Black Jack: The Life and Times of John J. Pershing

Rating:
Summary: Great American Soldier -- Cumbersome Biography
Review: I asked for this biography as a Christmas present 20 years ago. I finally got around to reading it, and I was not disappointed. Dr. Vandiver has written an first-rate biography which compares to Dumas Malone's sextet on Thomas Jefferson and Douglas S. Freeman's classic four-volume opus on Robert E. Lee. John Pershing probably has languished in obscurity in recent times because of the events which followed World War I (the Roaring Twenties, the Depression) and World War II, which resulted from, as Pershing himself warned, failing to fight World War I to a decisive finish. He is also denigrated by some as not being able to chase down Pancho Villa during the Punitive Expedition. Vandiver sets the record of history straight on Pershing, though, as nearly all biographers of great men are wont to do, he does lapse into hagiography and glosses too readily in many instances over his faults and weaknesses. Nevertheless he fairly portrays Pershing as the simple, direct, honest, energetic, efficient, and dedicated man and soldier who rose to the rank of General of the Armies, a rank attained only by George Washington before him. Vandiver traces Pershing from his youth, his sojourn as a teacher in a small school, and his cadet days at West Point, showing how his values and experiences moulded him well for the service and duty he would render his country for decades. From West Point, Pershing went west to become an Indian fighter, to Cuba in the Spanish-American War, and then to the Phillipines, where he conquered the wild Moro tribes of Mindanao. Pershing performed each of his assignments with excellence and bravery, always earning the highest praise from his superiors. He was a spit-and-polish martinet, insisting that his subordinates conform to the highest standards set at West Point. He never asked of his men anything he would not ask of himself, and he honestly believed that all that drill, efficiency, and discipline put his soldiers at the minimum risk when the tasks of campaigning and battle were at hand. He had no patience with slovenly subordinate officers who let their commands slide. Pershing did have a knack for selecting excellent subordinates, and rarely had problems getting his overall plans and objectives executed. The best part of Vandiver's work is that which describes Pershing's command of the AEF. The general did an incredible job of commanding the mobilization, buildup of troops and materiel in France, and ensuring the training of his Doughboys, all the time holding off repeated French and British attempts to siphon off and amalgamate the arriving American soldiers into their forces. Had the French and British succeeded, it is not inconceivable that they would have wasted thousands of American soldiers in the grinding, failing trench warfare the French and British were accustomed to on the Western Front. Pershing's dogged insistence on an American army angered the Allies, but proved decisive and effective in the last five months of the conflict. To their everlasting credit, both Secretary of War Newton Baker and President Wilson also never wavered from this course, and backed up Pershing fully whenever Lloyd George or Clemenceau tried to press their case over the general's head. Vandiver fully portrays the human side of General Pershing, including his marriage to Frances Warren, their brief 10 years together, and his grief at losing her and their three daughters in a fire at the Presidio in 1915. He also depicts Pershing's social circle as a young man, and the fortuitous friendships with men who became extremely influential and helpful to him later in life. Many of the subordinates he mentored and nurtured all either proved essential to the building and command of the AEF and/or became the pillars of America's armed forces in World War II (Marshall, Patton, and MacArthur, for example). This biography does have a few editorial flaws. Dr. Vandiver, who was a prodigy who never attended high school or undergraduate school, does some excellent writing for having had no formal coursework, but he does have a shocking weakness in writing subordinate clauses as separate sentences. Of which this is an example. A good editor would have caught the few dozen instances in this work and revised the grammar. Also Dr. Vandiver sometimes drops articles from a sentence, resulting in some clumsy passages. Again, good editing would have corrected these. At the end of the second volume, as Pershing's retirement approaches, Dr. Vandiver omits the necessary explanation that, in 1924, the mandatory retirement age in the armed forces was 64; the reader has to infer that from the narrative. Nevertheless Dr. Vandiver hit a home run with his biography of Pershing, and it deserved far more acclaim and exposure than it has enjoyed in the past 20 years. Reading about this genuine American hero was a breath of fresh air in these times of antiheroes. America today surely needs more men like General Pershing. Thanks to Dr. Vandiver, he will not be forgotten.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent biography of a great American general
