1920: America's Great War

by Robert Conroy

  “Yes, I will do that as a matter of courtesy. Of course, Sims doesn’t report to me nor I to him, so we’ll see what good that does. But you are right again, Lieutenant, if the German Army is out, one can only wonder what the German Navy is up to.”

  * * *

  The U.S.S. Fox was a very new destroyer, launched only a year earlier in 1919. At just under twelve hundred tons, she carried a crew of one hundred and twenty-two men. Swift, she could do thirty-five knots, and her main armament consisted of turretless four-inch guns on her main deck. The Fox was called a flush deck because of her clean, straight lines and, since she had four smokestacks, ships like her were also called four-pipers.

  This morning she was doing nowhere near her top speed. Instead, she was scarcely crawling through the gentle swells off the California coast. The cold and clammy fog had her totally imprisoned and her captain was not going to risk a collision with anything larger than a seal. The waters north of San Francisco were just too busy with commercial traffic to take such a chance.

  Fine by me, thought Ensign Josh Cornell as he squinted through his binoculars at a blank wall of fog. He was standing at the very bow of the ship after getting the wild idea that being as far forward as possible would help him see better. It hadn’t helped at all, and he was beginning to feel a little foolish.

  Only a year out of Annapolis, Josh originally thought assignment as a junior officer to a destroyer was a setback to his career. Most of his classmates thought serving on a battleship was the fastest way to promotion, and he’d been teased when they’d learned that he was on his way to a lowly destroyer.

  Cornell was rethinking his original thoughts. On a destroyer, an officer was expected to know a lot about everything instead of being a specialist, like a gunner, although firing the great guns had to be one of the most exciting things possible. He also liked the dramatic way the destroyer knifed through the seas. To him it evoked memories of reading about Viking longships.

  To his astonishment, he hadn’t gotten seasick, which the rest of the crew found surprising as the Fox’s other newcomers spent the first few days of the cruise puking their guts out and fouling the ocean. He was from Nebraska and hadn’t even seen a large lake, much less an ocean, until enrolling at the Naval Academy. Even though he was slightly built, thin haired, and looked younger than twenty-three, the men had begun to accept him. He did his work without complaint and didn’t pretend to know everything just because he’d gone to Annapolis. He asked questions and respected sailors who asked him about a variety of things.

  Cornell was puzzled regarding the destroyer’s current assignment. Something was stirring and either nobody knew what it was or nobody was talking. The Fox was patrolling off San Francisco and their home base at Mare Island in the northern half of San Francisco Bay, and everyone wondered why. Since the battleship Arizona had almost flown out of the base the day before and the two remaining battlewagons, the Nevada and Pennsylvania, had left before dawn this morning, the rumors were rampant. Some had the U.S. in a war with Germany, which Josh thought was utterly implausible. The destroyer’s skipper said they should be prepared for anything. Or maybe the whole thing was a damned surprise maneuver.

  Suddenly, the lookout above screamed, “Ship, dead ahead!”

  Cornell froze. He squinted as if he could will the fog to clear. He saw nothing. No, wait…There was a large and shapeless object in front of him and moving closer. It was another ship and it was dangerously close. Dear God, would they collide? On the bridge behind him, he could hear the captain calling for a sharp turn to port and for more speed from the engine room.

  The stranger was only yards away. It was a massive vessel whose hull towered above the Fox. They would not collide, but it would be close and the giant stranger’s powerful wake would rock them brutally. They could handle that and Cornell started breathing again.

  As the stranger slid by, he saw massive turrets and guns. Jesus, it was a warship, a battleship, but which one? It had to be reinforcements from out east. As the Fox pulled away, guns from the battleship’s secondary battery suddenly opened fire and shells ripped through the helpless and outgunned American destroyer.

  “What the hell is going on?” he heard the captain yelling. “Get on the radio,” he said before another shell struck the bridge, silencing him and sending mutilated bodies flying about like toys.

