good time to take a look at Christmas, 1918.

Rather obviously, a focus of many people was on their servicemen who remained overseas in France, the war having just ended.  This was the case, for example, for the Wyoming National Guardsmen of the 148th Field Artillery, who were now on occupation duty in Germany.  Lot of troops had already come home, but a bit oddly, perhaps, the troops who were mostly likely to have returned were those who had been stationed in the United Kingdom at the time of the war's end. They were packed up and shipped home nearly immediately, most of them having only recently arrived.  So the oddity of military logic, and perhaps there was some logic to it, is that if you just showed up, you were sent right home.  The same was true for those who never made it overseas.  Many were pretty quickly discharged (into an uncertain economic future).  Combat troops who had been fighting in France went on to Germany. And of course, Germany was in turmoil so that made some sense.

In fact, not only was Germany in turmoil, there was a gun battle in Berlin on December 24 between the "Volksmarine" who were there and the German Army.  The Volksmarine were naval troops (Kreigsmarine), sailors and solders who had gone over to the Reds.  On the 24th, they battled unit s of the Regular German Army.  The Volksmarine held the field at the end of the day and the German Army's performance at street combat proved to be quite poor.  The Army negotiated a withdraw from the city and the Reds returned to their barracks.  The situation defused itself and the German government slowly assumed control of the city.  The Volksmarine, for their part, grew discontented with their lack of pay and ultimately they were called to collect pay in the presence of right wing military authorities some weeks later, who dismissed and discharged them, retaining 10% of those who mustered for pay (30 men) and shot them dead in an application of the old Roman principle of decimation.

With stuff like that going on, you can see why experienced troops were retained.

The military always makes an effort to celebrate major holidays and Christmas is one, perhaps the biggest one. We can be assured, therefore, that in every American military unit there was a type of Christmas feast and can be more assured that in a lot of units, probably most units, officers dined on the 24th and 25th separately and probably as formally as the circumstances would allow.

Christmas Tree in Officers Club, France.

As would be suspected, there wasn't one single expression of Christmas that was the same from unit to unit, for those stationed overseas, but a variety of them.  The American Red Cross, which had been active in the war (as we've discussed earlier) continued to be and made an effort to bring Christmas to the troops.

Red Cross Recreation Hut in France decorated for Christmas.

Not all of those troops were in good condition, of course. Some celebrated Christmas in Europe as convalescents.

Christmas stocking over the best of a convalescing American solder in the United Kingdom.

The Red Cross also remained active in trying to distribute needed items to soldiers.

Red Cross socks being distributed as presents to soldiers.  The American Army,  in spite of the nation really materially mobilizing for the war, had a hard time supply woolen goods of some sorts, including socks, for some reason.  Socks were knitted by volunteers.

While also observing the holidays themselves.

Red Cross nurses in their quarters, decorated for Christmas.

Christmas wasn't a happy one universally in Europe by any means.  Death had impacted everyone and privation had set in everywhere.

Cartoon from the New York Herald, December 25, 1918.

In Europe, where they could, and as we would expect that they would, Americans tried to make the Christmas a little more cheery for those who had been impacted by the war.

American military and Red Cross personnel giving Christmas gifts to British orphans in the Untied Kingdom.

In the U.S. things were not bad, in spite of the strain the war had imposed, and people were mostly just waiting for troops to come home. Some would be coming home as badly damaged men, of course, and the families of the missing would find that some wouldn't be coming home at all.  But most would be coming home to their families and old lives (we'll post on that soon).  Therefore, Christmas had a sense of longing. . . 

J. C. Leyendecker's 1918 Saturday Evening Post illustration, which we've already run here.  His 1917 cover had a solder feeding an orphan.

but it also had many of the contemporary features of American holidays, consumerism already being a thing, in spite of what people like to believe.

While the war had brought more than full employment to the United States (indeed, everywhere), and while deaths from the war, whether direct combat losses or ancillary ones, like those lost due to the 1918 Flu Epidemic, created a workplace shortage (grim topic for Christmas I know), there were still those in the country, indeed a lot in the country, who lived hard lives.  Efforts were made to recall them as well.

Christmas for horses and their drivers in Washington D. C.

So our post on Christmas, 1918.  Some things we'd recognize, and some not so much.