Review: I asked for this biography as a Christmas present 20 years ago. I finally got around to reading it, and I was not disappointed. Dr. Vandiver has written an first-rate biography which compares to Dumas Malone's sextet on Thomas Jefferson and Douglas S. Freeman's classic four-volume opus on Robert E. Lee. John Pershing probably has languished in obscurity in recent times because of the events which followed World War I (the Roaring Twenties, the Depression) and World War II, which resulted from, as Pershing himself warned, failing to fight World War I to a decisive finish. He is also denigrated by some as not being able to chase down Pancho Villa during the Punitive Expedition. Vandiver sets the record of history straight on Pershing, though, as nearly all biographers of great men are wont to do, he does lapse into hagiography and glosses too readily in many instances over his faults and weaknesses. Nevertheless he fairly portrays Pershing as the simple, direct, honest, energetic, efficient, and dedicated man and soldier who rose to the rank of General of the Armies, a rank attained only by George Washington before him. Vandiver traces Pershing from his youth, his sojourn as a teacher in a small school, and his cadet days at West Point, showing how his values and experiences moulded him well for the service and duty he would render his country for decades. From West Point, Pershing went west to become an Indian fighter, to Cuba in the Spanish-American War, and then to the Phillipines, where he conquered the wild Moro tribes of Mindanao. Pershing performed each of his assignments with excellence and bravery, always earning the highest praise from his superiors. He was a spit-and-polish martinet, insisting that his subordinates conform to the highest standards set at West Point. He never asked of his men anything he would not ask of himself, and he honestly believed that all that drill, efficiency, and discipline put his soldiers at the minimum risk when the tasks of campaigning and battle were at hand. He had no patience with slovenly subordinate officers who let their commands slide. Pershing did have a knack for selecting excellent subordinates, and rarely had problems getting his overall plans and objectives executed. The best part of Vandiver's work is that which describes Pershing's command of the AEF. The general did an incredible job of commanding the mobilization, buildup of troops and materiel in France, and ensuring the training of his Doughboys, all the time holding off repeated French and British attempts to siphon off and amalgamate the arriving American soldiers into their forces. Had the French and British succeeded, it is not inconceivable that they would have wasted thousands of American soldiers in the grinding, failing trench warfare the French and British were accustomed to on the Western Front. Pershing's dogged insistence on an American army angered the Allies, but proved decisive and effective in the last five months of the conflict. To their everlasting credit, both Secretary of War Newton Baker and President Wilson also never wavered from this course, and backed up Pershing fully whenever Lloyd George or Clemenceau tried to press their case over the general's head. Vandiver fully portrays the human side of General Pershing, including his marriage to Frances Warren, their brief 10 years together, and his grief at losing her and their three daughters in a fire at the Presidio in 1915. He also depicts Pershing's social circle as a young man, and the fortuitous friendships with men who became extremely influential and helpful to him later in life. Many of the subordinates he mentored and nurtured all either proved essential to the building and command of the AEF and/or became the pillars of America's armed forces in World War II (Marshall, Patton, and MacArthur, for example). This biography does have a few editorial flaws. Dr. Vandiver, who was a prodigy who never attended high school or undergraduate school, does some excellent writing for having had no formal coursework, but he does have a shocking weakness in writing subordinate clauses as separate sentences. Of which this is an example. A good editor would have caught the few dozen instances in this work and revised the grammar. Also Dr. Vandiver sometimes drops articles from a sentence, resulting in some clumsy passages. Again, good editing would have corrected these. At the end of the second volume, as Pershing's retirement approaches, Dr. Vandiver omits the necessary explanation that, in 1924, the mandatory retirement age in the armed forces was 64; the reader has to infer that from the narrative. Nevertheless Dr. Vandiver hit a home run with his biography of Pershing, and it deserved far more acclaim and exposure than it has enjoyed in the past 20 years. Reading about this genuine American hero was a breath of fresh air in these times of antiheroes. America today surely needs more men like General Pershing. Thanks to Dr. Vandiver, he will not be forgotten.

Rating:
Summary: Great American Soldier -- Cumbersome Biography
Review: This comprehensive biography of one of America's great soldiers traces Pershing's life from his middle class upbringing in rural Missouri, to West Point, to the Western frontier during the final years of the Indian wars, to the Philippines, to the Punitive Expedition to Mexico and finally to France and the command of the American Expeditionary Force. Pershing's no-nonsense personality and his insistence on discipline and training is evident throughout. But the author has difficulty achieving any balance in his reporting. A sentence suffices to explain the treaty terms with Germany at the conclusion of WWI, but endless pages describe medal ceremonies and the atmospherics of military conferences. The lengthy work is replete with platitudes, cliches and vague characterizations. It quickly becomes tiresome. Find another biography of this great American.