USA > New York > The first hundred years : records and reminiscences of a century of Company I, Seventh Regiment, N.G.N.Y., 1838-1938 > Part 28
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From Young's Ranch we hiked back to Laguna Seca and Sterling's Ranch. Then came a fourteen-mile hike in extreme heat to Edinburgh, county seat of Hidalgo County. The country was flat and the courthouse at Edinburgh was surmounted by a cupola which could be seen for many miles. Owing to the clear, dry atmosphere, this cupola seemed to be close at hand when it was a long way off and we struggled on, mile after mile, with the goal in sight and apparently just ahead but always remaining just ahead until the courthouse at Edinburgh became a byword for the thing which looks easy but is unattainable.
We had been doing our marching either early in the morning, starting at sun- rise, or in the late afternoon when the intolerable mid-day heat had let up. When we made camp at Edinburgh we were told that, on the following day, we would make an especially early start on the eleven-mile hike which would bring us home to McAllen. One of the difficulties of an early start was the necessity of
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breaking camp before daylight. Tent pegs and more important things would be overlooked in the darkness and not missed until we reached the next stop and besides, it was hard to make up a neat pack when you could not see it and had to feel for everything. Consequently, at Edinburgh, a large part of the Company made up their packs the night before and slept in the open without tent or other covering.
Suddenly and without warning, at 12:30 a.m., came one of those tropical storms where the rain pours down in a great solid mass as though from a fire hose. In an instant we were as thoroughly drenched as though we had fallen into a pond and the water was cold. The Regiment rose to its feet, a soaked, miserable, shivering crowd, bewildered by the suddenness of the awakening. Headquarters sized up the situation at once, camp was broken and, at 2:30 a.m., the storm having ceased, we marched out of camp on the last leg of the Eleven- Day Hike. We splashed along for four or five miles through black darkness and then dawn broke and about the same time we reached the limit of the storm area and marched into the home camp at McAllen over dry and good roads. The Field Music, which had remained in camp, came out a mile or so to meet us and under the inspiration of fife and drum and bugle, the tired and plucky 7th pulled itself together and marched into camp, dirty and travel-worn but with all the swing and precision of the old Regiment at its best.
OUTPOST DUTY
One day, during the second week in September, Company I was ordered to Madero to guard a pumping station at that place, relieving a detachment of the 2nd Texas which had been ordered elsewhere. This was an important assign- ment as the pumping station on the banks of the Rio Grande supplied water to Mission and Edinburgh and also for the irrigation of the surrounding country. This was the first time that any troops of the New York Division had been called on to do real outpost duty and we were very much pleased with ourselves over the fact that we had been selected. We also learned that General O'Ryan, commanding the Division, had referred to Company I as his regulars and we liked that nickname so much that we called ourselves General O'Ryan's Regu- lars from that time on. The old Ninth Company spirit, fostered by Captain Hayes and Lieutenants Nichols and Grant, had resulted in our being picked from the whole New York Division for the duty.
The order came out of a clear sky about 4:30 in the afternoon, when we least expected anything of the sort. Within the hour, packs were made, trucks loaded and the First Platoon was on the way, less one squad which rode on the trucks. The Second Platoon was to follow the next morning. The First Platoon marched over roads which were heavy from recent rains but reached Mission in one hour and five minutes, a record for the Division. At Mission they met the returning trucks on which they rode over bumpy roads the three remaining miles to Madero. As many men were packed into each truck as could possibly be squeezed in and this mass of humanity was thrown from side to side as the trucks bumped and swayed over the cart track called a road.
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Madero was a squalid Mexican village and a short distance beyond it was our camp which had been partly prepared by the squad which went on ahead. A guard was immediately placed on the river bank to watch for an attack. It would take very little work to put the pumping station out of business and the report that shots had recently been fired across the river put the guard on the alert, so much so that the Corporal in charge spent the whole night investigating reports of boats filled with armed men and other suspicious circumstances which were probably one of those illusions which come to tired eyes after hours of gazing into the darkness. The following day was devoted to making gabions and repairing the earthwork defenses of our camp.
