AXIS OF EGO - The Conquest of California

I urge those who still adhere to the “Great Man” theory of history, to consider what historian T.H. Watkins has called the “low comedy…” of the American conquest of California. There wasn’t a “Great” man in the entire cast, despite having three chances at one. In fact, the second act was almost reduced to slapstick, thanks largely to Marine Lieutenant Archibald Gillespie.

What should have been the curtain on Act One came down grandly on 11 August, 1847, when the United States captured Los Angeles with little more than a band playing “Yankee Doodle”. Sacramento, Monterey and San Diego had already succumbed to the Americans, who had infiltrated the vast territory  and captured it from within. Prime examples were the 3,000 citizens of the Pueblo of Angeles who, after decades of intermittent and ineffective government from Mexico, were optimistic about joining the “Norteamericanos”.  But the gringo conquistadors were stretched so thin. that after three weeks they had to abandon governance of the largest town in California to the oversight of Lt. Gillespie and his forty volunteers, whereupon “Archie” proved to be a far better Lieutenant than he was an Alcalde - or Mayor.

Gillespie was arrogant and not very bright, and had never had an independent command before. Instead of trying to bond with the community leaders, this popinjay bullied and blustered and placed the town under martial law.  His curfew starved the stores and cantinas surrounding the plaza until their cash flow resembled the usually anemic L.A. River.   Homes were searched and personal belongings were confiscated.  Anyone who tried to reason with Gillespie was arrested. Finally, on the night of 23 September, 1847, when a group of drunken Angelinos got into a fight with some drunken soldiers, the Lieutenant panicked and retreated to a hill top fort overlooking the town.

Unfortunately the fort had no water supply. And this combination of American arrogance and stupidity swelled the ranks of the Californian rebels’ with self confidence. Their numbers rose to 400. On 8 October, 1847 Gillespie was forced to quit the waterless “Fort Monroe”. He retreated to San Pedro, where he recruited seamen and marines from a naval sloop.  But 150 picadors drove him off again. (The “greasers” were short on guns and powder, but not brains or courage.) Towns all across southern California now staged their own revolts, and suddenly the American conquest of California, an accomplished fact in mid-August, was in doubt all over again.

Two men rode to Gillespie’s rescue. One was a dull, journeyman soldier with a real talent for carrying a grudge, Brigadier General Stephen Kearny (pronounced 'Karney'),  known as the Father of American Cavalry. He was marching west with 300 dragons after having conquered New Mexico. The other man was Colonel John C. Fremont, who had an actor’s sense of direction and a soldier’s sense of subtly, and would prove to be one of the luckiest idiots in American history. Fremont was currently in Monterey, commanding the 500 barflies and adventurers of the “California Battalion”, right now the single largest land force West of the Colorado River. Informed of Gillespie’s retreat, Fremont immediately marched south with about 150 of his more sober warriors.

Meanwhile out in the parched, wind swept California high desert, the exhausted General Kearny had run into Kit Carson, who informed him that California was already conquered. Relieved, Kearny sent 200 of his dragoons back to Santa Fe, and resumed his march west with just 100 men. But then he ran into Gillespie, with the story of the uprising in Los Angeles.

Gillespie assured Kearny that the Californians had almost no guns, were disorganized and could be easily bullied by real soldiers. What followed was the battle of San Pasqual, which ended with a half dozen American dead and both Kearny and Gillespie wounded, (Kearny losing an arm) and the Americans trapped atop a waterless Mesa. I can't shake the conviction that Gillespie had something ti do with that. They were rescued only when Kit Carson made a daring escape under fire and returned with navy reinforcements from San Diego. Needless to say, after that everybody stopped taking any advice from Gillespie.

Meanwhile Fremont had been marching down the coast, reasserting American dominance like an avenging angel, sort of. There was no fighting. There was no shooting. There were no flaming haciendas.

And most important of all, after peacefully occupying San Luis Obispo on 14 December, 1847, Fremont was met not by an opposing army but by the lovely Dona Ruiz, married to the cousin of Andres Pico, the last Mexican commander of the Californians. She was the perfect weapon for the operation.  Lovely, smart and sophisticated, she seduced Fremont into considering the possibility of a peace treaty with the rebellious natives who had just violated an earlier treaty.

