December 1941

by Craig Shirley

  That said, doubts at the time persisted about the viability of capitalism. Even owners and operators of private business, such as C. M. Chester, chairman of General Foods and a high official in the National Association of Manufacturers, told their annual gathering that the “free market must prove itself.” The redoubtable Wall Street Journal was crammed with stories specifying how government was regulating businesses, pressuring them, harassing them, but also contracting with them. On Friday the fifth alone, dozens of government contracts were announced, many of them with clothing companies such as the D. & D. Shirt Co. of Pennsylvania for 50,000 flannel shirts for $24,500; or 10,000 khaki shirts from the Philadelphia QM Depot for $5,345; $2,250 to the Marine Tobacco Co. for “Tobacco, cigarettes and cigars”; and $34,510 to the Gillette Safety Razor Co. of Boston for 2,285,250 safety razors.42

  The American ambassador to Great Britain, John C. Winant, had no doubts (and no understanding) about Moscow’s commitment to the free market. He ludicrously told a prominent Jewish leader, Rabbi Morris S. Lazaron, “that Russia has turned her back on Communism in respect to the work of the individual, religious liberty and the employment of the talents of man.”43

  Audaciously, the Third Reich announced that because of the “black list” of pro-German business in the Americas produced by Washington, they would ask for reparations from the U.S. government to pay for business “losses . . . after the Reich wins the war.”44 An authoritative new book, The Structure of Nazi Economy, authored by Maxine T. Sweezy and published by the Harvard University Press, was released to favorable reviews. “As a critical study it should be of considerable interest to students of economic affairs, who will find Miss Sweezy’s discussion of Nazi policy in terms of Keynesian theory particularly rewarding,” wrote a reviewer in the Christian Science Monitor.45 The book took no political position but was simply an exhaustive look at the German economy under Hitler.

  Up on Capitol Hill, a House committee was continuing their investigation into Nazi propaganda in America and was uncovering an astonishing amount of material as well as the fact that both Italy and Nazi Germany were sending a tremendous amount of money to America to fund anti-interventionist movements including the “Citizens No Foreign War Coalition.”46 Led by Martin Dies, a Democrat from Texas, the House Committee on Un-American Activities had discovered so many German agents operating in America and so much activity, he was actually worried about the formation of a Fascist political party in America.47

  One of the organizations being investigated by the Dies Committee was the America First Committee itself, worried that it was a front group for the German Bund. It was estimated that “twenty-five percent of America First membership were Nazi sympathizers.” The rest were simply “honest American isolationists.”48 What’s more, “It is understood that the committee also has amassed a considerable amount of information about Japanese activities in the United States. This, however, has been withheld in view of the delicate situation.” Dies was further investigating “365,000 persons ostensibly Communist sympathizers.”49 Dies was heavily investigating labor unions, which his fellow Democrats—including more than a few at the White House—found grating.

  A suspected pro-Soviet group, Fight for Freedom, was under investigation by HCUA for its ties to Moscow. Another group, the Washington Youth Council, was also decidedly pro-interventionist. They heard from Senator Claude Pepper of Florida, who brought down the house when he shouted, “Adolf Hitler is a devil from hell! You had just as well try to make peace with the devil!” Pepper warned against Hitler gaining a “foothold in South America.” Other speakers included representatives of England and China.50

  What Dies and his committee did not know was the Japanese consulate in Honolulu was just a few blocks from the harbor, had a magnificent view of the fleet, and was a beehive of espionage, with detailed reports going daily to Tokyo, via radio, telegram, telephone, and the U.S. mail.51 Nor did he know that the United States was hip deep in Japanese agents and sympathizers.

  Because of their poor recruiting numbers, the navy announced that enlistment into the reserves would be cut from a minimum four-year obligation to a two-, three-, or four-year obligation. Joining the navy and seeing the world was not the cup of tea most young American men dreamed of. That could have something to do with German submarines, though not all Wolf Pack U-boats were skippered by courageous men either. The British Admiralty released the story of a U-boat that was forced to the surface as a result of repeated depth charges dropped. The commander jumped into the water before his sub was sunk by the British; some of the crew were lost. This particular German commander had no interest in going down with his ship.

