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Hello, my friends, and welcome to another episode of History That Doesn't Suck. I'm your professor, Greg Jackson. As you know, we are typically doing a narrative history of the United States. We're currently in the midst of World War I. But while I was researching and writing the last episode, which went quite in depth on Belleau Wood, where many a legend of the U.S. Marine Corps was born in the
had the pleasure of getting to know Captain Mack Caldwell. In the process, Captain is a very well-spoken and intelligent, capable Marine officer. So- We'll see. Oh, no, without fail, sir. Captain, let me go ahead and give you a proper introduction. You feel free to interject when I get something wrong in your bio. Okay.
But we're going to go ahead and talk a bit more about Belleau Wood because as we were texting and talking, and again, I'm so grateful for you giving of your time. I could just feel your passion and your depth of knowledge on Belleau Wood and how it even speaks to the Marine Corps today. I remember thinking in the midst of our conversation, okay, this is one for everyone. I am selfish to keep this man to myself. So, but Captain Matt Caldwell, you are...
Again, Marine Corps infantry officer. You're currently serving right here in beautiful Salt Lake City, Utah. Yes, I am. Lifelong lover of history. And you actually graduated from the United States Air Force Academy. I did. So we'll get into that a little bit. Betrayal, if we can. You majored in law and political science. And you have been...
With the Marine Sense, you're a graduate of Basic Free Fall, the Marine Infantry Officer course there.
and forgive me, the Marine Corps Expeditionary Warfare School. - Yes. - Okay. - Yeah. - Did I botch that too badly? - That was beautiful. Far more eloquent than I could do myself, but thanks for the introduction, Greg. Yeah, I'm excited to chat with you. And one thing I will say, I told you I had to poke fun at you a little bit. - You're welcome to. - In preparing to come down and meet with you, I re-listened to episode 62.
I'm a native of Lookout Mountain, Tennessee. And for your listeners, if they go re-listen to episode 62, it's about the Chickamauga and Chattanooga campaign and the Civil War. Or as people back home would say, the war between the states. Okay. I got to watch myself there, right? Yep, yep. No, but I had to give you a hard time because your French is too good, Greg. You keep talking about this town called Lafayette, Georgia, and...
or Lafayette, but back home, we call it Lafayette. Lafayette. It's Lafayette. I'll tell you what, man, my eyes has heard this so many times when I break the fourth wall in some of these conversations. The United States, primarily English speaking, so much French influence, so much Spanish influence, indigenous languages, and that's just the tip of the iceberg. Yeah. Yeah, we're just a
when it comes to, yeah, it's written this way and it's said this way in this state, but it's said that way in that one. And yeah, there's a, well, thank you. I appreciate the compliment and I'm sorry I didn't nail that. You know, the Confederate States of America lost that battle and history is written by the victors. So it will live on as Lafayette. Okay. You know, we'll talk about this, I'm sure later on. History is written by the victor. And as we look at the Battle of Belleau Wood,
I'll lead off by saying it was not a resounding victory. The reality of that fight is it was awful. Yeah. The casualties that Marines of the 4th Marine Brigade assumed relative to the German defenders, Abella Wood, were almost three to one. I mean, the defender has a decisive advantage in any conflict. That's what German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, when he was fighting through Italy and North Africa in World War II and studying the
you know, how offensive operations function. He said that the ideal ratio of forces in the offense should be nine to one, or even as much as 25 to one, because the defender has such a decisive advantage of the terrain, entrenchment, so on and so forth. And that was witnessed, you know, for four years during the First World War. But
Bella Wood was not a resounding, beautiful, glorious victory for the Marines. That it was not. And you know what? Let's go ahead and table that though for just one second. Just one second. Getting too fired. No, no, no. I love it. I love the energy. You're ready to go. There was one thing I wanted to do before we dive right into Bella Wood. And this came out of, well, it came right out of our conversation. I could tell you've got a depth of knowledge that I, of course, don't.
and won't have on the core.
Kind of short like that. We all right to call it the Corps? Yes. All right. As long as you don't say the Corps. People who say the Corps, that tears up my heart a little bit. Again, the French, right? The French speaking. I know to drop those last letters. So give us a little bit more background because as we get into Belleau Wood, as my listeners know from the last episode, we see more casualties on June 6th alone than the Corps has seen in its entire history since the American Revolution. Yes. And by the time the campaign's over, over those few weeks of fighting in Belleau Wood-
We have more deaths even. Forget even the wounded and the MIA, just deaths alone. More in Belleau Wood than any in U.S. history for the Marine Corps. So talk to us a little bit about what this Corps is. How do we get from the Revolution to Belleau Wood? I mean, that's not a...
Yeah. Not a huge ask, right? Just go ahead and convey that in a few minutes. Let's condense 130 years of history, shall we? Sure. Well, let me start by saying I am an active duty Marine, but I am not here as a representative of the Marine Corps. So, you know, the little asterisk next to my name should be that my thoughts and comments today are in no way the official communique of the United States Marine Corps. But I am excited to share what I as a Marine feel.
know and understand about my service and the lore and the prestige that is being a United States Marine. And it may come across as arrogant, but the reality is that as Marines, we take great pride in our history. And that all began in 1775, 10 November. The Second Continental Congress commissioned a young man named Captain Samuel Nicholas to
to raise two battalions that would become the first Continental Marines, the first and the second battalion of Continental Marines. And knowing that this would be, by its very nature, a maritime force designed for naval engagements and shipside combat and occasional combat in the littoral environment along the shores and rivers, Captain Nicholas knew that he needed to find a
gritty, tough human beings. So naturally he went to a bar and he set up, he literally set up a table in Tun Tavern in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and
And he signed up a bunch of drunkards and castoffs of American society. So Philly Tavern, that's where we get the Marine Corps. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Marine Corps was started in a bar, which is very much still a part of our ethos today. But the Continental Marines were, they were the beginning. When you hear the term leatherneck, right? Yes. Which I mentioned in the episode. So yeah, what's this leatherneck business? Leatherneck was...