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*If I publish a "New Years Resolutions For Other People" post, like I have on some prior years, but not last year, one will be for people to quit converting every holiday into Veteran's Day.  I am a veteran, but frankly it's gotten strangely out of hand since the Depression Era/World War Two generation became aged and the Boomers started to feel guilty about how they'd treated them.  When I was a kid, Veteran's Day was observed but frankly not a great deal.  Memorial Day was used by families to honor and remember their own dead.  Now, Veteran's Day, Memorial Day, Pearl Harbor Day have all become Veteran's Days and I routinely see people posting things to make you feel vaguely guilty if you don't recall Veteran's on whatever particular day it is.

December 17, 1918. No Booze for Soldiers. No Booze for Coloradans, No Booze for Montanans. Villa ponders attack

Up until at least the Korean War, if not the Vietnam War, a deficit of clothing meant that discharged soldiers often wore their uniforms after a time following their discharge.  That was very much the case after World War One and World War Two.  Here, the Federal Government was concerned about discharged soldiers drinking in uniform.

In the popular imagination, Prohibition was forced on an unwilling nation by a bunch of silly temperance women who didn't realize that America was a drinking nation.  That version of the story is very far from true.

The Cheyenne State Leader was reporting that Montana would go dry on December 30.  1918 was to be Montana's last "wet" year.  Villa, the paper also reported, was up to no good.

In reality, Prohibition was a hugely popular movement and was gaining ground in the states prior to it become Federal law.  By this date in 1918, Colorado had gone "bone dry" and Montana was about to.

Not all was bleak. One of the Casper papers was reporting that American soldiers still preferred American girls.  Those American soldiers would be bringing home quite a few French brides and even a few Russian ones.  Of course, the report here did contain some bad news for American women.  Some of the soldiers were reporting pretty favorably on les femmes Francais.

So Prohibition was really arriving in the individual states prior to the Volstead Act making it the law of the land and prior to any Constitutional amendment requiring it.  When Prohibition was repealed, it meant that each state that had laws on the books had to revisit those laws if it wanted to likewise repeal Prohibition in their state, which serves as a lesson in rushing to amend laws to comport with what seems to be a national development.  That allowed those states a breather to adapt to the new situation, which in the case of Wyoming it very much took, phasing drinking back in over a period of years.

The other Casper paper noted that "Arrests Halt Delivery of Denver Booze".   What an irony if compared to the Denver of today.

Well, on the not so boozy, presumably, high seas:

1918  The USS Cheyenne, formerly the USS Wyoming, but renamed due the later battleship being assigned that name, assigned to Division I, American Patrol Division. 

The Cheyenne, is to my eye, an exceedingly odd looking vessel.  It was a "monitor", a class of ship that recalled Civil War heritage, given the use of of "monitors" in that war. The more modern class of monitor was designed to pack a big bunch and present a low profile, thereby making it a potent naval weapon that was designed to be hard to hit.  By World War One, it was principally used as a rather odd submarine tender and was flagship of her flotilla in the Atlantic.

December 2, 1918. Wilson speaks, the Papers Comment, Some Troops Come Home, Some go to their Final Resting Place, the Post War World National and Local starts to emerge.

This day, which was a Monday in 1918.  Woodrow Wilson gave his fist post war State of the Union address. 

It's interesting to note that Wilson, in spite of serving a full eight years during which the world was at war for four of which, and during which the United States teetered close to war for nearly the entire time, he only delivered one address while the nation was actually at war.

The address was a significant one dealing with the post war world, how Wilson envisioned it, and the peace.

The address:

GENTLEMEN OF THE CONGRESS:

The year that has elapsed since I last stood before you to fulfill my constitutional duty to give to the Congress from time to time information on the state of the Union has been so crowded with great events, great processes, and great results that I cannot hope to give you an adequate picture of its transactions or of the far-reaching changes which have been wrought of our nation and of the world. You have yourselves witnessed these things, as I have. It is too soon to assess them; and we who stand in the midst of them and are part of them are less qualified than men of another generation will be to say what they mean, or even what they have been. But some great outstanding facts are unmistakable and constitute, in a sense, part of the public business with which it is our duty to deal. To state them is to set the stage for the legislative and executive action which must grow out of them and which we have yet to shape and determine.

