Ernie Pyle and the mud-rain-frost-and wind boys – The Poor Bloody Infantry

This past week I had one of those travel experiences that seems to happen all too often with modern airline travel. However, the fifteen hours I spent shuttling between four airports and two different airplanes gave me an opportunity to read “Ernie’s War: The Best of Ernie Pyle’s World War II Dispatches” compiled and edited by David Nichols. I picked up this book as I left the house for this trip because I had just seen the bio-pic made about Ernie during World War II – “The Story of G.I. Joe” starring Burgess Meredith as Ernie Pyle (based upon Ernie’s first World War II book, “Here is Your War”). I can only say that if you really want to find some insight into the world and the experiences of the infantry soldier, you have to read Ernie’s columns. His World War II writings were compiled into two books – the already mentioned “Here is Your War” recounting his experiences and those of the American G.I.s in North Africa, while “Brave Men” was based upon his reports from his time in Europe. (And by the way, reading of their experiences in war makes the obstacles and challenges of modern air travel fade into at worst minor annoyances!)

I feel a close kinship with the infantry, even though my own limited military training was as an armored scout observer. However, my training company captain may have known something more about the subject than I did at the time. I once in jest asked him why in the age of mechanized infantry (such as my home National Guard unit) we had to walk so much. He explained that in the U.S. Army, being mechanized infantry meant that you got to carry a P-38 (this P-38 being the Army issue can opener essential to opening the tins that our C-rations came in). Having come relatively late in life to reenacting, I find I have come home to the infantry whether it be Billy Yank, Johnny Reb, Tommy Atkins, or G.I. Joe.

Ernie Pyle wrote that “I love the infantry because they are the underdogs. They are the mud-rain-frost-and wind boys. They have no comforts , and they even learn to live without the necessities. And in the end they are the guys that wars can’t be won without.” Ernie Pyle spent much of his time as a war correspondent during World War II with the infantry in Europe and in the Pacific (with the Marines). While he spent time with the other services and branches of our armed forces, his writings make evident his bond with and affection for “the poor bloody infantry” whether G.I.s or Marines.

Years ago, a friend shared with me a short text he had found that also spoke of the infantry that I was reminded of while reading Ernie’s columns. The links between its words and those of Ernie seemed to speak of the universal and eternal experience of the infantry soldier. It was reportedly written as a practice piece for Egyptian scribes learning the art of writing in hieroglyphics, while also serving as a warning of what might befall them if they were not diligent in that practice and failed to win a scribe’s position.

“Come, [let me tell] you the woes of the soldier, and how many are his superiors: the general, the troop-commander, the officer who leads, the standard-bearer, the lieutenant, the scribe, the commander of fifty, and the garrison-captain…..He is awakened at any hour…..His march is uphill through mountains. He drinks water every third day; it is smelly and tastes of salt. His body is ravaged by illness. The enemy comes, surrounds him with missiles, and life recedes from him. He is told: "Quick, forward, valiant soldier! Win for yourself a good name!" He does not know what he is about. His body is weak, his legs fail him…..Be he at large, be he detained, the soldier suffers. If he leaps and joins the deserters, all his people are imprisoned. He dies on the edge of the desert, and there is none to perpetuate his name. He suffers in death as in life. A big sack is brought for him; he does not know his resting place.”

Even in the 21st Century, the poor bloody infantry (in a phrase whose origin is almost as ancient and obscure) constitute the sub-atomic particles of the military machine. Ultimately, each and every individual in uniform with their personal weapon is an infantryman. Any armed force that fails to remember this will find itself at a serious disadvantage when confronted by another force that did not thus fail.

It's Not Just Art Historians That Plague Museums

I may have left the impression in my last posting that the only problems museums have are with art experts and historians who fail to do proper research on military and war related exhibits. However, the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of American History has had a similar problem now for several years. In the year before it closed for renovations, the Museum unveiled an exhibition called "The Price of Freedom: Americans at War, this presents a survey of America's conflicts and their costs. This exhibition is again on display, unchanged, after these renovations.

An obvious element in such an exhibit would be the American Civil War, described by many historians as the conflict that defined America. The photo included with this article is one that I took earlier this year after the museum was re-opened. I took an almost identical photo before the closure for renovation and attempted to alert museum curators to the errors thus illustrated. Whoever placed the equipment upon the mannequin did it backwards - a fact that as an active reenactor of a Civil War Union soldier immediately struck me when I first visited the exhibit.

The most visible item of equipment is the canteen covered in brown blanket cloth. This is resting on the mannequin's left leg when it should be resting on top of the oilskin cloth haversack and both lying atop the left hip, out the way yet still accessible. The haversack on this mannequin has been reversed from its proper position and can be made out hanging close to the body at the right front.