Three weeks later Kearney was approaching the San Gabriel River, marching northward towards Los Angeles. He was now leading a force of 550 sailors and his surviving dragoons. He found his route blocked by about 300 Californian picadors. Kearney ordered his cannon to unlimber, when he was countermanded by Commodore Stockton, who commanded the U.S. Navy in these parts. Technically, Kearney was in command of all land forces while Stockton was just as an observer. But all the gunners were sailors, and rather than argue the point Kearney left the disruptive Stockton to his silent cannon and waded his infantry across the knee deep river. After Kearney got his men to the other side and they fired off a few rounds, the Californians retreated.

Two days later, on 9 January, 1848 came the real fighting at the battle of La Mesa. All day the Californians rode around the Americans, looking for an opening, and finding none. They suffered 15 dead and 25 wounded, to 1 dead and 5 wounded Americans. The Californians abandoned Los Angeles and retreated to Pasadena.

On 10 January,  1848 the American forces entered Los Angeles for the second time.  Gillespie was allowed to raise the flag over the post he had squandered, after which he was quietly kept out of sight since because, as another Lieutenant recorded, “The streets were full of desperate and drunken fellows, who…saluted us with every item of reproach.”  And I think we can all imagine just what kind of salute that was.  Commodore Stockton immediately sent a rider north to find Fremont with the good news. The Pathfinder was easy to find, just over the Cahuenga Pass, in the San Fernando Valley.

Because it was there that Dona Ruiz had reappeared. Dona arranged a meeting between her uncle-in-law, Californian commander Andres Pico, and General Fremont, at a humble six room adobe with the ostentatious title of Campo de Cahuenga. As Fremont explained, “The next morning (13 January, 1848) …in a conference with Don Andreas, the important features of a treaty of capitulation were agreed upon…”

The treaty, signed at a kitchen table, was what might be called “generous”.  After turning over all their “artillery and public arms”, of which they had almost none, the Californian soldiers could either go home, or they could go south to fight the Americans again, in Mexico. Or they could just take their lances and go home. They would not be required to take an oath of allegiance to the United States until a peace treaty was officially signed with Mexico, at some time in the future. The Californians were so pleased with the treaty they threw a 3 day fiesta for Fremont and his men. Appropriately enough, the reconstructed Campo de Cahuenga sits on Lankershim Boulevard, in North Hollywood, at the foot of Universal Studios Amusement Park. And on the bottom of a drawer in that kitchen table, amongst a list of far more important signatures, is my own humble name. But I am getting ahead of myself…

General Kearney was not pleased with the treaty. As the ranking field commander he should have been the one to negotiate and sign it. His men had done all the fighting. And maybe the loss of an arm had made him a little grumpy.  Nor was he happy to hear that the troublesome Commodore Stockton bad taken it upon himself to appoint Fremont as the new governor of California; especially since he, Kearny, carried a Presidential appointment making himself the governor. There was a lot of ego in the air over the next few weeks, until Kearney finally forced Fremont to acknowledge that legally Kearney was the governor.

He wasn’t governor for long, though. Kearney was ordered to return to Washington to explain what had happened. And not having much trust in the United States Navy - for some reason - he made his return overland. But remember what I said about the General knowing how to carry a grudge?  One of Kearney’s last acts as governor was to order Fremont to return with him. And as soon as “The Pathfinder” reached Kansas, General Kearney had him arrested and court-martialed for insubordination. Fremont was convicted and discharged from the army.

Kearney was promoted and sent south to take part in the conquest of Mexico. Unfortunately, before he could reach the “Halls of Montezuma”, the general contracted Yellow Fever, He returned to his home in St. Louis where he died in October of 1848 at the age of 54. It had been a very busy year for the General.

And now I have to remind you about Fremont being a lucky idiot. Forced out of the army, Fremont moved with his wife to California where, later in 1848 he bought some land. And guess what; in 1849 about $10 million worth of gold was found on his property.  And that is not even the lucky part of this idiot's story. The gold made Fremont rich enough that in 1856 he could afford to be the first Republican candidate for President. He lost. And then in 1860 the second Republican candidate for president was Abraham Lincoln. He won. So Fremont did not have to deal with the civil war and  all the other problems Lincoln had to deal with. So you see how lucky he was.