A year ago we had sent 145,918 men overseas. Since then we have sent 1,950,513, an average of 162,542 each month, the number in fact rising, in May last, to 245,951, in June to 278,760, in July to 307,182, and continuing to reach similar figures in August and September, in August 289,570 and in September 257,438. No such movement of troops ever took place before, across three thousand miles of sea, followed by adequate equipment and supplies, and carried safely through extraordinary dangers of attack,-dangers which were alike strange and infinitely difficult to guard against. In all this movement only seven hundred and fifty-eight men were lost by enemy attack, six hundred and thirty of whom were upon a single English transport which was sunk near the Orkney Islands.

I need not tell you what lay back of this great movement of men and material. It is not invidious to say that back of it lay a supporting organization of the industries of the country and of all its productive activities more complete, more thorough in method and effective in result, more spirited and unanimous in purpose and effort than any other great belligerent had been able to effect. We profited greatly by the experience of the nations which had already been engaged for nearly three years in the exigent and exacting business, their every resource and every executive proficiency taxed to the utmost. We were their pupils. But we learned quickly and acted with a promptness and a readiness of cooperation that justify our great pride that we were able to serve the world with unparalleled energy and quick accomplishment.

But it is not the physical scale and executive efficiency of preparation, supply, equipment and despatch that I would dwell upon, but the mettle and quality of the officers and men we sent over and of the sailors who kept the seas, and the spirit of the nation that stood behind them. No soldiers or sailors ever proved themselves more quickly ready for the test of battle or acquitted themselves with more splendid courage and achievement when put to the test. Those of us who played some part in directing the great processes by which the war was pushed irresistibly forward to the final triumph may now forget all that and delight our thoughts with the story of what our men did. Their officers understood the grim and exacting task they had undertaken and performed it with an audacity, efficiency, and unhesitating courage that touch the story of convoy and battle with imperishable distinction at every turn, whether the enterprise were great or small, from their great chiefs, Pershing and Sims, down to the youngest lieutenant; and their men were worthy of them,-such men as hardly need to be commanded, and go to their terrible adventure blithely and with the quick intelligence of those who know just what it is they would accomplish. I am proud to be the fellow-countryman of men of such stuff and valor. Those of us who stayed at home did our duty; the war could not have been won or the gallant men who fought it given their opportunity to win it otherwise; but for many a long day we shall think ourselves "accurs'd we were not there, and hold our manhoods cheap while any speaks that fought" with these at St. Mihiel or Thierry. The memory of those days of triumphant battle will go with these fortunate men to their graves; and each will have his favorite memory. "Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot, but hell remember with advantages what feats he did that day!"

What we all thank God for with deepest gratitude is that our men went in force into the line of battle just at the critical moment when the whole fate of the world seemed to hang in the balance and threw their fresh strength into the ranks of freedom in time to turn the whole tide and sweep of the fateful struggle,-turn it once for all, so that thenceforth it was back, back, back for their enemies, always back, never again forward! After that it was only a scant four months before the commanders of the Central Empires knew themselves beaten; and now their very empires are in liquidation!

And throughout it all how fine the spirit of the nation was: what unity of purpose, what untiring zeal! What elevation of purpose ran through all its splendid display of strength, its untiring accomplishment! I have said that those of us who stayed at home to do the work of organization and supply will always wish that we had been with the men whom we sustained by our labor; but we can never be ashamed. It has been an inspiring thing to be here in the midst of fine men who had turned aside from every private interest of their own and devoted the whole of their trained capacity to the tasks that supplied the sinews of the whole great undertaking! The patriotism, the unselfishness, the thoroughgoing devotion and distinguished capacity that marked their toilsome labors, day after day, month after month, have made them fit mates and comrades of the men in the trenches and on the sea. And not the men here in Washington only. They have but directed the vast achievement. Throughout innumerable factories, upon innumerable farms, in the depths of coal mines and iron mines and copper mines, wherever the stuffs of industry were to be obtained and prepared, in the shipyards, on the railways, at the docks, on the sea, in every labor that was needed to sustain the battle lines, men have vied with each other to do their part and do it well. They can look any man-at-arms in the face, and say, We also strove to win and gave the best that was in us to make our fleets and armies sure of their triumph!