We remained at Madero Pumping Station for about a week without anything of importance happening and we enjoyed very much the change from routine work at McAllen. Not far from camp was the house of an American sugar planter whose wife was a wonderful cook. Some of the diplomats of the Company induced her to give dinners at so much per head, chicken dinners with marvel- lous hot biscuits, served on a table with tablecloth and napkins, luxuries that we had almost forgotten existed. Everyone who had the price indulged in one of those dinners and the contrast to Army fare was such that four helpings to chicken and twelve biscuits was nothing out of the ordinary. The only difficulty was to walk back to camp when the meal was over.
We were relieved by Company G on September 15 and it was about two months before our turn at the pumping station came around again. We came back the second time with a vision of chicken dinners leading us on like a new star of Bethlehem. For the main body of the Company it was a repetition of our
7 INNY OFF TO THE BORDER ME ALLEN TEXAS
Company I off for the Rio Grande, showing the famous incinerator at the head of the street by Paul Jennewein
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--- ---
DETCH 7THINE NY'N.G BUILDING BREAST WORKS RT MADERO TEXAS 1416
Out post at Madero on the Rio Grande,
first visit but one platoon under Sergeant Guy Carlton was sent to Cavassas Crossing, five miles up the river, and they dined mostly on memories. This platoon marched to its station in single file along an overgrown trail which followed the river bank. Most of the way was through woods and thick under- growth which grew luxuriantly here because the river supplied the necessary moisture.
At Cavassas they found a small clearing a hundred yards or so from the river where they pitched their pup tents, fitted the mosquito nettings inside the tents to avoid being eaten alive and made themselves as comfortable as the circumstances permitted. Cavassas Crossing was a ford across the Rio Grande and our platoon was stationed there to prevent Mexicans from wading over into the United States. The Mexican side had high banks and there appeared to be a settlement, just out of sight, over the bluff. A railroad also ran along that shore and at frequent intervals Mexican troop trains went puffing by. Our side of the river was wild and uninhabited. The ground was low and in flood time much of it was under water but, when we arrived, the river was down and, for some distance back from the water's edge, the land was of a black oozy mud into which we sank over our shoe-tops. A foot once planted in this ooze was hard to withdraw; so walking along the shore was decidedly difficult, but good exercise.
A guard of six men and a Corporal was stationed at the American end of the ford and during the first night they kept the Corporal on the jump with alarms. On one occasion, this Corporal, having investigated a report that a detachment of Mexican cavalry was crossing the river and finding it contrary to the facts, was returning to the bush which served as his headquarters when he came face
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to face with a big Texas steer on his way to the river for a drink. The path was too narrow for passing and neither Texas steers nor Ninth Company Corporals are troubled with inferiority complexes. One said "Shoo," the other pawed the earth and bellowed. One charged a little way with fixed bayonet, the other charged a like distance shaking the longest pair of horns in Texas. Then for ten minutes, one stood with lowered head and the other at charge bayonets, after which both gave a snort of contempt, turned and walked with great dignity in opposite directions, giving an occasional glance to the rear.
The second day at Cavassas-November 2-we took part in the election of a President of the United States. An orderly, on horseback, brought the ballots which had been sent down from Albany and we filed into an abandoned Mexican shack, built of sticks plastered with mud, took our ballot, put a cross opposite our choice for President, voted for a number of other people that we knew little or nothing about, and then the orderl'y strapped the box of ballots on his saddle and rode off. Our ballots reached Albany some time after election day and made no change in the results but they did give us considerable amusement.
Besides watching the ford, we had to keep in touch with the troops above and below us, which was accomplished by sending out patrols at frequent intervals. The down-river patrol marched halfway to the Madero Pumping Station, meet- ing a patrol which had left the rest of the Company at Madero, at the same hour that our patrol had left Cavassas. The Madero patrol brought as much food as it could carry and turned it over to the Cavassas patrol which took it back to camp. In that way we did our marketing and also kept an eye on the river and reported any suspicious activities visible on the other shore.