A colloquialism ascribed to Marines at the early, you know, in the early beginnings of the Marine Corps that described this leather essentially band that Marines wore around their neck.
And that was designed as a defense to their head and their neck from conflict by sword. So when Marines would engage in combat from ship to ship... Right, this is like the grappling hooks have come out. Yes. We're butted up. Broadside to broadside. Yeah. People are going to swap blood. Those, I'll tell you, I am...
and writing about the War of 1812 for this podcast years ago now, it piqued my interest in naval history. I was just so fascinated at how the ships themselves function. Of all the wars and battles that, you know,
This podcast is really taking me all over the place. Social history, military history, you name it. Those seem like the most terrifying to me. Yeah. I mean, especially in the times that we're talking about, I learned to swim when I was four years old. I mean, many Americans today have access to maybe a community pool or a lake or if you're really lucky, the ocean, and you learn how to swim. People didn't know how to swim in 1775. That was not...
a common joyous way to spend an afternoon. You don't go to the lake and, you know, celebrate the 4th of July and go swimming. And so for many of these sailors... It was a less common ability. Mm-hmm. For many of these sailors and marines... They didn't know how to swim. They were surrounded by death.
If the ship goes down, you're dead. Not to mention the fact that they're covered in wool clothing to the tune of eight to ten pounds worth of equipment. So even if they are fairly decent at treading water, yeah, that's... Miles and miles from shore, falling off the ship is death. But the Marines, they prefer to fight on the ship. And so when two ships would come broadside to broadside, the job of the Marines was to go conquer the other ship.
So they would go over the bulkhead and engage. They were in such close proximity that most of the fights that took place were by sword at that time. And so that leatherneck was that piece of leather surrounding their neck designed to prevent an enemy's sword from being able to slice through their head. As gruesome as that may sound, the leatherneck was a protection. And so Marines became known as leathernecks.
And it was not necessarily a term of honor and distinction, right? That's a really polite way to term it. And those terms have followed Marines. Nowadays, we're called crayon eaters. And I lean into that. I tell people my favorite flavor is green, right? So as Marines, we're just proud of the fact that we're viewed as a rugged, oftentimes rudimentary force. The reality is we're tough, we're gritty.
And we try to be smart, but Leathernecks, that's where the term came from. Okay. No, I'm, I'm capturing this, the overall vision here. We're born in a tavern, Leathernecks. I can see the, the grit persona that, that carries with this. As you're describing the, the naval battles, I am of course, picturing Master and Commander, the film in my head. It is an excellent movie. Excellent soundtrack as well. Yes.
Okay, so the Leathernecks, the Marines, they're gritty. What role do they play in some of the conflicts that precede World War I? So obviously the American Revolution, we see a little more engagement on the waters than, say, the Civil War. Yes. Yes, speak to any of these if you can. Sure. So the Marine Corps did not...
exists in continuity from its founding in 1775. There was actually an interwar period between the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 where the Marine Corps was stood down and didn't exist. The only standing army, if you will, that the United States maintained was the Department of the Navy and the Army, both of which fell under the Secretary of War. And both of which were
Very small compared to today. Extremely small. World War I is that big shift. Right. Yeah. And, you know, America was an isolationist country. We had our own continent, so to speak. And so the idea of maintaining a standing force in
didn't jive with most Americans who were weary of war, and the Marine Corps was a casualty of that, for better or worse. Right. And, of course, the states maintained militias. The Guard. Yep. The predecessor of today's National Guard. Yeah. But the Marine Corps did come back in the late 18th century and had limited involvement in the War of 1812.
Marines were in Tripoli, Libya in the early 19th century. You'll hear in the Marines hymn, the halls of Montezuma. Marines were involved in the Mexican-American War, which included an amphibious landing in Mexico and a march all the way to Cuba.
Things that for longtime listeners, I'm sure they're having some flashbacks to those episodes. Yes. And these are important components of our history that are often overlooked. But the reality is the Marine Corps was extremely small.
We were a maritime defense force that could conduct amphibious infantry operations at that point in our history. And we gradually grew, very limited involvement with the United States Navy in the Civil War and with the Confederate States Navy, even less so. But the Marine Corps did not play a significant role in that conflict whatsoever.
However, later on, especially in small wars, which is kind of the Marine Corps specialty throughout history, we thrive in small war situations. At the very end of the 19th century, the Marine Corps started to gain steam. In the eyes of Congress, in the eyes of the American people, there was more value. So, you know—
respectfully follow me here for just a second. Then if I can just play devil's advocate, do it. So we do have the Navy. So there's the sea. We've got the army that that's the land. And of course the air, that's not even a factor until he really gets world war one, right? The Wright brothers kind of have to come along and do their thing. So why, why have the Marines? That's a great question. And it's an existential question that has been asked often.
including in the halls of Congress? Why are we footing billions of dollars, at the time, millions of dollars towards this service that is effectively redundant, right? The capabilities that the Marine Corps has, doesn't the Army have those? Yes. Doesn't the Navy have the capability to handle amphibious operations with Naval Special Warfare and SEAL teams? Yes. So then why should the Marine Corps exist? And this was a question that was famously asked
you know, a number of years ago to the Commandant of the Marine Corps. And he said, quite frankly, and I think to his credit, he said, America doesn't need a Marine Corps. America wants a Marine Corps. Marines are different. And I'm no longer quoting. Marines are different. The way we train, the way we fight, the character and the ethos of who we are as United States Marines is
We are different. And I say that as someone who spent four years at the Air Force Academy learning to become an airman. I have the deepest and utmost respect for the Air Force. I even did a semester at the Naval Academy. I've deployed on naval shipping. The Marine Corps is different. We are different. And that's what America, frankly, wants. America wants a force that
Throughout the 20th century, we'd become known as the shock troops. We were America's maritime force and readiness, expeditionary force and readiness it then became. When the nation needed someone to be there overnight, like UPS, that's us. So, all right.
running with that. Yeah. Is, is that part of how we even end up with Marines in the AEF? So World War I, we're talking about Black Jack Pershing, the commander of the AEF and the 4th Marines. Um,
This is the only Marine unit in the whole AEF. And it does, in my mind, I say this as someone who's never served. I'm not attached to the military. I want your insider perspective here. How odd is that? Or is it not odd for the Marines to have this one unit inside what is otherwise a U.S. Army unit?