  The Fox staggered like a losing prizefighter. Debris rained down on Josh. He ran back to the ruins of the bridge. Shattered bodies and limbs were everywhere and blood ran in torrents on to the deck and into the ocean. Josh knew they should be fighting back, but with what? Her four-inch guns were popguns against a battleship, and, besides, none of the crew was at their battle stations. Finally, a machine gun on the Fox opened fire, impotently strafing the armored hull of the battleship.

  More shells struck the Fox and she exploded with a deafening roar. Josh found himself flying through the air like a bird. He hit the water and it knocked the wind out of him. The cold Pacific grabbed him with icy claws. Something was wrong with his left leg. Pain was shooting up from it. He gasped and tried to breathe.

  Instinctively, he tried to swim. A piece of debris floated by and he grabbed on to it. A handful of other crewmen were doing the same thing. A very small handful, he realized sadly as someone grabbed him and steadied him.

  Finally, the fog cleared a little and he could see a line of gigantic battleships heading for what he presumed was the Golden Gate and the base at Mare Island. He caught sight of a flag. They were German. Since when were we at war with Germany? he wondered as he fought off the pain from his leg. He caught the name of one of the ships, the Bayern. According to the latest Jane’s she was one of Germany’s newest and mightiest battleships and carried fifteen-inch guns. What the hell was she doing here?

  And if she was headed for San Francisco Bay and Mare Island, there was nothing he could do about it. His first and only priority was to survive. His leg was killing him and he’d swallowed salt water which was making him vomit, and he was rapidly freezing. Still, he was an officer had to lead, had to live.

  He called and gathered about him the half dozen men floating in the water. They connected their pieces of debris into something resembling a raft and climbed on. The ocean swells kept washing over them but at least they weren’t in danger of drowning if they didn’t fall off and if the sea remained fairly calm.

  Finally the sun came out, warming them slightly, and they could see to the horizon. Josh could see nothing to the east. The coast was too far distant and the German ships had disappeared. They were far out to sea. He wondered how long they’d have to float. They had no food or water and he’d already begun shaking from shock and the cold. One of the men was praying for a miracle. Josh joined him.

  It came. After a couple of hours, a fishing boat sighted the Fox’s survivors and hauled them on board, where they lay gasping and shaking. The crew had them strip, dried them, and gave them blankets and hot soup. They gave the injured Navy men first aid and put a splint on Josh’s leg. Of course the boat had no radio. Josh knew that would have been too much to ask for.

  Hours later, as they approached the Golden Gate, they saw smoke arising from the old coastal batteries at Fort Point, along the shoreline by the Presidio complex, and well to the northeast where Mare Island was situated.

  A motorized Navy launch filled with men armed with rifles and submachine guns, intercepted them as they turned and headed north to the Mare Island base. Josh lurched to his feet and to the boat’s rail. He recognized a petty officer named Mahoney.

  “What happened, Mahoney?”

  Mahoney blinked and then recognized Josh. “The fucking Germans paid us a surprise visit, sir. I guess that was why those three big ships of ours had left. Three older battleships were anchored in the bay and they were sunk or badly damaged, and then the damned Germans shot up the facilities,” shouted Mahoney. “Came right through the Golden Gate like they were invited to dinner. They pounded our coastal forts which
didn’t fire back very much at all. Scuttlebutt says they were either abandoned or sabotaged or, hell, both.”

  “Jesus,” said Josh.

  “And then they opened fire on our ships when they came in range. Thank God they didn’t land any men. They might still be here if they had. Now what happened to you, sir?”

  Josh explained that his ship had been ambushed by the Germans and that almost the entire crew was dead. Mahoney said that the medical facilities at Mare Island and the city of Vallejo were swamped. He suggested the fishing boat try a civilian hospital in the city and Josh concurred. So did the skipper of the fishing boat who wanted them off his vessel as soon as possible. If war had begun, he wanted no part of it. Josh didn’t blame him one bit.

  * * *

  Many of Kirsten’s neighbors left the group, understandably fearful about their own properties. Kirsten shared that feeling, but she felt a desperate need to find out what was actually going on. Surprisingly to her, Olson was one of those who left them. So much for leadership, she thought.