Oh, and Gillespie? After driving Los Angeles into rebellion, history pretty much dumped him like a hot potato. He retired a Captain before the civil war. And nobody even asked him to help out. He became a businessman and died in San Francisco in August of 1873.

He was almost forgotten entirely, but during World War II, the U.S. navy built so many ships they decided to name one of them, a destroyer, after Lt. Archibald Gillespie. The DD-609 performed heroic service through out the war, earning 9 battle stars and was then mothballed until 1971. Two years later she came out of mothballs had a brief second career as a target hulk. And I urge all future candidates for "Great Man" in history to keep in mind the ultimate fate of the U.S.S. Gillespie - sunk in 1973, by her own navy.

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FAMILY TIES - Good Riddance To Saxon England

I have been contemplating of late the passing of Saxon England. To tell you the truth, I don't miss it that much. After the Saxons cashed in their chips officially, on the battlefield at Hastings in 1066, I suspect you would have have heard a collective sigh of relief which arose across the length and breadth of England.

Consider Edward, the penultimate Saxon King of England. They called him “the Confessor” but that was more of a twelfth century public relations gambit than an actual description of the real ninth century King. Edward was a pretty ruthless guy. He had his own mother arrested on trumped up charges of adultery just so he could seize her property, if that gives you an idea of his actual family values.

In 1045 Edward married the Saxon, Edith Godwin. He was about forty-five years old at the time and Edith was all of sixteen. The problem here was that Edith’s Saxon father, Leofric Godwin, the powerful Earl of Wessex, had kidnapped Edward’s favorite half brother, Alfred, and handed him over to his Viking enemies. Those not very nice people had blinded Alfred, and he later died from his wounds. As a result Edward was on record as saying that the only way he would forgive the Saxon Godwins is if they brought Alfred back from the dead. So I suspect that Edward’s marriage to Edith Godwin was not exactly a love match.

Leofric owned most of southern England and his wife was Lady Godiva of naked horse riding fame. Did the Lady really ride bare-back through the village of Coventry just to lower the tax burden on the felons, meaning the free people living in the village? I doubt it. In the first place, it would chafe. And, forgiving taxes sure doesn't sound like something the Saxon Leofric would have gone along with.  Although...I am willing to believe the part of the legend about the one curious man named Tom who was struck blind because he just had to take a peek at Lady Cadiva's canter. That made him the original "Peeping Tom".  And that is too good a story not to believe.

In addition to Edith, Leofric and Godiva Godwin had produced five Saxon sons, who were, in descending order of seniority and ascending order of brains, Sweyn, Harold, Tostig, Gyrth and Leofwine. And by all accounts they were all trouble. As an example, in 1046 Sweyn Goodwin was creditably accused of seducing the Abbess of the monastery of Leominster.

The modern translation of the Saxon term for “seduction” is more of a “rape”, and King Edward had Sweyn banished for that crime. It was a year before Leofric could bribe Edward into letting the little Saxon monster come home again. But, being a spoiled brat Sweyn forgot that daddy had rescued him and remembered only how long it had taken for daddy to rescue him. In the meantime Edward became determined to get rid of the whole Godwin clan.  Including his wife.

In 1051 some of Edward’s French relatives over stayed their welcome in Dover, and the townsfolk staged a riot to drive the freeloaders out of town. Of course it is likely that Edward’s relatives had intended to inspire just such a response, because Edward immediately ordered Leofric to punish the citizens Dover for insulting his family. See, since Dover paid rent to Leofric, he would just be punishing himself. So Leofric refused. And that gave Edward the excuse he needed. He ordered Leofric and the entire Saxon Godwin male clan save one banished from England, and Edward shipped poor Edith off to a nunnery.

In this dispute, one Goodwin, , the youngest boy,  Leofwine Godwin, had sided with Edward. It was the “smart” play for Leofwine since, as the youngest son, he was never going to get rich living off his older brothers’ leavings. Meanwhile the banished elder Leofric and his loyal sons hung out in Ireland and France for a year, gathering their strength.