And what shall we say of the women,-of their instant intelligence, quickening every task that they touched; their capacity for organization and cooperation, which gave their action discipline and enhanced the effectiveness of everything they attempted; their aptitude at tasks to which they had never before set their hands; their utter self-sacrifice alike in what they did and in what they gave? Their contribution to the great result is beyond appraisal. They have added a new lustre to the annals of American womanhood.
The least tribute we can pay them is to make them the equals of men in political rights as they have proved themselves their equals in every field of practical work they have entered, whether for themselves or for their country. These great days of completed achievement would be sadly marred were we to omit that act of justice. Besides the immense practical services they have rendered the women of the country have been the moving spirits in the systematic economies by which our people have voluntarily assisted to supply the suffering peoples of the world and the armies upon every front with food and everything else that we had that might serve the common cause. The details of such a story can never be fully written, but we carry them at our hearts and thank God that we can say that we are the kinsmen of such.

And now we are sure of the great triumph for which every sacrifice was made. It has come, come in its completeness, and with the pride and inspiration of these days of achievement quick within us, we turn to the tasks of peace again,-a peace secure against the violence of irresponsible monarchs and ambitious military coteries and made ready for a new order, for new foundations of justice and fair dealing.

We are about to give order and organization to this peace not only for ourselves but for the other peoples of the world as well, so far as they will suffer us to serve them. It is international justice that we seek, not domestic safety merely. Our thoughts have dwelt of late upon Europe, upon Asia, upon the near and the far East, very little upon the acts of peace and accommodation that wait to be performed at our own doors. While we are adjusting our relations with the rest of the world is it not of capital importance that we should clear away all grounds of misunderstanding with our immediate neighbors and give proof of the friendship we really feel? I hope that the members of the Senate will permit me to speak once more of the unratified treaty of friendship and adjustment with the Republic of Colombia. I very earnestly urge upon them an early and favorable action upon that vital matter. I believe that they will feel, with me, that the stage of affairs is now set for such action as will be not only just but generous and in the spirit of the new age upon which we have so happily entered.

So far as our domestic affairs are concerned the problem of our return to peace is a problem of economic and industrial readjustment. That problem is less serious for us than it may turn out too he for the nations which have suffered the disarrangements and the losses of war longer than we. Our people, moreover, do not wait to be coached and led. They know their own business, are quick and resourceful at every readjustment, definite in purpose, and self-reliant in action. Any leading strings we might seek to put them in would speedily become hopelessly tangled because they would pay no attention to them and go their own way. All that we can do as their legislative and executive servants is to mediate the process of change here, there, and elsewhere as we may. I have heard much counsel as to the plans that should be formed and personally conducted to a happy consummation, but from no quarter have I seen any general scheme of "reconstruction" emerge which I thought it likely we could force our spirited business men and self-reliant laborers to accept with due pliancy and obedience.

While the war lasted we set up many agencies by which to direct the industries of the country in the services it was necessary for them to render, by which to make sure of an abundant supply of the materials needed, by which to check undertakings that could for the time be dispensed with and stimulate those that were most serviceable in war, by which to gain for the purchasing departments of the Government a certain control over the prices of essential articles and materials, by which to restrain trade with alien enemies, make the most of the available shipping, and systematize financial transactions, both public and private, so that there would be no unnecessary conflict or confusion,-by which, in short, to put every material energy of the country in harness to draw the common load and make of us one team in the accomplishment of a great task. But the moment we knew the armistice to have been signed we took the harness off. Raw materials upon which the Government had kept its hand for fear there should not be enough for the industries that supplied the armies have been released and put into the general market again. Great industrial plants whose whole output and machinery had been taken over for the uses of the Government have been set free to return to the uses to which they were put before the war. It has not been possible to remove so readily or so quickly the control of foodstuffs and of shipping, because the world has still to be fed from our granaries and the ships are still needed to send supplies to our men overseas and to bring the men back as fast as the disturbed conditions on the other side of the water permit; but even there restraints are being relaxed as much as possible and more and more as the weeks go by.

Never before have there been agencies in existence in this country which knew so much of the field of supply, of labor, and of industry as the War Industries Board, the War Trade Board, the Labor Department, the Food Administration, and the Fuel Administration have known since their labors became thoroughly systematized; and they have not been isolated agencies; they have been directed by men who represented the permanent Departments of the Government and so have been the centres of unified and cooperative action. It has been the policy of the Executive, therefore, since the armistice was assured (which is in effect a complete submission of the enemy) to put the knowledge of these bodies at the disposal of the business men of the country and to offer their intelligent mediation at every point and in every matter where it was desired. It is surprising how fast the process of return to a peace footing has moved in the three weeks since the fighting stopped. It promises to outrun any inquiry that may be instituted and any aid that may be offered. It will not be easy to direct it any better than it will direct itself. The American business man is of quick initiative.