One night, the 2 a.m. patrols from Cavassas and Madero met, according to schedule just as a hurricane broke. Reports were made, the food transferred and the two patrols started back, fighting through the black night against a wind which nearly blew them off their feet. Clothes were bags full of water which bubbled around the men's bodies as they walked, the trail was hard to follow in the dark and it suddenly became bitterly cold. After a hard struggle, both patrols reached their respective camps but it was a discouraging homecoming for the one from Cavassas. Where their camp had been was a pretty little lake with here and there the top of a tent showing above the rippling waters. Blankets and extra clothing danced merrily on the little waves as they sailed before the wind.
The storm had come up so suddenly that the platoon sleeping in the camp had saved very little of their own clothing and nothing belonging to the wet and bedraggled patrol, shaking with the cold. The day, or rather night, was saved by Jimmie Greene, ex-Boy Scout, who started a fire under the most impossible conditions, on a bit of ground which rose above the flood. All the rest of the night a forlorn platoon stood around the fire, each man turning like a chicken on a spit as one side got unbearably hot and frostbite threatened the other.
The next day the storm passed on, leaving warm and beautiful weather in its wake. The river returned to its bed, most of our property was recovered and life seemed pretty good after all, though breakfast was a little sketchy-everything but the canned goods being ruined. The camp was all festooned with blankets,
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clothing and equipment, hanging out to dry, when a very much worried officer from headquarters dashed up on a galloping horse and seemed surprised to find anyone alive. The platoon was ordered to rejoin the rest of the Company at Madero as we were about to be relieved by another company, our second tour of outpost duty being ended.
BACK AT MCALLEN
Between hikes and outpost duty and a few other things which took us abroad, we lived in camp at McAllen, working with shovel and pick, hammer and saw, to make the camp more liveable. We also had Company manoeuvers and regimen- tal manoeuvers, drill and rifle practice. One day, during manoeuvers, half of the Company held a pumping station near McAllen while the other half tried to capture it. The defenders had patrols out watching every approach and felt so sure of making good the defense that they challenged the attackers to get a single man through the lines and promised to concede victory if they did. The main body of the defense sat in the grounds of the pumping station waiting for the enemy to start something and watching a very old Mexican woman hobbling along towards a cottage. Suddenly there was a shout. The clothes had dropped off the old woman exposing, not a shrivelled old body, but Private John Anhut of the enemy in the center of the defense position.
In all our manoeuvers, squads under their own Corporals were sent out on patrol and there was a good deal of rivalry between them. They crept along dry irrigation ditches and through the chapparal, had mock encounters with enemy
Madero outpost, 1916
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patrols in which both sides always claimed the victory, sometimes nearly having a real fight over which squad had annihilated the other. Sometimes, instead of the enemy, they would come unexpectedly on a rattlesnake or a coyote. It was all mock warfare but it was invaluable training to the men of Company I who were soon to be officers in a real war ..
As the weeks wore on, some of the men of the Company developed a fondness for animals which they indulged at every opportunity. Pet dogs, cats, arma- dillos, horned toads and even rattlesnakes were domiciled at one time or another in the various tents. Most of these mascots were harmless and their antics helped to while away the time, but when Private Dunning brought a pet rattlesnake into his tent and kept it in a box with a screen laid loosely over it and those in the nearby cots could hear the rattler rustling about and working his rattle, there was a kick long and vigorous which resulted in the death of the reptile.
To vary the monotony of camp life, we had ceremonies and shows. Parades and reviews were tendered to various important people. Most ambitious of the shows was a horse show given by the 1st New York Cavalry, and a Frontier Day given by the Division. The Horse Show was as much like the annual affair at Madison Square Garden as the limitations of McAllen would permit, which is equivalent to saying that it was quite different, in spite of the best intentions. The Frontier Day was a wild and woolly western rodeo with bull dogging, broncho busting and all the frills and thrills of a big rodeo at Cheyenne. The cow punchers of Hidalgo County and beyond strutted about in all their regalia and were very much upset when a man from the New York Infantry rode a horse which none of them could master. One cowboy pulled a gun but the soldiers took it away from him and chased him off the lot.