Right. Deployment. Right. Well, fighting abroad had been the specialty of the Marine Corps in history. And again, if we put this conflict in context, in 1917, 1918, the Marine Corps less than 20 years before had rather famously fought in Cuba, in the Philippines, in the Boxer Rebellion in China, right? Marines were involved in conflict internationally. And so there was a certain level of repute
about the Marine Corps that led the American, you know, the AEF to say, why don't we call up a brigade, the 4th Marine Brigade of Marines to come to France and join in the fighting because they have experience.
Which they desperately need. I mean, we're training troops with freaking broomsticks, right? So someone who actually knows what they're doing is invaluable. And to be fair, the level of experience that Marines brought was very, very small. The overwhelming majority of the Marines that fought in the 4th Marine Brigade had...
had just enlisted, right? Had answered the draft call and the decision to serve because they wanted to be Marines. They wanted to be a part of this legend, this sort of
opaque idea of a force. - Just tavern invoking leatherneck tradition. - Yes, yes, exactly. They wanted to be part of the drinking buddies that are the United States Marine Corps. They wanted to join the gun club. - Well, do you feel we've laid some good track to get us to Belleau Wood? - If I can say one more thing, one thing that I think is important to the context of the whole fight here for the Americans is we were unproven. And as I know you've mentioned about in the last couple episodes,
The Americans were not a force at this point that could be relied upon in the eyes of the Brits and the French and their allies. We were there to help, but we were not an ally yet. Right. And the Germans even went back to unrestricted warfare with the thought, the Americans can't get this together fast enough. Yes. There's just no way. Yeah. And in the spring offensive, you know, before the Battle of Belleau Wood,
The Germans had very little respect for the Marines. They thought that the Marines were going to be this green, fresh bunch of people who thought that, you know, warfare was this glorious endeavor. Well, and, you know, to be fair, putting that context together, these European militaries, they've been at war for years. They're a bunch of hardened veterans. I can absolutely see where they would look at the United States with, at that time, a
Very small military. The National Guard outnumbered the federal, if you will, forces. You know, we can talk about, yeah, some of the experience in Spanish-American War, other small conflicts into the Philippines. But yeah, it's just nothing compared to total war. You're right. The level of experience just wasn't there. So the context that I want to provide is
There was a chip on the shoulder of every American in the AEF. Yes. Even more so, it's pretty well documented. There was no love lost between Black Jack Pershing and the United States Marine Corps.
He was not a vocal advocate of Marines. And so that ship that every American carried, magnify that by a power of 10 for every Marine. Because the Marines of the 4th Brigade, they were, again, they were different. They were outcasts. They were set aside and apart. But...
One last thing I'll say before we really get into the details of the battle. The commander of the 4th Marine Brigade, as the conflict was about to begin, he experienced an issue with his health and was replaced. And when General Pershing wrote to the new commander, he said, I'm giving you the best brigade in France. So if it all fails, I will know who to blame. And that was, again, no love lost between Pershing and the Marines. But that statement...
I think was a testament to the fact that he knew Marines fight differently. And he expected that when the conflict came, not if, but when, as we know in the Great War, it was going to happen. But he knew that the 4th Marine Brigade was the unit that he wanted at the hardest battle whenever that fight came. Well, and as the AEF is just getting started, that hardest battle is Belleau Wood. It is. So let's take a quick break and let's get into some of that ugly. ♪
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So we've established who the Marines are. And importantly, I'd say kind of the insider perspective, how the Marines see themselves. That is the unique thing, Captain. Cap. Can we do Cap? Call me whatever you like. Okay. You know, that's the unique thing that you can bring here, that you do bring beyond just your depth of knowledge on Belleau Wood itself is
listeners know from the last episode, the broad strokes of Bellowood to briefly paint the scene. We're in the third wave of the German spring offensive, a massive salient that is huge bulge has developed on the lines as Ludendorff, the German general is attempting to simply divert to get the French to pay attention to things down by the Marne river and not think about
The KO punch, he's about to land up in Flanders against the Brits. But of course, he's far more successful than he could have ever dreamed. And suddenly, Paris is only 50 miles away. How do we not go on? Pétain turns to the AEF, to Black Jacks, says, please, s'il vous plaît, some troops, some men.
We get the second and third. And of course, within those forces, we have the fourth. Yes. The fourth Marines. And so, Bella Wood, June 6th. This is, is it too much for me to say this is like a rebirth of the Marine Corps? It really is. This is where much of the legend that is the Marine Corps today started. And it started as a result of a French force that, for all intents and purposes, was fighting on its heels. Yes.
As the Germans made progress in this sector of the conflict, we talk a lot in the military, especially in the Marine Corps, about centers of gravity and critical vulnerabilities. Centers of gravity being that thing that you or the enemy has that you can use to your advantage to win the fight. And a critical vulnerability being the gap or the lapse that, if exploited, can defeat your center of gravity or defeat the enemy's center of gravity. Well, the Germans viewed...
They viewed this part of the line as the critical vulnerability in France's line.