The ordinary and normal processes of private initiative will not, however, provide immediate employment for all of the men of our returning armies. Those who are of trained capacity, those who are skilled workmen, those who have acquired familiarity with established businesses, those who are ready and willing to go to the farms, all those whose aptitudes are known or will be sought out by employers will find no difficulty, it is safe to say, in finding place and employment. But there will be others who will be at a loss where to gain a livelihood unless pains are taken to guide them and put them in the way of work. There will be a large floating residuum of labor which should not be left wholly to shift for itself. It seems to me important, therefore, that the development of public works of every sort should be promptly resumed, in order that opportunities should be created for unskilled labor in particular, and that plans should be made for such developments of our unused lands and our natural resources as we have hitherto lacked stimulation to undertake.

I particularly direct your attention to the very practical plans which the Secretary of the Interior has developed in his annual report and before your Committees for the reclamation of arid, swamp, and cutover lands which might, if the States were willing and able to cooperate, redeem some three hundred million acres of land for cultivation. There are said to be fifteen or twenty million acres of land in the West, at present arid, for whose reclamation water is available, if properly conserved. There are about two hundred and thirty million acres from which the forests have been cut but which have never yet been cleared for the plow and which lie waste and desolate. These lie scattered all over the Union. And there are nearly eighty million acres of land that lie under swamps or subject to periodical overflow or too wet for anything but grazing, which it is perfectly feasible to drain and protect and redeem. The Congress can at once direct thousands of the returning soldiers to the reclamation of the arid lands which it has already undertaken, if it will but enlarge the plans and appropriations which it has entrusted to the Department of the Interior. It is possible in dealing with our unused land to effect a great rural and agricultural development which will afford the best sort of opportunity to men who want to help themselves and the Secretary of the Interior has thought the possible methods out in a way which is worthy of your most friendly attention.

I have spoken of the control which must yet for a while, perhaps for a long long while, be exercised over shipping because of the priority of service to which our forces overseas are entitled and which should also be accorded the shipments which are to save recently liberated peoples from starvation and many devastated regions from permanent ruin. May I not say a special word about the needs of Belgium and northern France? No sums of money paid by way of indemnity will serve of themselves to save them from hopeless disadvantage for years to come. Something more must be done than merely find the money. If they had money and raw materials in abundance to-morrow they could not resume their place in the industry of the world to-morrow,-the very important place they held before the flame of war swept across them. Many of their factories are razed to the ground. Much of their machinery is destroyed or has been taken away. Their people are scattered and many of their best workmen are dead. Their markets will be taken by others, if they are not in some special way assisted to rebuild their factories and replace their lost instruments of manufacture. They should not be left to the vicissitudes of the sharp competition for materials and for industrial facilities which is now to set in. I hope, therefore, that the Congress will not be unwilling, if it should become necessary, to grant to some such agency as the War Trade Board the right to establish priorities of export and supply for the benefit of these people whom we have been so happy to assist in saving from the German terror and whom we must not now thoughtlessly leave to shift for themselves in a pitiless competitive market.

For the steadying, and facilitation of our own domestic business readjustments nothing is more important than the immediate determination of the taxes that are to be levied for 1918, 1919, and 1920. As much of the burden of taxation must be lifted from business as sound methods of financing the Government will permit, and those who conduct the great essential industries of the country must be told as exactly as possible what obligations to the Government they will be expected to meet in the years immediately ahead of them. It will be of serious consequence to the country to delay removing all uncertainties in this matter a single day longer than the right processes of debate justify. It is idle to talk of successful and confident business reconstruction before those uncertainties are resolved.

If the war had continued it would have been necessary to raise at least eight billion dollars by taxation payable in the year 1919; but the war has ended and I agree with the Secretary of the Treasury that it will be safe to reduce the amount to six billions. An immediate rapid decline in the expenses of the Government is not to be looked for. Contracts made for war supplies will, indeed, be rapidly cancelled and liquidated, but their immediate liquidation will make heavy drains on the Treasury for the months just ahead of us. The maintenance of our forces on the other side of the sea is still necessary. A considerable proportion of those forces must remain in Europe during the period of occupation, and those which are brought home will be transported and demobilized at heavy expense for months to come. The interest on our war debt must of course be paid and provision made for the retirement of the obligations of the Government which represent it. But these demands will of course fall much below what a continuation of military operations would have entailed and six billions should suffice to supply a sound foundation for the financial operations of the year.