And when they were ready, the Saxon Godwins came home, which is another way of saying they re-invaded England. After a fight they forced Edward to return all of their seized lands and let poor Edith out of the monastery. And then, of course, Leofric forced his own youngest son, Leofwine, into exile in Scandinavia; after all, turnabout is fair play. And they were all Saxons, which is to say they were only a couple of generations removed from being Vikings.

Leofric Godwin died in 1055, not long after the death of his eldest son Sweyn, cause unknown in either case.  Suffice it to say that I'll bet Edward shed not a tear at their funerals. But Harold may have. Harold was now the head of the Godwin family, which made his little brother Tostig, his problem.

Tostig was running Northumbria and had doubled the taxes while boozing it up and stealing from the local gentry. In 1065, while Totsig was out of town, the noblemen of York, Lincoln and Nottingham all rose up and slaughtered Tostig’s sycophants. The rebels then marched on Oxford, the local government center. King Edward saw no reason he should be paying to straighten out yet another of the Goodwin brood fight, and frankly, neither did Harold. So Harold simply turned Northumbria over to the rebel leader, Morkere.

That left Totsig out of a job, and very unhappy with his elder brother. Tostig sailed for Scandinavia and a reunion with his younger brother, Leofwine.

Near the end of 1065 Edward the Confessor fell into a coma and finally died on 5 January, 1066. Harold, never one to waste time, the very next day, 6 January, 1066. got himself crowned as Harold II. Harold the Saxon was the first king ever crowned in Westminster Abby.

And poor Edith, the daughter of Lady Godiva, the girl who had been a queen at 16, a divorcee and a nun at 24, a queen again at 25, was now, at the advanced old age of 26, a widow and a nun again. Her loving brother Harold shipped her off to a brand new abbey at Winchester, where she died in December of 1075, at the age of 36. The Saxons were very hard on their women.

They were almost as hard on their kings. The new King Harold was facing two immediate challenges. From Normandy there was Edward’s cousin William, who claimed that Harold, while hiding out in France, had promised him the throne of England.

And on 8 September 1066, a Viking army under the King of Norway, landed at the mouth of the river Tyne. With the Vikings were the Godwin brothers, Tostig and Leofwine. Who was it who said that family ties were the best of ties, the worst of ties? I think it was me. Anyway....

Harold immediately marched his army north, moving so quickly that just outside of York, at Stamford Bridge, on 25 September, 1066 he caught the Vikings without their armor on. According to legend, Harold met Tostig before the battle and offered him a chance to change sides - again. Tostig asked what Harold could offer the Vikings if they would peacefully go home. Harold replied that he could offer each of them six feet of English soil, or more if they were taller. Making peace and saving lives does not seemed to have interested the Saxons very much.

Harold Goodwin’s army than fell on the Vikings and almost wiped them out. Amongst the piles of dead were both Tostig and Leofwine. And it does not seem that Harold felt any sorrow that so little of the his family was left. It was a great victory, spoiled only when word arrived that William and his Norman army had landed on English soil far to the south on 27 September, 1066.

Harold now marched his exhausted men 240 miles south to meet William’s army at Hastings on 14 October  1066. There, nine hours of more slaughter reduced the vaunted Godwin family to just Edith, sewing away in her nunnery.

William the Norman would be remembered as the “Conqueror”, and Harold II the Saxon King, as the “Conquered”. But really, history must have been glad to see the back side of such a bloodthirsty pack of cannibals as the Godwins, the last ruling Saxons of England. With family like that, you don't need enemies.

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SOME GOD DAMNED THINGS - Called L-S-T s.