This was 53 miles from Paris, easy road to take all the way to Paris. And this was a vulnerability that they wanted to exploit. So they threw division after division after division at this segment of the line. And the French took the brunt of that blow. As the French were essentially retreating and withdrawing out of the Belleau Wood area, the Meuse-Argonne area on the 5th,
It's very famously said to Captain Lloyd Williams of the 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, you should retreat. Like we're retreating. Why are you here, Marines? You should be retreating. And Captain Williams responded. That's one of the famous quotes. And he said, retreat. Hell, we just got here.
And that was the mindset that the Marines took into this fight. So the 4th Marine Brigade consisting of two regiments, the 5th Marines and the 6th Marines, each with three battalions. And there was also the 6th Machine Gun Battalion, which was a Marine Machine Gun Battalion. So seven battalions in total that were postured to take on this German force. So just real quick, brigade, battalion.
We're just talking the next level down. Yes. Right? I just want to make sure that listeners are all following this. Sometimes I think these terms, they just kind of, whoa, they're almost overwhelming. Yeah. Let me clarify that. Yeah. Honestly, I have my own cheat sheet anytime I get into these military episodes. I'm like, okay, I'm going to...
And I got to, of course, double check, right? What's changed since the last war? Yep. So by all means, anything more you want to say on that? Sure. Have at it. A battalion is a maneuver element consisting of approximately...
1,000 Marines. Okay. So 800 to 1,200, somewhere in that range. A regiment consists of three to four battalions. So a regiment borders on about 4,000 Marines. A brigade consists of about two regiments. Okay.
So again, we're talking echelons of force here. The 4th Marine Brigade, that was the entirety of the Marines in France. Right. Consisted of two regiments, each of about 4,000 Marines. Okay. And those regiments were further broken down into three battalions apiece. Okay.
The battalions are the important maneuver elements in this fight. The battalions are going to be oriented, all six of them with the machine gun battalion, the seventh supporting. They're going to be oriented essentially along a north-south running line at Bois de Belleau.
So, Belleau Wood. And the Germans have set in a defensive position inside of the wooded area. On the 4th of June, the Marines had sent out a reconnaissance patrol. You know, First Lieutenant Eady had gone out and literally he spoke fluent German. He and his Marines hid in bushes close enough to the German lines. It's crazy. This is how we used to do intelligence and surveillance, right?
They hid close enough to the Germans that they could listen to their conversation and determine generally how the Germans were postured and how they intended to fight against the 4th Marine Brigade. That'll make the hair stand on your neck a little bit. A little bit, right? Yeah. I'm sure they were a little puckered in that situation. Yeah, puckered is another word that comes to mind. I'm just thinking about even the process of getting out there. Yes. Yeah, well, reconnaissance was done at night.
Yes. And, you know, in World War I. It's still terrifying, though. Oh, yeah. I mean, come on. Absolutely. It's not like today where you can drop your, you know, night vision goggles and you have your great way of seeing your thermals and whatever. Right. They went out under the cover of clouds and, you know, with what little starlight or moonlight may have peeked through. And that's how they found a position to listen to the enemy and find out the Germans' posture. And that was the intel that drove the brigade commander to...
Okay.
And so the Germans were entrenched on 6 June, which ironically is D-Day. Right. 26 years later. We will get to that eventually. Yeah, barely 100 miles away. Yeah, that was very much not lost on me as I was looking at this going, really? Right. It's June 6th? Yes. It's crazy. And 6 June meant something very different in 1943 to the average American than it meant in 1944. Yeah. But that being said...
The Germans were, unbeknownst to the Americans because the intel was not complete, very well dug in in Belleau Wood. They had a number of machine gun positions that were in defilade, right? So the Germans had dug beyond chest deep. They had a well-defended trench line. Their machine guns were behind cover and concealment so their positions wouldn't be revealed.
Oh, wow. And they were at the edge, the western edge of this wooded area. To the west, there were several wheat fields that extended anywhere from 200 to 400 meters wide. And that was the linear danger area, we call it, right? So this was, excuse me, a cross-compartmental danger area, a large, dangerous area.
of terrain that the Marines would have to cross in order to get to where they could effectively engage the Germans. And it's pretty much totally open. Yes, wide open. Just wheat, occasional poppy. It's like charging across two to four football fields. Yes, yeah, while getting shot at. Yeah. And I wanted to equate this to, you know, in 1863, Pickett's Charge was the last-ditch effort that...
The Army of Northern Virginia ditched against the Army of the Potomac at Gettysburg. Right. And it failed. And it was a long, if you've been to Gettysburg, you know what this looks like. It kind of goes through a short, narrow valley, which split by a creek. And then Pickett and his men were meant to come up on the far side and take the Union position that was in a bit of a hill. The wheat fields in Belleau Wood were much like that.
Pickett lost decisively. And that was, you know, many historians will say... The high watermark of the Confederacy. That was it. That was the turning point. And this fight at Belleau Wood had the potential to go the same way. Here, if we equate the Union position to the German position, they were dug in, they were entrenched, they had an advantageous piece of terrain. And the Marines, in this case, were going to have to cross...
no man's land to get to where they could actually fight the enemy. Generally, in World War I, these sort of assaults were accompanied by effective cascading artillery. Yes, a rolling barrage. A rolling barrage, right? Go ahead and explain that a little bit more. What is, I've used that term in a number of episodes. Please, layman's terms, what is a rolling barrage? A rolling barrage is essentially a
dropping bombs in front of you as you walk so you get the enemy to duck. That's the whole point. If the artillery doesn't kill the enemy, which oftentimes it doesn't,
It'll make him put his head down. So he can't shoot at you. Yes. When he can't see you, he's probably not going to be pulling the trigger because that's a waste of his limited ammunition. Right. So the point of the rolling barrage was to put the enemy's heads down. And the closer and closer the assaulting force got to the enemy's trench line, the more the artillery would back off.