I entirely concur with the Secretary of the Treasury in recommending that the two billions needed in addition to the four billions provided by existing law be obtained from the profits which have accrued and shall accrue from war contracts and distinctively war business, but that these taxes be confined to the war profits accruing in 1918, or in 1919 from business originating in war contracts. I urge your acceptance of his recommendation that provision be made now, not subsequently, that the taxes to be paid in 1920 should be reduced from six to four billions. Any arrangements less definite than these would add elements of doubt and confusion to the critical period of industrial readjustment through which the country must now immediately pass, and which no true friend of the nation's essential business interests can afford to be responsible for creating or prolonging. Clearly determined conditions, clearly and simply charted, are indispensable to the economic revival and rapid industrial development which may confidently be expected if we act now and sweep all interrogation points away.

I take it for granted that the Congress will carry out the naval programme which was undertaken before we entered the war. The Secretary of the Navy has submitted to your Committees for authorization that part of the programme which covers the building plans of the next three years. These plans have been prepared along the lines and in accordance with the policy which the Congress established, not under the exceptional conditions of the war, but with the intention of adhering to a definite method of development for the navy. I earnestly recommend the uninterrupted pursuit of that policy. It would clearly be unwise for us to attempt to adjust our programmes to a future world policy as yet undetermined.

The question which causes me the greatest concern is the question of the policy to be adopted towards the railroads. I frankly turn to you for counsel upon it. I have no confident judgment of my own. I do not see how any thoughtful man can have who knows anything of the complexity of the problem. It is a problem which must be studied, studied immediately, and studied without bias or prejudice. Nothing can be gained by becoming partisans of any particular plan of settlement.

It was necessary that the administration of the railways should be taken over by the Government so long as the war lasted. It would have been impossible otherwise to establish and carry through under a single direction the necessary priorities of shipment. It would have been impossible otherwise to combine maximum production at the factories and mines and farms with the maximum possible car supply to take the products to the ports and markets; impossible to route troop shipments and freight shipments without regard to the advantage or-disadvantage of the roads employed; impossible to subordinate, when necessary, all questions of convenience to the public necessity; impossible to give the necessary financial support to the roads from the public treasury. But all these necessities have now been served, and the question is, What is best for the railroads and for the public in the future?

Exceptional circumstances and exceptional methods of administration were not needed to convince us that the railroads were not equal to the immense tasks of transportation imposed upon them by the rapid and continuous development of the industries of the country. We knew that already. And we knew that they were unequal to it partly because their full cooperation was rendered impossible by law and their competition made obligatory, so that it has been impossible to assign to them severally the traffic which could best be carried by their respective lines in the interest of expedition and national economy.

We may hope, I believe, for the formal conclusion of the war by treaty by the time Spring has come. The twenty-one months to which the present control of the railways is limited after formal proclamation of peace shall have been made will run at the farthest, I take it for granted, only to the January of 1921. The full equipment of the railways which the federal administration had planned could not be completed within any such period. The present law does not permit the use of the revenues of the several roads for the execution of such plans except by formal contract with their directors, some of whom will consent while some will not, and therefore does not afford sufficient authority to undertake improvements upon the scale upon which it would be necessary to undertake them. Every approach to this difficult subject-matter of decision brings us face to face, therefore, with this unanswered question: What is it right that we should do with the railroads, in the interest of the public and in fairness to their owners?

Let me say at once that I have no answer ready. The only thing that is perfectly clear to me is that it is not fair either to the public or to the owners of the railroads to leave the question unanswered and that it will presently become my duty to relinquish control of the roads, even before the expiration of the statutory period, unless there should appear some clear prospect in the meantime of a legislative solution. Their release would at least produce one element of a solution, namely certainty and a quick stimulation of private initiative.