I don't think they even saw each other. The German sailors were shooting at blips on a primitive radar screen, and the British and Americans were just panicking, like chickens with a fox in their hen house. But in that confused melee on a moonless April night ten miles out in Lyme Bay off the English coast, Nazi Germany might have come within one torpedo of winning the Second World War. All they had to do was sink one more of those lethargic targets waddling across their sights at ten knots, and the Allied invasion of France would have been delayed for months, perhaps forever. But how could they know that, when the vital importance of these fat clumsy ships came as a surprise even to the man who inspired their creation? A year earlier Winston Churchill had complained that “ the destinies of two great empires . . . seemed to be tied up in some god-dammed things called LST's”

The need for such a ship occurred to the British Prime Minister  in June of 1940 when 300, 000 British and French soldiers were rescued off the beaches of Dunkurque, France. The men were saved, but all their trucks and tanks and cannon had to be left behind. So, the need was simple - a vessel which could run up on a beach to directly load or disgorge heavy tanks. Of course in practice things were more complicated. The ship would require a shallow draft to “beach” itself, but a deep draft to remain stable while crossing the open sea. While loading and unloading it had to remain level with its stern afloat and its bow on dry land and pointing “up” the beach. Naval Architect Rowland Baker was ordered to design this floating contradiction. Luckily, he knew enough about ships to be a genius

Like all engineering problems, the most elegant solution was the source of the problem, in this case sea water – too little or too much. Impact with the land would require the strength of a double hull, while pumping sea water between the hulls would lower the draft, making the ship more stable in the open sea. Selectively pumping that water out of compartments between the hulls would allow the ship to come inshore, while balancing level. All it required was a bit of plumbing, which Baker ingeniously provided. Britain managed to convert three small oil tankers to the new design, but their ship yards were already stretched thin. So, in October of 1941 Baker was sent to Washington on a Lend -Lease shopping spree.

The U.S. Bureau of Ships did not like the design submitted by Baker, and they assigned John Niedermair to fix it. He made the ship bigger (330 feet long), which allowed it to carry 2,100 tons of equipment, and he added a winch system to the anchor chain to help drag the ship off the beach. He even made the bow doors wider. In early November of 1941, Britain immediately ordered 200 of the new Landing Ship Tanks. And then in December Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, and then Hitler, for some insane reason, declared war on America, as well. And suddenly the US Army and Marine Corps were  also demanding as many of these ships as possible. Two short months earlier no one had even  heard of an LST.. And that created a new problem.

The U.S. Navy went from 790 active ships in December of 1941, to 6,700 in August of 1945. There was no room in U.S. shipyards for the last minute orders for LST's for our own military, let alone the British. So the decision was to open “cornfield shipyards”, with companies like Chicago Bridge and Iron on the Sennica River in Illinois, Dravo in Pittsburgh and American Bridge in Ambridge, Pennsylvania, and the Missouri Valley Bridge and Iron works in Evansville, Indiana. - all on the Ohio River, and all now building LSTs.  The economics of this was described as "Cost Plus". The Government would pay whatever it cost, plus a small profit margin. It took them six months to build the first ones, from keel to christening. That was incredibly fast for ship building, but not fast enough.

The original plan to invade France called for just three divisions in the first wave, and the only American division was to land on the beach code named Omaha. It was clear, that would not be a strong enough force to guarantee success, but with only 300 LST's  anticipated as arriving in Europe in time, they could not land more. In September of 1943 the head of the U.S. War Production Board, Donald Nelson, visited London and experienced Churchill's panic first hand.. Nelson cabled his staff that LST's were “most important single instrument of war”, and he added “the need for these ships has been grossly understated”

On 8 September, 1943 work began on LST number 507 at the Jefferson Boat and Machine Corporation in Jeffersonville, Indiana, on a bend in the Ohio River, just upstream from Evensville. Like all 117 of her sister ships built here – like the 1,000 of her sisters built in America -  the Jefferson Boat LST's were  assembled from 30,000 separate parts, and built in 3 sections, which were then welded together, mostly by women earning $1.20 and hour and working 9 hour shifts and a 54 hour work week. (Building an LST ) 

Ten weeks after beginning, LST number 507 was launched sideways into the Wabash River, and after fitting out with her deck guns, she sailed down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans, where she officially joined the U.S. Navy on 10 January, 1944 - 124 days from laying keel to joining a convoy. She was just one of 62 brand new LST's that reached England that winter.

This amazing influx of LST's allowed allied planners to add two divisions to the first wave, and a second American beach on Omaha's right, this one to be named Utah.  But just inland from Utah beach, the Germans had flooded the land, leaving only two roads off the beach. 

