COLLAPSE AT MEUSE-ARGONNE by Robert H. Ferrell ( 9780826215321 )

Item Details

Title:

COLLAPSE AT MEUSE-ARGONNE
THE FAILURE OF THE MISSOURI-KANSAS DIVISION

By:

Format:

Hardback

List price:	£45.50
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ISBN 10:

0826215327

ISBN 13:

9780826215321

Publisher:

UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI PRESS

Pub. date:

25 June, 2004

Pages:

184

Description:

The 35th Infantry Division was made up from the national guards of Missouri and Kansas. With little in the way of battlefield training, this division was committed to the Battle of Meuse-Argonne in 1918 and within five days had ceased to be an effective fighting force.

Synopsis:

During World War I, the Thirty-fifth Division was made up of National Guard units from Missouri and Kansas. Composed of thousands of men from the two states, the Missouri-Kansas Division entered the great battle of the Meuse-Argonne with no battle experience and only a small amount of training, a few weeks of garrisoning in a quiet sector in Alsace. The division fell apart in five days, and the question Robert Ferrell attempts to answer is why. The Thirty-fifth Division was based at Camp Doniphan on the Fort Sill reservation in Oklahoma and was trained essentially for stationary, or trench, warfare. In March 1918, the German army launched a series of offensives that nearly turned the tide on the Western Front. The tactics were those of open warfare, quick penetrations by massive forces, backed by heavy artillery and machine guns. The American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) commanded by Gen. John J. Pershing were unprepared for this change in tactics. When the Thirty-fifth Division was placed in the opening attack in the Meuse-Argonne on September 26, 1918, it quickly fell.In addition to the Thirty-fifth Division's lack of experience, its problems were compounded by the necessary confusions of turning National Guard units into a modern assemblage of men and machines. Although the U.S. Army utilized observers during the initial years of World War I, their dispatches had piled up in the War College offices in Washington and, unfortunately, were never studied.The Thirty-fifth Division was also under the command of an incompetent major general and an incompetent artillery brigadier. The result was a debacle in five days, with the division line pushed backward and held only by the 110th Engineer Regiment of twelve hundred men, bolstered by what retreating men could be shoved into the line, some of them at gunpoint. Although three divisions got into trouble at the outset of the Meuse-Argonne, the Thirty-fifth's failure was the worst. After the collapse, the Red Cross representative of the division, Henry J. Allen, became governor of Kansas and instigated investigations by both houses of Congress. Secretary of War Newton D. Baker testified in an effort to limit the political damage. But the hullabaloo gradually died down, and the whole sad episode passed into the darker corridors of history.By focusing on a single event in history, Collapse at Meuse-Argonne offers a unique glimpse into one of the most critical battles of World War I. Historians, as well as the general reader, will find this new perspective on what really happened to the Thirty-fifth Division fascinating.

Illustrations:

Illustrations, maps

Publication:

Imprint:

University of Missouri Press

Returns:

Returnable

Some other items by this author:

A COLONEL IN THE ARMORED DIVISIONS (HB)

A YOUTH IN THE MEUSE-ARGONNE (HB)

AMERICA'S DEADLIEST BATTLE (PB)

AMERICAN DIPLOMACY (HB)