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Chapter 15 The World War Toward the end of June 1917, the War Department informed me that I would go to England and France as a member of a commission to study the types and the employment of field artillery.1 The chief of staff2 sent for me and in great secrecy handed me a letter addressed to “General John J. Pershing. For his eyes alone.” He told me to be in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the next morning and give it to General Pershing. I was ordered not to let anyone know that I was going and to sail from Halifax for England. In the hall, I met a member of the board on camps, which was about to convene, but I did not tell him that I would be absent. Without reporting my departure to the chief of the Militia Bureau,3 I packed my trunk and left my office. I had told my dear wife that I was going to inspect a camp. When she went with me to the station, I felt that she knew. I reached Halifax early the next morning and went at once to seek information at the American consulate. Although I knew nothing of General Pershing’s movements, others understood that he had sailed from New York on the SS Baltic.4 When I asked for the consul, I told him who I was and that I must meet General Pershing to give him a letter. He told me that he knew nothing of General Pershing and withdrew. He soon returned and seemed more friendly. I assumed that he had looked me up in the Army Register. He then said that he was translating a code message about General Pershing but would go with me to see the senior British naval officer in port, who was a captain of one of the station cruisers. The captain received me coldly, insisted that he knew nothing about General Pershing, and declared that, if he did know, he would not tell me. By that time, the consul had become very friendly. I had avoided registering at a hotel and had seen no one except the consul and the British captain. The consul took me to the hotel for lunch. One of the first people I saw was Captain Quekemeyer,5 General Pershing ’s aide. He had been a cadet while I was on duty at West Point and was very friendly. He said that he had been looking for me. I 102 THE WAY OF DUTY, HONOR, COUNTRY asked how he knew that I was in Halifax. He replied that everyone in Halifax knew that I was there. He said that he had come to join General Pershing when he arrived. On entering the dining room, the consul introduced me to Captain Hayes,6 who commanded the Olympic,7 lying in the stream loaded with Canadian troops ready to sail for Europe. Meeting him was very fortunate for me later. I spent the remainder of the day with the consul at his office and went home with him that night. He constantly called the port but could get no news of the Baltic. About midnight, the telephone rang, and the admiral’s chief of staff told the consul that the admiral had just arrived and was informed that the consul wanted to see him. The consul explained my mission. The chief of staff said that the Baltic had not reported and was not expected to call. I told him that I must see General Pershing and asked him to send me in a destroyer to locate the Baltic. He said that this could not be done. I was chagrined and bitterly disappointed at the failure of my mission. The next morning, the consul and I went to the port office. The captain whom we had seen at lunch the previous day was very friendly, explaining that, because enemy submarines had been sighted off Halifax, the Baltic had not reported or answered my radio and had been ordered to proceed from wherever she was without calling at Halifax. I learned that Mr. Balfour’s8 party would sail that day on the Olympic and asked for transportation on her. The captain of the port radioed the British military attaché in Washington for authority for me to proceed on the Olympic. During the afternoon, I was told that I could board the Olympic, and I did so at once. On the ship, I met the...

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