To the point where once the assaulting force was within small arms range of the trench line, the artillery would cease. At that point, it's a small arms fight. Right. Now, that rolling barrage, it wasn't going to work at Belleau Wood. And the reason it wasn't going to work was because artillery at the time, the munitions that were fired were...
not intended to be used in wooded areas. They were meant for open areas. The way that the round worked, right? And we're going to get very technical here. Okay. The round had essentially a cone-shaped munition at the front of the round that once crushed, as soon as it impacted anything, the round would explode. So for Germans in a tree line, those rounds were exploding above their head, 40, 50, 60 feet high up in the canopy of this forest.
So for all the artillery that the Americans and the French lobbed at the Germans in Belleau Wood, it had very little effect on the Germans. And it didn't put their heads down because they weren't scared. The trees were going to take the brunt of the force of that artillery barrage. So those machine gunners in their defensive positions were able to look out across the wheat field. And when the Marines were given the order to charge—
and they started running across the wheat fields, the Germans' heads were up. And like I'm sure we'll talk about later, this was not a glorious, beautiful event
you know, fight like you see from Gettysburg of Joshua Chamberlain leading his men down the hill with their bayonets fixed. This was a bloody deadly assault. And just 60 years prior, you know, the tactic of the day was a linear assault, you know, stand up in formation, everyone get online. We're going to charge across this field. And those tactics, the AEF, I mean, Blackjack Pershing, uh,
Oh, I'll go Southern for you by my Southern friend. Bless his heart. Yes. Um, he is still a fan of many of those tactics and he's been very, uh,
slow to give heed to the french and british as they're saying actually trench warfare is pretty important to understand not just open warfare yep and he's he also hasn't grasped the value of artillery he he's not turned that corner so i know those are also factors here they absolutely are at bella wood so i mean we've got kind of an old school approach and uh
And what artillery is being fired, I actually wasn't aware of that part. It's just blowing up over their heads. It's ineffective. Yeah. So they didn't bring enough and it wasn't effective to boot. And no longer like in 1863, are these men charging against, you know, maybe a sharps repeating rifle that shoots 14 rounds a minute. Right. Or against a, you know, a single shot musket. Yeah, I know this is 500, 500 rounds in a minute. They're marching against...
well-lubricated, capable enemy machine guns that are designed to eat meat. And that's what they did. And the assault across the wheat fields by both the 3rd Battalion 5th Marines and the 3rd Battalion 6th Marines proved extremely deadly. And under normal circumstances, this would have been the time for a novice, green, new force to tuck tail and run.
Hey, this isn't working. Let's get back in the tree line. This is insane. This is stupid. We're dying. Yeah, we're all going to die. There are many accounts of Marines who, you know, I was listening to one earlier of a Marine platoon commander who got within 20 meters of the Belleau Wood tree line and turned around and said, where's my platoon?
They were all dead or wounded in the field behind him. All of them, but six, right? Right. And we'll talk about Floyd Gibbons in a minute. I don't know if you referenced him in the last episode. But briefly, right? So let's, I'm happy to get into more details on him. Why don't we, if I'm not tearing you away from where you'd like to go, could we talk about George Hamilton a bit? Absolutely. Let's go there. That feels like the natural next place. Yeah. And he's someone that's near and dear to my heart because he was a member of 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, a company commander.
That was my unit. No way. When I was in the Fleet Marine Force, I was part of 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, Company A, which is, you know, 1-5 is the most highly decorated unit in the Marine Corps. We've been in every major engagement the Marine Corps has ever fought. And George Hamilton, he's an iconic figure of 1-5's history.
You'll hear me say 1535. That is a reference to the 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment. Okay. Or the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment. So, 15 was assigned with the seizure of Hill 142, which was part of the wooded area. They had a shorter field to cross, right? So, they crossed the field, and the moment they entered the tree line, Captain Hamilton and his Marines encountered a well-entrenched enemy defense. Okay.
Which is, as an assailant, you don't want to fight against that. It's suicide. You're walking in on someone who has cover, concealment, and firepower, and he's already aiming his weapon system at you. And you're out of breath because you just did this break-off run across an open field, and you come into a trench line you don't know, and that's when most of the Marines got shot, right when they entered the tree line. But Captain Hamilton knew that in order to gain the advantage over the enemy, they had to seize Hill 142. And
In the Marine Corps, we talk a lot about, you know, one of the Marine Corps leadership principles is set the example. We have these leadership principles that are very important to us as a service, and set the example is one of the most important. George Hamilton set the example. When he entered the tree line, his Marines tell the story, and he was actually recommended for the Medal of Honor, which was eventually reduced to Distinguished Service Cross, but
He killed four Germans in hand-to-hand combat in the forest. Hand-to-hand combat is not... That's gruesome. Yeah, we're not... He didn't stand five feet away and shoot someone. That would have been nice for him. His hands around throats, punching, pulling, pulling hair, ears, gouging eyes. These are nightmares. This is what...
The sort of thing that torments a soldier for the rest of their lives. Absolutely. And that was what was required of every Marine that fought at Belleau Wood because they were fighting in immensely close proximity. Many of these Marines, they fixed their bayonets and the weapon of choice was not the bullet. It was the bayonet and the bare hand and the knife. And so much of what
The Marines proved the Battle of Belleau Wood was a willingness, just the sheer willingness to fight that way. And George Hamilton embodied that. Again, he could have tucked tail and run.
which some Marines did, by the way, right? We're not all built that way. Right. But George Hamilton led his, at that point, very small company uphill 142 in hand-to-hand combat and beat the Germans off by sheer force of will. And maybe we'll come to this later, but there's a very famous painting of
That hangs at the infantry officer course in Mitchell Hall. Yeah, and at the basic school in Quantico, Virginia. And that painting depicts a member of 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, Captain Hamilton's unit, standing over a German soldier, bayoneting him in the chest. That is a gruesome image. Yeah. That's not something that I hope anyone listening to this podcast looks at and says, wow, that's so awesome. Right. It's terrible. It's awful. And that's how we as Marines have to fight.