Towards the middle of our stay on the Border (September 6-8) the Regular Army sent inspectors to look us over and report on our efficiency. Our clothing and equipment were inspected with the greatest care. We were drilled and manoeuvered all over the place. Finally we were given a marching test carrying full equipment though it was not customary, in the Army, to require men to carry so much weight while hiking in the heat of Texas. The distance was over twelve miles, the thermometer over 140 degrees. The men suffered more than ever before. It was a long, gruelling fight against heat exhaustion, a fight that we kept up to the bitter end because we were Ninth Company men and did not intend to have any regular see us fail.
Another activity-perhaps the most important of all from the point of view of training-was rifle practice. At first we had a range near McAllen to which we used to march, make holes all over the target and return home the same day. Then our old friend La Gloria or Heaven was made into an up-to-date range and we would hike out there in two days, shoot the course, have adventures with rattlesnakes and take two days to get home. We were acclimated now, hard as nails, and hiking was no longer the trial it had been.
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THE GREY JACKETS' FIRST DAY IN TEXAS
We landed here on the Sabbath, And the sight that met our eyes Was a vast expanse of cactus, And the sun-bleached, cloudless skies.
The ground was baked as hard as brick, For sixteen months sans rain, As we took one look at the arid waste We wished we were home again.
But there wasn't time for tho'ts like these, There was work for every man, And every mother's son in the bunch Worked only as Grey Jackets can.
We plodded along thru' the bloomin' brush And stacked arms out in the sun.
Then the camp was made and the tents were pitched As if it were only fun.
In the fifteen years I've played the game And watched tent cities grow, I've never seen one appear like this, By magic,-row on row.
But Seventh Regiment weather Was not left behind, my boy, Old Jupiter Pluvius came along And this time brought us joy.
We had not been under canvas More than an hour or so,
When a big black cloud appeared in the east, And the wind began to blow.
With thermometers climbing through the roofs, Sweat coming from every pore, And the hard work done in the blazing sun,
We could not stand much more.
And so when the heavens opened And the rain came down in a flood, The human ants came out of their tents To cool their boiling blood.
After the open-air shower And an old-fashioned towel rub, All hands agreed it was just as good As a Saturday night in the tub.
And to show their hard-worked Colonel That his men were still in the ring, Each Company Street turned out in force And all began to sing.
And right here let me tell you, That "barber shop chords" and "swipes" May be harsh to the ear at home, but here Are sweeter than organ pipes.
The Colonel himself was about "all in," But his humor was still to the fore, For he welcomed the officers to their "home" With the same smile as of yore.
What do Grey Jackets think of their Colonel ?
Well, give them a chance to show There isn't a spot on the face of the earth If he led, they wouldn't go.
At retreat we marched to the east of the camp A few yards into the brush, Battalions formed three sides of a square, "Parade rest," then a hush.
The Chaplain read a few short prayers Under the Texas sky, And there wasn't a man who felt ashamed Of the tear that came to his eye.
There wasn't a man but thought of home And those he had left behind, But he didn't want to go back again Till one thing was off his mind.
They all thanked God the chance had come To the Grey Jackets of today, To put the Regiment on the map And put it there to stay.
-GEORGE P. NICHOLS
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"THE ROOKIE SPECIAL"
By Gordon Grant
As I face these sheets of blank paper it comes to me with rather a shock that it is twenty years to a day since the bugle sounded "Assembly" through the Armory and the column marched out to entrain for Texas. Twenty years! 1916- 1936. A lot of water has flowed over the dam and under the bridge meanwhile, and many world-staggering events have come about.
Could I summon to the tip of my pen but a minute touch of Kipling magic I might instil into my yarn a little of that quality that makes good entertain- ment. I might adequately describe that sickening "left-behind" feeling that was mine as I watched the Regiment entrain-a victim of a "game foot" which prompted Colonel Fiske at the eleventh hour to appoint me recruiting officer. I might picture the awful, still vacuum that was the Armory after that hectic week of uncertainty and false rumors, as I returned alone to survey my head- quarters.
But the pen, I fear, will produce little but a factual discourse in which the first-person pronoun will occur with disconcerting frequency.