On the mannequin's left hip, resting approximately where the haversack should be is the black leather cartridge box which would have carried the soldier's rounds of ammunition. This should be resting on the right hip where the soldier can easily use his right hand to reach back, open the pouch, and pluck out a single paper cartridge containing both one bullet and the black powder that when the weapon is fired would propel the bullet towards the chosen target.

The next most important accessory is the cap pouch, a small coin purse sized leather pouch that contains the soldier's percussion caps. After the soldier has poured the black powder down the barrel of his musket, dropped in the bullet, and then used his ramrod to force all of this down to the bottom of his weapon's barrel, he would hold the musket in his left hand while his right hand would reach down to remove a single cap from this pouch which should be just the right side of the buckle of his waist belt. This cap is placed upon the cone or nipple of the musket where it will be struck by the weapon's hammer when the trigger is pulled. The hammer's blow should set off the fulminate of mercury contained in the percussion cap which should create enough of a spark to ignite the black powder already poured down the barrel, firing the weapon. In this instance, the mannequin's pouch is in approximately the right position though the haversack being incorrectly placed just below it makes it difficult to reach.

It would be reasonable to surmise that neither the mannequin nor the curator or individual who kitted out this mannequin was ever dressed down by a sergeant major or any kind of sergeant for being a "slovenly soldier" because their kit was all a scramble. It is not impossible that the individual was using an original image of an actual Civil War Union soldier as a reference aid when placing the equipment on the mannequin. If this is the case, the individual was either unaware or had forgotten that in some forms of photographs or images from this period, the image is in fact a mirror image of the original subject, i.e., backward or reversed so that the real person's right side is on the leftside of the image. The sad result is that the exhibition misinforms the public and leads knowledgable visitors to conclude that the museum is ignorant on this subject and reluctant to admit that fact.

Military Art and the Art of War: Can We Get Art Historians to Study Military History?

One of my favorite past-times at home or on the road is to visit art galleries in search of artwork that might offer some insights about war, warfare, and its practioners. However, I have learned that these excursions also present the risk of coming within earshot of art museum docents, guides, and experts as they explain the military scenes and subjects depicted, all too often exposing gaps in their knowledge of military history, war, and warfare.

One my first such experiences was at the National Gallery of Art exhibition Winslow Homer in the National Gallery of Art. This exhibit brought together a small selection of works tracing the career of this American artist, including some of his Civil War drawings and paintings. Of particular interest to me was “Home Sweet Home”, depicting two Union Army soldiers in a moment or relaxation in camp. Also in this exhibit was “The Sharpshooter on Picket Duty”. This image first appeared as an engraving in Harper’s Weekly, November 15, 1862. It depicts a Union Army sharpshooter in a tree drawing a bead on a long-range target, a scene captured during McClellan’s Peninsular campaign which sought but failed to capture the Confederate capitol of Richmond, Virginia.

As I was studying the two paintings, a National Gallery guide led a group of visitors into the small gallery. The guide presented a general and not inaccurate description of the two paintings, though he skipped over a number of details that I had found particularly interesting and was clearly not as immersed in the Civil War. He was apparently unaware that the sharpshooter in the painting was an image from the Peninsular campaign and insisted on linking it to the later Battle of Antietam fought in western Maryland, apparently not knowing that Winslow Homer was actually present during the former campaign. As for the campfire scene in the first-named painting, my examination of the canvas quickly convinced me that one of the soldiers had placed his tin cup on the fire to make himself a cup of coffee – something I had myself done as a Civil War Reenactor and Living Historian. I also knew from my study and from my reenacting experience that the Union Army (and most modern reenactors) almost literally ran on coffee.

As the guide continued to examine “Home Sweet Home,” he referred to the tin cup on the fire as a small pot and declared that the soldiers were making stew. At this point I was unable to restrain myself and said loudly enough to be heard by the guide and the small group of visitors that actually the soldier was making himself some coffee in his tin cup. The guide ignored my comment even when I repeated it more briefly, refusing to even acknowledging my existence. I listened a little longer to his discussion of the paintings before leaving the room unacknowledged and apparently unheard, though I surrendered enough to impulse to tell one of the museum guards that “this fellow may know art but he knows next to nothing about the Civil War.”