  Thus, only four of them approached the town of Raleigh. So far they hadn’t seen any German soldiers, although they had noticed planes in the air. Kirsten suggested they dismount and spread out so as to not attract attention and the men agreed, looking nervously skyward. German planes carried machine guns.

  Finally, they reached the summit of a gentle hill and looked towards the town. Black smoke was billowing from a number of buildings and several others had been smashed flat. It looked like half the town was gone. Many men were moving around in the ruins. Kirsten and the others all had binoculars and there was no question. They were looking at several hundred German soldiers in the little town of Raleigh, California.

  “Would somebody explain this to me?” one of the men asked.

  Nobody had an answer. Their presence above the town was useless, and they decided to leave. Now it was indeed time to return to their homes, pack up, and go. However, they soon sighted German patrols between them and their destinations and it was several hours before Kirsten decided the coast was clear enough to try to reach her ranch.

  As she neared her home, she thought she saw wisps of gray smoke coming from its stone walls. She fought the urge to gallop and, instead, dismounted and approached her home with the same caution she’d used to examine Raleigh.

  Her home was gone. The main house and the barn had been gutted. The walls were standing but that was it. There were bodies on the ground and there was no sign of life. Or Germans, for that matter. Whoever had attacked her home had moved on.

  She carried her rifle in the crook of her arm and led her horse. She walked carefully into the compound that had been her home. The first body was Leonard’s. Her cousin had been shot and his body hacked at with what she assumed were sabers. His own broken rifle lay beside him, so maybe he had gotten one of the invaders. She hoped so.

  Two more bodies were those of men who worked on the ranch. She would have a lot of burying to do, she realized grimly.

  “Over here.” It was a woman’s voice and Kirsten turned in the direction it came from. Her cook, Maria, was waving to her from a shed that hadn’t been destroyed. She ran over and embraced Maria. They both cried at the simple pleasure of being alive and having found each other. Maria was older, in her forties, and had come with Kirsten from Texas.

  Maria looked away. “Your other cousin, Ella, is in there,” she said, pointing at the shed.

  Kirsten entered. She heard animal gruntings and sobs that took her a moment to realize came from a huddled figure in the corner. It was Ella and she was wrapped in a blanket. Kirsten pulled the blanket aside. Ella was naked and her body was a mass of bruises.

  Maria entered and hugged Ella, rocking her telling her everything was all right. Ella screamed and pushed her away. Finally, Ella calmed a little and Maria stood up.

  “The Germans came, maybe a dozen of them and all on horseback. Leonard tried to stop them so they killed him. He managed to wound one of them and that made them very angry, so angry that they shot the other men after they finished killing Leonard. Me they left alone. I guess I was too old and fat for them. Ella, they didn’t. They stripped her naked in the yard so all the men could see her and laugh at her, and then took her inside and tied her to her own bed and raped her. That was where I found her, all covered in blood and shit.”

  Kirsten was sickened. “All of them?”

  “Probably not. Maybe only six of them. After a short while they came out. They had a young officer who was the first to rape her and he ordered the men back on their horses and to continue the patrol. The officer told me to get Ella out of the house because they were going to burn it.”

  Maria looked down at the ground. “I did as I was told. Ella has been like this since then. I’ve seen other women like this in Mexico after they were gang-raped. Sometimes they change and get better. Sometimes they don’t.”

  Kirsten felt guilty. Leonard was dead and Ella had been ravished and here she was, unharmed. Ella’s mind was full of shame and pain and fear. Ella was a fragile person and had always led a protected, sheltered life, even on the ranch. Maria was right. Ella might not ever get over the shock.

  If Kirsten hadn’t gone to Raleigh to see what was going on, she would have been home when the Germans had attacked. Would she have made a difference or would she have been just one more rape victim? She knew the answer. She would have suffered like Ella had.

  Two more of her hired hands showed up. They’d been away in the fields and had prudently kept it that way. Kirsten had them help her search through the charred rubble for anything useful. Only the interior of the buildings had burned since the walls were made of adobe and stone.