I believe that it will be serviceable for me to set forth as explicitly as possible the alternative courses that lie open to our choice. We can simply release the roads and go back to the old conditions of private management, unrestricted competition, and multiform regulation by both state and federal authorities; or we can go to the opposite extreme and establish complete government control, accompanied, if necessary, by actual government ownership; or we can adopt an intermediate course of modified private control, under a more unified and affirmative public regulation and under such alterations of the law as will permit wasteful competition to be avoided and a considerable degree of unification of administration to be effected, as, for example, by regional corporations under which the railways of definable areas would be in effect combined in single systems.

The one conclusion that I am ready to state with confidence is that it would be a disservice alike to the country and to the owners of the railroads to return to the old conditions unmodified. Those are conditions of restraint without development. There is nothing affirmative or helpful about them. What the country chiefly needs is that all its means of transportation should be developed, its railways, its waterways, its highways, and its countryside roads. Some new element of policy, therefore, is absolutely necessary—necessary for the service of the public, necessary for the release of credit to those who are administering the railways, necessary for the protection of their security holders. The old policy may be changed much or little, but surely it cannot wisely be left as it was. I hope that the Con will have a complete and impartial study of the whole problem instituted at once and prosecuted as rapidly as possible. I stand ready and anxious to release the roads from the present control and I must do so at a very early date if by waiting until the statutory limit of time is reached I shall be merely prolonging the period of doubt and uncertainty which is hurtful to every interest concerned.

I welcome this occasion to announce to the Congress my purpose to join in Paris the representatives of the governments with which we have been associated in the war against the Central Empires for the purpose of discussing with them the main features of the treaty of peace. I realize the great inconveniences that will attend my leaving the country, particularly at this time, but the conclusion that it was my paramount duty to go has been forced upon me by considerations which I hope will seem as conclusive to you as they have seemed to me.

The Allied governments have accepted the bases of peace which I outlined to the Congress on the eighth of January last, as the Central Empires also have, and very reasonably desire my personal counsel in their interpretation and application, and it is highly desirable that I should give it in order that the sincere desire of our Government to contribute without selfish purpose of any kind to settlements that will be of common benefit to all the nations concerned may be made fully manifest. The peace settlements which are now to be agreed upon are of transcendent importance both to us and to the rest of the world, and I know of no business or interest which should take precedence of them. The gallant men of our armed forces on land and sea have consciously fought for the ideals which they knew to be the ideals of their country; I have sought to express those ideals; they have accepted my statements of them as the substance of their own thought and purpose, as the associated governments have accepted them; I owe it to them to see to it, so far as in me lies, that no false or mistaken interpretation is put upon them, and no possible effort omitted to realize them. It is now my duty to play my full part in making good what they offered their life's blood to obtain. I can think of no call to service which could transcend this.

I shall be in close touch with you and with affairs on this side the water, and you will know all that I do. At my request, the French and English governments have absolutely removed the censorship of cable news which until within a fortnight they had maintained and there is now no censorship whatever exercised at this end except upon attempted trade communications with enemy countries. It has been necessary to keep an open wire constantly available between Paris and the Department of State and another between France and the Department of War. In order that this might be done with the least possible interference with the other uses of the cables, I have temporarily taken over the control of both cables in order that they may be used as a single system. I did so at the advice of the most experienced cable officials, and I hope that the results will justify my hope that the news of the next few months may pass with the utmost freedom and with the least possible delay from each side of the sea to the other.

May I not hope, Gentlemen of the Congress, that in the delicate tasks I shall have to perform on the other side of the sea, in my efforts truly and faithfully to interpret the principles and purposes of the country we love, I may have the encouragement and the added strength of your united support? I realize the magnitude and difficulty of the duty I am undertaking; I am poignantly aware of its grave responsibilities. I am the servant of the nation. I can have no private thought or purpose of my own in performing such an errand. I go to give the best that is in me to the common settlements which I must now assist in arriving at in conference with the other working heads of the associated governments. I shall count upon your friendly countenance and encouragement. I shall not be inaccessible. The cables and the wireless will render me available for any counsel or service you may desire of me, and I shall be happy in the thought that I am constantly in touch with the weighty matters of domestic policy with which we shall have to deal. I shall make my absence as brief as possible and shall hope to return with the happy assurance that it has been possible to translate into action the great ideals for which America has striven.

The importance of the speech wasn't lost on the press, which reported on it that very day.  Not surprisingly, in a railroad town like Laramie, the press noted that Wilson wasn't in favor of relinquishing government control of the railroads.  This had been a major feature of the war and in fact the country had nationalized the lines during the war, something it didn't have to do during World War Two. That rationalized rail transport and kept labor demands in check, but it wasn't universally popular and had some odd collateral impacts.