War is an ugly thing. It is gruesome, bloody. It's filled with death. It's filled with honor and dishonor. It is not something that should be glorified or dignified as this beautiful chorus of fire and valor. It is an ugly thing. And I'm saying that as someone who's never been to combat. I haven't. I joined the Marine Corps in 2016. And for most of the Marine Corps,
OIF and OEF, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were for all intents and purposes coming to an end when I joined. So I didn't see that fight, but the Marine Corps trained me to be ready for it. And that's how we train all of our Marines today. So that portrait of a Marine bayoneting a German soldier in the chest, staring him in the eye, like think of the intimacy in that moment.
That's what George Hamilton did by killing four Germans face-to-face, eye-to-eye, man-to-man, and taking their life in his own hands. He embodied what Marines would have to do to win that fight. And that level of bravery was seen all over the war. But it just so happened that there was a wartime reporter from the Chicago Tribune
named Floyd Gibbons, who was actually there that day with 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine. So 3-5 actually crossed one of those long wheat fields. And Floyd Gibbons was with 3-5 during the crossing. He actually wrote about that lieutenant who turned around and said, where the hell is my platoon? Well, sir, they're dead or fallen. And Floyd Gibbons, not long after that moment,
you know, himself wearing the tin hat and, and it's nuts that he, oh my gosh. Yeah. Can you believe that? Honestly, only barely. It's remarkable. If, if I, yeah,
If I didn't read it myself, if I didn't see the photos of this man, as I'm sure you know, and I actually wasn't able, I tried to work this into the last episode. There just wasn't a natural place for it to highlight Floyd that much, but he lost an eye. He did. He was thought to be dead. I was able to fit that part in, but yeah, he lost an eye permanently. Floyd Gibbons was shot three times on his march across the wheat field with the Marines. And to his credit, as a member of the press,
Walked shoulder to shoulder with Marines across that wheat field with 3-5. And while he was in the prone, not 20 meters from the boundary of Bella Wood, around from a machine gun, ricocheted. He said his face was about six inches off the ground. It ricocheted off the ground, entered the left side of his face through his jaw, split his eye, and then came out of his head and
And his forehead, like right above his, you know. Oh my gosh. His ocular bone, whatever that's called there. I'm not a doctor. That's okay. And. You painted a plenty vivid picture. That's warfare. And he was also shot twice in the arm. And, you know, after realizing that, he took account of himself. And having served with Marines for the last few days and weeks, I think he understood the ethos that a Marine had to have, which was.
Well, this is my situation and this is how I'm going to fight out of it. He realized, hey, you know what? I'm shot up pretty badly. I'm alive and I need to get out somehow. So he laid as still as he possibly could for three hours and
managed to then get pulled after the Marines had, you know, gotten into the wood and gained some ground. He was pulled back to the rear, sent to the United States. But while he was in the rear area shortly after he'd been wounded, he penned a letter with his good eye, right? Yep. Can you believe this? I mean, you can't write this stuff. Can't make it up. He penned a letter of everything he had seen that day at the Battle of Belleau Wood.
And at the time, everything had to go through a sensor. Everything from the front had to go through a warfare sensor before it could go back to the American press to be written up in the papers. And the sensor believed that these were Floyd Gibbons' last words. He was convinced that this man who'd been shot in the face was dead.
So he said, you know what? I'm not going to censor this article. I should give Floyd Gibbons the dignity of every word that he wrote and let it reach the air. And it did reach the Chicago Tribune. And Floyd Gibbons' account of 6 June 1918 was instrumental in what made the Marine Corps, forgive me, I'm almost a little emotional about it. It was instrumental in what made the Marine Corps special in the eyes of the everyday American.
Because he gave an account of just unbelievable bravery and courage, which is one of our core values. To stare the enemy in the face and keep walking toward him. Like that is, that's crazy, right? I think so, yes. And that's who we are as Marines. We're just a little bit crazy.
Floyd Gibbons, amazing story. We talked about tactics earlier. I want to come back to it. At the time, so much of warfare was this linear swinging of forces and marching in a line shoulder to shoulder to get from point A to point B. Well, the Marines very rapidly learned they needed to instead use a tactic called cover and movement, which is still something that we practice in the infantry today. Marines listening to the podcast will know the phrase, I'm up, they see me, I'm down.
That's what we call cover and movement, where you and a buddy or two adjacent units
engaging an enemy, you know, the lead unit fires while the rear unit stands up, gains ground, and then hits the deck. And then they swap positions. And the other one does so. Cover each other. Exactly. Yeah. That method of cover and movement, I won't say, I can't say definitively it was the first time it was used. But they're figuring out, okay, these old school open warfare tactics don't work. Let's try something different. Yes. And the Marine Corps learned those lessons in blood from,
in the wheat field west of Belleau Wood. The 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines, and 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines, that's where cover and movement became a common part. And again, I don't want to overstep my knowledge of history here, but that's where it really became known as a successful tactic in engaging a superior enemy position, cover and move. And so that tactic eventually got the Marines into the woods. If I could go, I want to come back to the 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines,
Marines love to talk about a guy named Dan Daly. Oh, yeah. Sergeant Major Dan Daly he would eventually become. On this day, he was a company first sergeant and had the rank of gunnery sergeant with 3rd Battalion 6 Marines. And Gunny Daly at the time
had already received two medals of honor, one in the Boxer Rebellion and then one, I believe, in Haiti in 1915. I could be botching that. I am 99%. We'll just leave it at 99% so we can just spare some of those emails. But I am 99%. And if I'm wrong, Marines, forgive me. It was Haiti. Yeah, but Gunny Daly was renowned for his heroism. I mean, he was...