  They were not going to stay at the ranch. No, she decided they would take to the hills and make camp. At least she and Ella and Maria would. The two hands could come along if they wished. She wouldn’t blame them at all if they ran for safety. If they got to the hills, they could rest and figure out what to do.

  And what would that be, she wondered despairingly? Her world was destroyed. All tangible memories of Richard, like the pajamas she’d worn, were gone in the fire. Could she start over? Would the Germans and Mexicans allow her to start over? In the meantime they would go for the hills.

  * * *

  Major George Patton led his tiny command, a score of Americans from the 7th Cavalry, right at the unsuspecting German force. It was a brave but futile effort. There were close to two hundred German cavalry including dozens with those intimidating medieval lances. At a hundred yards, Patton ordered his men to stop, pull out their rifles, and fire several shots in the Germans’ direction. He thought they’d hit a few, but couldn’t be certain.

  With a whoop, the Americans turned and raced away. Looking over his shoulder, Patton saw the infuriated German cavalry thundering towards him. Bugles sounded and still more Germans joined the atack. He had half a mile to the crossroads and his lightly encumbered men easily kept their lead, even increasing it. The Germans opened fire but their shots went wild. This is wonderful, Patton thought jubilantly.

  They passed the crossroads and continued on with the Germans in hot but ragged pursuit. When the Germans were within two hundred yards of the road, the remainder of Patton’s force from the 7th Cavalry, three hundred strong, opened fire from their concealed positions.

  The Germans panicked. Men and horses fell, tumbling over each other and creating ghastly mixed piles of human and horse flesh. God damn, Patton exulted. Didn’t the Germans give a stinking crap about the possibility of an ambush, or were they so confident and arrogant they didn’t care? He only wished he had a larger force, then he’d really kick some German ass. Too damn bad that the 7th Cavalry was scattered all over the place, same as all the other American units.

  The Germans were withdrawing in great haste. Patton and his men mounted up and moved out cautiously. “We gonna chase them, Major?” asked a young private, his face flushed with excitement.

  Patton laughed. The boy was a figh
ter. Good. The Army needed fighters. Too many men had gotten soft thanks to undemanding garrison duty. “Not this time. They’re headed to their main force and ain’t no way we can take them all on. Maybe next time.”

  They counted the German casualties. Thirty-one dead and another sixteen wounded had been left behind. Two Americans had been slightly wounded. Not a bad day’s work, Patton thought.

  A shriek from above shocked them. A German biplane was diving on them, its machine guns firing at all the foolish Americans the pilot had caught out in the open.

  Now it was the turn of Patton and the rest of the Americans to panic. Bullets tore through flesh. Men and horses screamed in pain and fear. They scattered, instinctively trying to give the German pilot little to shoot at. They scattered like three hundred rabbits running in every direction. Patton drew his new 1911 Colt Automatic and fired at the plane. The .45 caliber pistol kicked like a mule but Patton’s fury overcame it. He hit nothing.

  The German made pass after pass, shredding Patton’s command. Finally, the German flew away. Out of ammunition or low on fuel, or maybe just bored and out of targets. Patton didn’t care, just so long as it left. For whatever it was worth, he’d identified it as a Fokker VII, normally a high-altitude fighter.

  Patton was lucky to be alive, shaken but alive. Planes like the German fighter usually did not fly alone, but this one had. Had there been others, the American force would all now be dead. He gathered his men. He’d suffered twenty-four dead and forty seriously enough wounded to be out of action. One of the dead was the boy who wanted to chase the Germans. What a fucking waste, he thought. The boy was a fighter, damn it.

  Ironically, three captured German wounded had been killed by their own plane. Tough shit, Patton thought angrily. At least he still had some prisoners to be grilled. He doubted they could do anything but tell the obvious—Germany had invaded California.

  Patton’s victory was now ashes. General Connor had ordered him to avoid fighting and only gather intelligence. Connor was going to rip his ass and, deep down, Patton knew he deserved it.