Colorado Midland advertisement. The Colorado Midland had seen its business dramatically expand, and then collapse, under government control.  It went bankrupt in 1918 as a result.

The Boomerang was late on U.S. troops arriving in Germany.  They'd already done that.

Cold and snow as in the forecast, just like the day on which I'm writing this.

The Cheyenne paper reported on the speech as well, but it was also noting the shopping frenzy of the season in a cartoon, once again giving evidence to the popular concept of the commercialization of Christmas being a recent phenomenon to be in error.

The Cheyenne paper was reporting on a royalist plot in Germany.  I'm not familiar with that event, but then I'm not familiar in detail with all of the chaotic events of the immediate post war world in Germany.

Can anyone recommend a book on that?

Anyhow, this event was mentioned in a lot of newspapers at the time, and in fact the upper ranks of the German military never really lost their royalist views.  Indeed, one of the often missed features of the Nazi militarization of the 1930s was a dedicated effort to wrestle control of the military away from the German aristocratic class, something that would have an overall negative impact on world events as the new officers very often indeed had Nazi loyalties, where as the old officer class was loyal principally to its own class.  Neither situation was great, obviously, but Nazi loyalties were obviously worse.

The paper in Cheyenne also reported that the Bolsheviks in Russia were up to no good, which indeed was true.

The Casper paper also reported on the plot in Germany but a preview of coming attractions was given in the report of a shooting at the Midwest Hotel in Casper.  Casper's population had exploded during the war and an old red light district had expanded into a major feature of the town, the legendary Sand Bar district. The Midwest Hotel was literally right on the boundary of the district.

The papers at that time typically wrote headlines in this frankly racist fashion.  Violence in the Sand Bar was hardly confined to one race, but when African Americans were involved in it, their race was featured, as here, in the headline all too often.

Of course, with the war now over (save for in Russia) a lot was going on elsewhere. . .

 RMS Mauretania in New York City with American aviators and other troops returning from Europe after World War I on December 2, 1918.

The rather shocking speed at which the United States demobilized in 1918-1919 is demonstrated by the above.  The RMS Mauretania brought home more than aviators, it also brought home ground troops, who disembarked in New York.  The U.S. was already bringing soldiers home.  Indeed, the American military was clearing out of the United Kingdom as quickly as possible.

There are a lot of reasons that this was the case, but it shows the old line about the Vietnam War, often said about World War Two, may not be fully informed.  That classic assertion is that at the end of the Second World War there was a long stay in Europe or Asia followed by a long sea voyage home where as during the Vietnam War you were just brought home and dumped off.  There's something to that, but at least at the end of World War One the U.S. was speeding some troops home. These guys would not be in uniform long.  

Of course, that says nothing really about what happened during the second war.  There were a lot of U.S. mistakes made in regard to everything in World War One, and things may very well have been different some twenty plus years later.

Graves Registration Service This skirmish line (detail of Company A, 321 Labor Battalion) is searching for bodies along the south bank of the Vesle River, near Bazoches. The stretchers are used to transport the bodies to the cemetery. December 2, 1918

Not everyone was coming right home, of course.  Over 1,000,000 U.S. troops in France were going into Germany for occupation duty.

And some American soldiers were never coming home.  These photographs show the grim details of a Grave Registration unit at work.  Note that this unit is all black, showing how the inclination to assign black troops to service units was there during World War One.  More black troops served in service units than in combat units in the Great War, a trend that would continue on into World War Two when almost all black troops were in service units until the end of the war, when that policy in the still segregated Army was reversed (the Marines didn't take in black enlistees at all until mid World War Two).  During WWI there were black combat units including some state units with mostly black officers, however, so things actually were somewhat more equitable in WWI than they became by WWII.

 One of the trenches ready for the reception of the bodies at the cemetery at Fère-en-Tardenois / Signal Corps, U.S.A.

Some of those troops who would be coming home were convalescing in England and France.  Here, some of those in the UK put on a show for local residents, who seemed to enjoy it, but must have found it odd after their own sons and daughters had been serving for a full four years in many instances.

This soldier in a wheelchair is supposed to be a tank. Note he's holding a M1917 revolver, no doubt removed from the holster of the soldier who is pushing him.