At the time, he was the only living Marine who had received two Medals of Honor. Just a god among men in the eyes of his Marines. I actually find interesting, if you'll forgive me for interjecting, how small he was, too. The guy weighed 130-some pounds. Don't you love that? I mean, when you think Medal of Honor, you think Marine. At least in my head, I'm picturing some...
really jacked, you know. Like me, right, Greg? That was exactly, yes, Captain. That was exactly what I was thinking. I think that something I love about the Marine Corps is we come in all shapes and sizes. And, you know, the Marine Corps would say today, we really, like, it doesn't matter where you come from, how much you weigh, as long as you meet the standards, right? Who you go home to at night, what is or isn't between your legs, right?
We care how you fight. And Dan Daly's the embodiment of that. My roommate at the infantry officer course was 130 pounds soaking wet. And I saw him carry his body weight for 10 miles while, you know, larger men were falling out behind. So much of what we do in the Marine Corps, it's about mental toughness and a will to win. Dan Daly had the will to win. And that will was embodied by his very famous quote. As the Marines were about to march across the wheat field,
And those, you know, these young 18, 19, 20 year old young men, the fear enters their eyes or they realize I may die in the next moment. If I stand up and walk across this field, that may be my last moment. And for many it was, right? But Dan Daly knew how to fight through that. And he stood up, turned around and looked at his Marines and said, come on, you sons of bitches. Do you want to live forever? Yeah.
If that doesn't grip you, I mean... Oh, it does. That's the Marine Corps in a nutshell. And we talked earlier about how this battle would become so much of the Marine Corps' ethos. It's men like George Hamilton killing four Germans with his bare hands, or Lloyd Williams saying, retreat hell, we just got here. Or Dan Daly saying, do you want to live forever? It is an unusually packed...
singular battle. Yes. Yeah. And you and I were talking about this before we came on air, but there were four future commandants in the Marine Corps present in this small fourth Marine brigade, um, including, you know, famous Marines like general John Lejeune, um, future general Clifton Cates, you know, one part of the battle on the sixth that often gets overlooked. Lieutenant at the time, Clifton Cates, um,
led the remainder of his company. He was a company commander and his company had, you know, he started with 250 Marines marching across this wheat field and got to the other side to the town of Beresh with 19 Marines, 19 Marines. I mean, he got to the other side with 8% of his fighting force and took the entire town of Beresh with 19 Marines.
I mean, that is the embodiment of our service. They had the will to win. He was not turning around. Clifton Cates, who later became the Commandant of the Marine Corps in the late 1930s, he was not quitting on his men. The 231 Marines that did not make it across that wheat field, their sacrifice would not be in vain.
Because he and 18 other Marines went door to door through the entire town of Beresh, which was inhabited at the time by German soldiers. Street fighting is just, again, gruesome stuff. Street fighting is, not only is it gruesome, it is challenging.
It is so challenging because threats are everywhere. Right. And they're not just at eye level. They're on the second story. They're on the third story. They're in a gutter, right? It is a three-dimensional fight. And Clifton Cates, a young Marine officer, led 19 Marines through that town and seized it.
So the 6th of June, I mean, it lives famously in Marine Corps history as a day when many legends were born that we now revere, you know, in the annals of Marine Corps history. When I was at officer candidate school, you know, a young cadet at the Air Force Academy at the time, learning about Marine Corps history, I was like, my God, look at these people. Like, these are just icons of humankind, right?
And so many of them on 6 June 1918 were in this one square mile forest called Bois de Belot, which would later be renamed to Bois de la Brigade de la Marine, right? Yeah. As an honor by the French. And the French were so impressed with the Marines' performance.
that they awarded the 5th and 6th Marine Regiments with what is called the French Forger. It's essentially a high military honor saying, hey, the sacrifice that you gave is something that we as French will always remember and honor. And to this day, as we sit here on...
You know, in May of 2023, the 5th and 6th Marine Regiment still wear the French Forager on their left shoulder. Really? Yes. And you only wear it while you're in that unit. When I was at 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, I became a part of that legacy, having not earned it, right? Right.
But the legacy that was earned by the men and women... That is passed down a century later. That remains. That French forger is still part of our heritage. So the 6th of June, come back to it, that is... Legends were born in the Marine Corps that day. And I might add...
Most of those legendary gains were not there on the 7th. It took all the way until, you know, it was a 20-day fight before the Marines could finally write back to General Pershing and say, Belleau Wood is entirely a Marine Corps, right? That was a long fight. And it was a fight where many lessons were learned in blood. The Marine Corps sustained, as you mentioned earlier, more casualties than
on June 6th, 1918, then the entire service had sustained at that point, and it's nearly, and it's 143 years of existence. More casualties in a single day. There aren't words for that. And that's where, you know, as I was going through this battle, I mean, you know, I really appreciated your input. And I could see, even as an outsider, just what a...
massive molding, shaping, formative event this clearly played for the Corps. And, you know, we talked about the legend that it became, this fight became. As I mentioned earlier, history is written by the victor. Right. This was not a beautiful fight. This was an ugly fight full of failures on behalf of the Marine Corps, failures that led to lessons learned.
but they also led to the creation of what would become known as the old breed of Marines. You know, I've mentioned these legendary Marines that were at the fight in Bella wood. They became known as the old breed. So let me recommend a book by Eugene Sledge called with the old breed. It documents his account of the Pacific theater in world war II, but Eugene Sledge fought with, you know, the, the old crusty Marines that led the campaign in the Pacific and
We're 19 and 20 year old kids fighting in the wheat fields and forests of France. And the old breed became legendary. And there's still an old breed in the Marine Corps. It's always that old generation, you know, for here in 2023, the old breed are the Marines who fought in Ramadi.