The National Gallery’s web site presents this painting for online viewing (link above) with a zoom feature that allows the viewer to enlarge details of the image for closer examination. Using this feature I have found that you can actually make out the curve of the top of the handle of the tin cup just above the rim at the back of the cup as it sits on the fire. You can take advantage of this capability to conduct your own examination of the image and draw your own conclusion. I should add, however, that in the catalog for the 1988 San Francisco exhibition Winslow Homer: Paintings of the Civil War there are citations from a number of critics’ comments upon “Home Sweet Home” dating from its first public showing in 1863. Among these, T.B. Aldrich wrote in The New York Illustrated News (16 May 1863) that this work:

“…shows a Federal camp at supper time. The band in the distance is playing ‘Home Sweet Home’ in the immediate foreground are two of the boys, one warming the coffee at the camp fire, and the other dreamily watching the operation….”

More recently I found myself in similar circumstances at the Seattle Arts Museum where I went to see the traveling exhibit Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness: American Art from the Yale University Art Gallery. This is a great exhibit of selected works from the Yale University collections that have been put on the road instead of into storage while their permanent home is undergoing renovations. The exhibition included two works of particular interest: “The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker's Hill,” painted by John Trumbull, and a photograph of unfinished pontoon bridges across the Rappahannock River opposite Fredericksburg, Virginia, taken during the American Civil War. Examining the placard describing the photograph of the pontoon bridges I found that it referred to the “unsuccessful siege of Fredericksburg,” described as unsuccessful because the bridges were never completed – according to the caption writer. Unfortunately for the Union troops involved, the “siege” actually did succeed as the bridges were completed, the Army of the Potomac crossed the river, and on December 13, 1862, engaged the Confederates entrenched on the heights beyond the town of Fredericksburg. The Civil War Preservation Trust website hosts an excellent presentation on the campaign and battle that goes into detail both on the bridges and the resulting battle.

As disappointing as I found the erroneous caption, it wasn’t until I returned to examine the photo again that I had another of those encounters with a guide. A Seattle Art museum guide was discussing John Trumbull’s painting “The Death of General Warren” (aka “The Battle of Bunker’s Hill”) depicting the battle fought on Breed’s and Bunker’s Hills in Charlestown opposite the city of Boston on 17 June 1775. At the approximate center of the canvas, the American patriot General Warren is lying in the arms of a comrade who is pushing away the bayonet of a British soldier attempting to thrust it into the dying American’s body. That soldier is also restrained by a British officer, Colonel John Small, who reportedly recognized the prominent American rebel and actually called out to him to surrender to avoid being killed in the final moments of the battle.

The guide attributed the British colonel’s act of restraint to a sense of community and kinship between the British and the American colonials. However, other accounts of the battle make it clear that such a sense of kinship was not universally shared among the British. As the leader of the Massachusetts Committee of Public Safety, Warren was a recognized leader among American patriots and his death was welcomed by many British officers. General Gage is reported to have said Warren’s death alone was worth the death of 500 other rebels. Another British officer, Captain Lane, who had been engaged in the running battle between Concord and Lexington and Boston before participating in the repeated assaults on the American positions, boasted that he had happily buried Warren in an unmarked common grave and hoped that he would never be found and identified. Finally, while elaborating on this point, the guide never chose to mention that the artist John Trumbull actually painted this work while in London, England a few years after the revolution and while studying there under the British artist Benjamin West – known for his own dramatic portrayals of British Army victories – a fact that can reasonably be concluded to have had some influence on how John Trumbull chose to portray the British Army on his own canvas.

These experiences have not totally dampened my enjoyment of these military scouting trips in the world of the fine arts. Just recently I toured a now closed National Gallery of Art exhibition – Dutch Cityscapes of the Golden Age – which brought together a collection of 17th century Dutch works focused upon the cities and urban scenes of the then newly independent United Provinces. These presented great views of the extensive fortifications that protected many of these cities from the forces of Spain during their independence struggle. There were also several canvases that presented the Dutch soldiers and militia in full regalia and kit, offering excellent information regarding their armaments, uniforms (such as they were), and even their level of drill and military training. But the sum total of my experience in such excursions is to tread warily when an art expert or even art historian describes for you the details of military history, war, warfare, etc. based upon the art work presented by that expert. Try doing some research of your own or find a military historian or expert on the war or period presented and compare the museum works to what these experts can tell you about the relevant military art.

Note: For the works of Winslow Homer, I have found two especially good sources: Winslow Homer, Paintings of the Civil War, by Marc Simpson with contributions by others, published by The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and the publishers Beford Arts, to accompany the 1988 exhibit of the same name (ISBN 0-88401-060-0 paper/ISBN 0-938491-15-6 cloth). For his engravings, I have The Wood Engravings of Winslow Homer, edited by Barbara Gelman, published in 1969 by Crown Publishers (LoC 73-75096).