Recruiting officer-without instruction, without anything except the Armory, a desk, a chair, some recruiting blanks (God knows where they came from), and my pet fountain pen which some aspiring rookie lifted a few days later.
The first thing I asked myself was: "How does one proclaim to the palpitat- ing youth of New York that the 7th Regiment wants recruits?" "A poster perhaps ! To be sure !! A poster !!! "
So up went a poster over the front door, and I'm not quite sure, but I think I made it myself. This done I retired to my lair-filled my fountain pen-and waited, like the spider in the tale, for my flies.
Within an hour-ha! an applicant-a Hebrew. Well, I did manage to con- vince him-or I thought I did-that he would be much happier were he to apply elsewhere. But next day the boy's father came down, or up, or over, to tell me some things which he evidently thought I should know on the subject of race discrimination. We parted friends, but he took his son with him.
Eight men was my total for the first week. The housing of them was simple enough-why not, with blankets and cots from the Armory stores and the drill floor for a barrack ?
Ah! but subsistence, that was something else. I made arrangements with Bancel and Pastorini for meals, but until that was consummated my pets came to me for chow money. The Government still owes me that, and on making claim for it I was informed in typical Army fashion that I had no business to incur such expense from my own pocket. So that was that.
Complications began to multiply, so I made a dash to Governors Island, and an appeal to the recruiting authorities produced nothing either as help or sug- gestion. I was just a National Guard Second "Looie" trying to catch his tail. However, somebody must have told somebody else down Fort Hamilton way that there was something doing up on Park Avenue at 66th Street, because on the fifth day of my vigil an Army truck drove up and discharged several cases
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of rifles, mess kits and uniforms, for which I signed a memorandum receipt. Of this, more later.
One hundred of everything. Count 'em! One hundred. But I did not count 'em, and that was that !
If only they had appended a nice competent drill sergeant, or even a cute little corporal to instruct the lads, I might have issued uniforms and given them something to do except sitting on the Armory steps waiting for the next meal and smoking my cigarettes.
I called Fort Hamilton on the telephone and was told to be patient, that orders would come in due time.
At the end of ten days my ten rookies and I were considerably on each other's nerves, as I had ordered them to be in quarters at 10 o'clock at night. Things were getting rapidly to a cracking point, when I received an order to report with my men and "one hundred of everything" at Fort Hamilton.
So away we went forthwith, in an O.D. truck which somebody was nice enough to send over.
There followed three weeks under the oldest and leakiest canvas possible to imagine-left-overs, I am sure, from the Mexican War, or perhaps only the Spanish-American. But the weather was kind, so except for a shower or two, the leaky canvas did not matter-much.
I was fortunate in having a grand old-timer of a sergeant to drill my recruits which were added to every day by details from the city and upstate.
I.G.
Basco
Another piece of good luck was my adoption by one of these, a man who had served two enlistments in the regular service.
He applied for the job of striker, and as such he was a gem. His name was Basco, and his good humor carried me through several ticklish situations.
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After our arrival at the Border he would periodically walk a couple of miles, appear at my tent door, render a most perfect salute, and present me with some grapefruit or a melon, or simply state that he had come to pay his respects to the Lieutenant. He was a good fellow-and I'm sure a good soldier. I often wonder what became of Basco.
On arrival at Fort Hamilton my first thought was to rid myself of "one hundred of everything" to the post ordnance officer.
He, good fellow, was quite willing-yea, eager to comply. But being an Army- trained ordnance officer, he must count everything first-oh, every little thing!
My assurance that none of the cases had been opened meant nothing to him. Would I stand by while the count was made? Certainly, I would. The count was made, and lo! one mess kit and one spoon were found wanting.
Who was responsible? I-and no other. I signed for them, didn't I?
Can you offer to pay for such things and square yourself in the Army? Try it. I was informed that I should have counted every little thing before I signed.
About the 12th of August I was told that on the second day following, I would entrain at Jersey City with one hundred and three men, en route for McAllen, Tex., a prospect that gave me some hearty qualms. The post officers were most cordial and helpful, particularly Captain Easterday, who issued my orders and volunteered some very sound and useful advice.
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