In 2003, or we're in on the march to Baghdad and their full chemical gear in the back of an amphibious assault vehicle sweating like you wouldn't believe in March and in Iraq. Right. Right. They're the Marines who like Kyle Carpenter, who.
jumped on a grenade to save his friends and lost the use of much of his body and lived to tell the story about it. Medal of Honor recipient, phenomenal Marine, good man, right? The old breed still exists, but that idea started...
during this conflict. And it kind of is also accompanied by this phrase that you'll hear thrown around oftentimes. You ever heard a Marine called Devil Dog? - Yep. - Yeah. - Mentioned that one in the episode. - There you go. So Devil Dog is another one of these colloquialisms that often is given to Marines and Marines are described as Devil Dogs.
Nowadays, sometimes it's a pejorative term. Like if a Marine does something silly, you say, hey, devil dog, was that a good idea? Right? Okay. Kind of to give him a hard time. Right. But devil dog, legend has it, came from the Battle of Belleau Wood.
and I don't want to disappoint the Marines that are listening, like I was disappointed when I found this out, but the reality is that's not true. Right. Devil Dog is a translation of a German term, Teufelshunde. Terrible German, I'm sure, but Teufelshunde translates to Devil Dog.
And that word actually first appeared in, I think it was the La Crosse Journal in La Crosse, Wisconsin in April of 1918. So two months before the Battle of Belleau Wood took place.
Marines were being described as devil dogs. And legend has it that that name was cemented in the annals of history at Belleau Wood. In fact, there's a memorial at Belleau Wood, this beautiful fountain that has a bulldog's head to celebrate the Marines. It's a bulldog depicting the devil dog. But the reality is that that term did not come from this fight.
It did come from the First World War. Whether it came from a German or not is up for debate. It may have been something that American, you know, the Marines, we are known to be arrogant as Marines. So that might have been a nickname we gave ourselves. But one way or another, it's part of the legend of this fight in France. And, you know, as a Teufelshunde myself, I'm proud to look back and say that these were great men who fought this fight.
Well, Captain, I'm just nothing but grateful for your insider perspective here. We're closing in on our window. Is there anything else that you think we really need to hit that's crucial to understanding how this battle has formed and informed what the Marine Corps is even now in the 21st century? Yeah. The last point I'll make here is that, and I mentioned this earlier,
War is really ugly. Yeah. And I don't want that to be lost on a listener. I always like, and you know, see, I'm of Pennsylvania descent back when we get back to Civil War era. So you'll just have to forgive me, my Southern friend. But I'll go ahead and quote the great Union General Kump, William Tecumseh Sherman. Yeah. War is hell. Right. That has just stuck with me.
For years. Yeah. It's hell and it's humility. And, you know, again, Battle of Gettysburg, when Pickett's Charge failed and the Confederate soldiers marched back across the field, General Lee, on his horse, traveler, walked out among his men and grabbed their hands and in tears looked at them and said, it has been all my fault.
God, that just pierces my heart. That's an example of humility in a leader. And you saw humility in leaders after Bella Wood. Marines learned lessons here. It was not all sunshine and rainbows. No war is. There are legends born out of this fight and legends that, as I just mentioned, are not always grounded in reality. But the fact of the matter is part of that legend is hard lessons learned in blood.
And the Marines who didn't make it home from Belleau Wood, killed or missing, right? There's a beautiful cemetery, American cemetery at Belleau Wood and soldiers, I might add. There were American soldiers, army soldiers that were a part of this fight. And they often get overlooked because so much of the story and the lore is about the Marines. It's focused on the Marines, yeah. The ones that didn't make it back, they are the lesson. They are the lesson that we have to look back and learn again.
And look at this fight and say, how do we have to change as a service? And we did. You know, I very much enjoy the wrong word, yet it's the one that comes to mind. Maybe it's just find important. I make it a point when I'm in the vicinity of a military cemetery to visit. Nothing, I think, will cure any pain.
fallacious romanticization faster than reading the names and looking at the dates. Yeah. Those were fathers. Those were husbands. Those were sons, daughters, right? Sometimes, you know, one of the first ones I actually got to was Normandy in France. And it was my first time abroad. And I remember just seeing this count, you know, this endless number
sea of white crosses speckled with the occasional star of David and reading those names and it hitting me. War is ugly. And so many of them were barely older than me. Yeah. You know, I was a high school kid. Yeah. Anyhow, we need to wrap up. This is a great conversation, Greg. Thanks for letting me be a part of it and telling the Marine Corps story as well or poorly as it came across. It is a legend in our history. And, um,
One that I'm thankful that you covered because Marines are honored by that episode. Well, thank you very much. And I appreciate, you know, it's always kind of serendipitous. You know, I'm not some big Hollywood-based, nothing against that. But, you know, I don't have an army of producers and whatnot that can line up, you know, the... Well, just line up anyone to go into some of these conversations. So when I find...
lightning strikes essentially right like i happen to meet somebody and and and i can really see hey there's a meaningful conversation that can happen here and you know something worthwhile and um seeing your passion i mean i felt it here again uh for this history at uh i really appreciate being able to get kind of that that insider perspective you know so thank you very much for providing that absolutely and absolutely uh again to to the note to end on that you know
War is war as hell. And I appreciate that you are so careful, you know, and thoughtful in both your interest in protecting the United States and serving. And yet, you know, there's I don't see that romanticization. I think that's a great it's a great place to be as well. Yeah. And as a Marine who's never seen combat, I, you know, I don't want to say that lightly as an experience that I don't have.
But it's an experience that I know for many Marines will forever, forever change who they are. Yeah. And I see it in many Marines I've led and been led by. So it's next time you see a Marine, shake their hand and tell them thank you because they sign up for, as do our soldiers, sailors, and airmen. They sign up for something that in the life of a human being should not be done.
but it is a reality of this world in which we live. So semper fidelis to all the Marines listening. Thank you, Devil Dogs. And thank you, Greg, for having me. My pleasure. Thanks again. And join me in two weeks. We will continue on with our narrative history of World War I. We'll see you then.
