Charles White Whittlesey

Early life and education

Whittlesey as he appeared while a student at Williams College

Whittlesey was born in Florence, Wisconsin, where his father worked as a logger, and he attended school in Green Bay, Wisconsin.^[1] He moved with his family in 1894 to Pittsfield, Massachusetts, where he graduated from Pittsfield High School in the class of 1901. He enrolled at Williams College, where he was a member of St. Anthony Hall,^[2] graduating in 1905. He was voted the "third-brightest man" in his class, and because of his aristocratic manner was nicknamed "Count." He earned a law degree from Harvard Law School in 1908. Soon after graduating he formed a law partnership with his Williams classmate J. Bayard Pruyn in New York City. Influenced by his friend and roommate at Williams, Max Eastman, Whittlesey spent several years as a member of the American Socialist Party before resigning his membership in disgust over what he viewed as the movement's increasing extremism.

Military service

In May 1917, a month after the American entry into World War I, Whittlesey took a leave from his partnership and joined the U.S. Army. He shipped for the Western Front as a captain in the 308th Infantry Regiment, 154th Infantry Brigade, part of the 77th Infantry Division. The 77th was known as the "Metropolitan Division," because it was made up largely of New York City men, principally from the polyglot Lower East side. Its members spoke 42 different languages or dialects.

By September 1917 Whittlesey was commissioned a major. On the morning of October 2, 1918, the 77th Division was ordered to move forward against a heavily fortified German line as part of a massive American attack in the Meuse-Argonne region. Whittlesey commanded a mixed battalion of 554 soldiers, who advanced forward through a ravine. Because the units on their flanks failed to make headway, Whittlesey's troops were cut off from their supply lines, pinned down by German fire from the surrounding 200-foot (61 m) high bluffs. The following days were perilous for Whittlesey and his men, as they were without food or water. Some of the men had never thrown a live grenade, but for four days, they resisted snipers and attacks by waves of German troops armed with hand grenades, and in one incident, flame throwers. During this period war correspondents seized on the incident and dubbed the unit the "Lost Battalion."

On October 7, the Germans sent forward a blindfolded American POW carrying a white flag, with a message in English:

The suffering of your wounded men can be heard over here in the German lines, and we are appealing to your humane sentiments to stop. A white flag shown by one of your men will tell us that you agree with these conditions. Please treat Private Lowell R. Hollingshead [the bearer] as an honorable man. He is quite a soldier. We envy you. The German commanding officer.

Whittlesey's alleged reply was "You go to hell!", although he later denied saying it, stating a response wasn't necessary. He ordered white sheets that had been placed as signals for Allied aircraft to drop supplies to be pulled in so they would not be mistaken for surrender signals. That night, a relief force arrived and the Germans retreated. Of the original 554 troops involved in the advance, 107 had been killed, 63 were missing and 190 were wounded. Only 194 were able to walk out of the ravine.

Post war

Monument to the Lost Battalion in the Argonne Forest, France.

Whittlesey received a battlefield promotion to lieutenant-colonel and returned to the United States as a war hero, receiving on December 6, 1918, one of the first three Medals of Honor awarded for valor in the war. (One of the other two went to his second-in-command, George G. McMurtry.)

The story of the Lost Battalion was one of the most talked about events of World War I.^[6] In 1919, the events were made into a movie.

He tried to return to his career, working as an attorney at the Wall Street firm of White & Case, but found himself in constant demand for speeches, parades, and honorary degrees. The pressure wore on him; he said to a friend: "Not a day goes by but I hear from some of my old outfit, usually about some sorrow or misfortune. I cannot bear it much more."^[2]

Disappearance

In November 1921, Whittlesey acted as a pallbearer at the burial of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery, along with fellow Medal of Honor recipients Samuel Woodfill and Alvin York. A few days later he booked passage from New York to Havana aboard the SS Toloa, a United Fruit Company ship. On November 26, 1921, the first night out of New York, he dined with the captain and left the smoking room at 11:15 p.m. stating he was retiring for the evening,^[7] and it was noted by the captain that he was in good spirits. Whittlesey was never seen again. He is presumed to have jumped overboard; his body was never recovered. Before leaving New York, he prepared a will leaving his property to his mother. He also left a series of letters in his cabin addressed to relatives and friends. The letters were addressed to his parents, his brothers Elisha and Melzar, his uncle Granville Whittlesey, and to his friends George McMurtry, J. Bayard Pruyn, Robert Forsyth Little and Herman Livingston, Jr.^[2] Also in his cabin was found a note to the captain of the Toloa leaving instructions for the disposition of the baggage left in his stateroom.^[2] He left the famous German letter asking for surrender to McMurtry.

Whittlesey's cenotaph is in a cemetery in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. It notes that his body was never recovered.

Citations

Sources

• "Charles White Whittlesey". Claim to Fame: Medal of Honor recipients. Find a Grave. Retrieved December 7, 2007.
• "Sought Whittlesey half day in midsea; Search Will Make Fruit Liner Toloa Late Reaching Havana" (pdf). The New York Times. November 30, 1921. p. 5.