That tactical problem could be solved, but the Americans needed someplace to practice, someplace with a tidal marsh just inland of a beach. 

And in December of 1943, three thousand British citizens were evacuated from the south coast of Devon in southwest England, around an area called Slapton Sands.

It was a duplicate of the topography of Utah Beach in Normandy. It was here,  in April of 1944, the allies staged Operation Tiger, a full scale live-fire practice of the Normandy landings.

At 7:30 in the morning of Thursday, 27 April, 1944, 30,000 men of the U.S. 4^th division were to rush ashore on Slapton Sands from, among other ships, 300 LST's.  But a glitch had thrown off the time table for the first wave. 

The gunnery ships were half an hour late, while most of the landing craft stayed on the original schedule. The gunnery officer on the cruiser HMS Hawkins, noted, “they had a white tape line beyond which the Americans should not cross until the live firing had finished. But...they were going straight through the white tape line and getting blown up.” 

About 300 men were killed or wounded. After that “glitch”, the rest of the first day's operations went smoothly, at least until after midnight, when the follow up units were preparing to practice their part of the invasion.

It was after one in the morning of Friday 28 April, 1944^, that eight LST's were plowing broad circles at ten knots in the calm, cold waters of Lyme bay, off Slapton Sands. These eight ships carried quartermasters, engineers, and even a graves registration unit, the house-keeping support without which an army cannot fight for very long. Their crews joked that the ship's initials actually stood for “Large Slow Target” or “Large Stationary Target”. This morning they were about to be proven correct. 

Bearing down on them were nine German Schnellbootes, (fast boats), each 120 feet long, each armed with four torpedoes and cannon and machine guns and capable of 42 knots – or four times the top speed of the LST's. All of the German boats carried radar. Only one of the LST's did.

According to the official U.S. naval history, issued in 1946, “LST 507, the first attacked, was hit by several torpedoes which failed to explode, then was set afire by a direct torpedo hit which did. Another struck five minutes later. 

The enemy craft strafed the decks with machine guns, and fired on men who had jumped into the water. LST 507 began to settle.  About the same time, LST 531 was hit and set afire.

About the same time, LST 531 was hit and set afire.

About 0210(am), LST 289 was hit by a torpedo which destroyed the crew's quarters, the rudder and the rear guns...” Amazingly, with its stern almost blown off, LST 289 was able to make it safely back to port. But after burning for two hours, LST 531 sank. Eventually a British destroyer arrived to pick up survivors, and was ordered to sink the wreckage of the pride of Jeffersonville, Indiana, LST 507. She had been in existence for six months, from birth to death. Her remains now lay 200 feet beneath Lyme bay, at 50°29′N, 2°52′W. 

The cost of that April night was 198 dead American sailors, and 551 dead American soldiers – 749 total, plus wounded. So tight was security surrounding the invasion that all survivors, the wounded and their doctors and nurses were sworn to secrecy, and many of the dead were buried in unmarked graves.

For the planners, the loss of three LST's meant that on D-Day, 6 June, 1944, there were no LST's in reserve. One more sinking would have meant a weakening of the invasion, and maybe the loss of Utah Beach. 

That was how close the German sailors came to stopping D-Day. They never knew it, of course. They never saw what kind of ships they were shooting at. On 6 June, 1944, the landings on Omaha Beach came perilously close to a disaster themselves. After losing 3,000 casualties, American troops were able to push barely 1 ½ miles inland. Meanwhile, on Utah, the beach added because of the rush the previous summer to produced LST's, 23,000 troops and 1,700 vehicles pushed almost 5 miles inland, at the cost of only 200 casualties.

As of 1 May,  1944, the full production of LSTs was assigned to the Pacific.  Looking back after the war, it was clear the invasion of Normandy was the product of total war -  in this case, the genius of a British design, improved by an American, implemented by the thousands of  American women who had never before had a job outside the home, and never dreamed they would build a sea going ship, who strained to build enough, to build that one ship more than was needed to give the allies a chance at victory. When you speak of war, it is best to remember not only how many lives it costs, but also the unimagined demands it makes upon the nation. Because you can never know in advance, what God-damned thing will be vital this time.

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