  German policy toward Jewish Germans was even more cowardly than the sub’s captain. Yet another harsh edict was issued in Berlin. Jews could no longer sell their own property without “official permission” from the state. The reason given by the Nazis was that Jews were selling their possessions in a manner “that is threatening to upset existing market regulations for their respective articles.”52 “This statement . . . refers to the sale of furniture, clothing, china, rugs and similar articles by Jews who have been expecting their turn to be expelled from the Reich capital.”53

  Curiously, American Jews were not nearly unified in their approach or attitude toward Hitler, internationalism, or Roosevelt. In 1941, a considerable number of Jewish Americans were financial supporters of the America First Committee or simply pacifists that blanched at the idea of getting involved in the European conflict. A leading Jewish intellectual and member of the Roosevelt administration, Jerome Frank, published a book in 1938 titled Save America First. In his book, Frank spoke for many, calling for “100 percent American—Western Hemispheric—isolation as the only safe way to save America. . . . It by no means [argued] for pacifism, but it warned against the propaganda of American Anglo-philes, Communists and sentimental internationalists.”54

  Frank later admitted that he and others did not see Hitler for the evil monster he was in the early days and that, in fact, many Jews had at first supported Benito Mussolini. “We thought Hitler was a paranoiac buffoon with mad bad dreams of world conquest which could never come true and he was no menace to the United States. We deplored as needlessly provocative the speeches of Secretary [Harold] Ickes criticizing Hitler.”

  Franks was not alone, as he recounted other Jewish members of the administration embracing isolationism. One of the biggest proponents of the America First Committee was Lessing Rosenwald, one of the richest Jews in America. Frank wrote all this in a long and provocative article in the Saturday Evening Post. “Strangely enough, there is a group of wealthy Fascist Jews in America—a group not large in number and who have escaped public attention for the most part. Hitler is alright, they believe, except for his anti-Jewish ‘mistake.’ Even this, they half forgive because, they say, too many Jews had participated in the German democratic government established after [the] World War . . . or the German Communist movement.”55

  Frank also identified another troublesome group in America, the Christian Mobilizers, a virulently anti-Semitic group that passed out “Buy Christian” signs for window display. From the right, lecturers warned darkly about the “fifth columnists” inside the U.S. government, pro-communist forces bent on a marriage between Washington and Moscow.56

  In his piece, Frank also covered an even far more dangerous group, the German Bund. “It will help . . . to consider the Americans who are classified as German Americans. There is, unfortunately, a small percentage of such citizens who are merely Germans in America. They are hyphenates. They part their American citizenship in the middle. Their wholehearted loyalties are not given to the United States. Some of them . . . would like to see this country dominated by the Nazis.”57

  Of the many controversial members of the Roosevelt cabinet, Interior Secretary Harold Ickes was at the top of the list. His official responsibilities were the natural resources of the country, but he expanded his portfolio to include foreign policy, t
rade, Jewish affairs, immigration, gas rationing, whatever caught his attention. Widely regarded as effective and brilliant and a marvelous public speaker, he was just as effective at rubbing others the wrong way. Claire Boothe Luce once caustically said of Ickes that he had “the mind of a commissar and the soul of a meat axe.”58

  Ominously, the very first American concentration camp was opened for business on Long Island. Named Camp Upton, it had extremely high fences topped with barbed wire, machine gun nests, and was built to house up to seven hundred “aliens.”59 Meanwhile, the British began rounding up aliens of every stripe, from Finns to Romanians and Hungarians, all countries with governments allied with Nazi Germany, all countries on which England had declared war. In the initial sweep, Scotland Yard arrested two hundred suspects.60

  The East Coast was still recovering from an oil shortage that dated back to the summer of 1941, when some tankers were diverted to England to help fuel the British military effort. Fingers had been pointed at Interior Secretary Ickes, who some thought unnecessarily alarmed Americans along the Eastern Seaboard by exaggerating the situation and arbitrarily closing gas stations when he should have been calming fears.61 There had been a brief congressional investigation, but before it really got under way, the “crisis” had passed.62

  Making matters worse was the government’s order for the gasoline companies to reduce the lead content in ethyl gasoline for the war effort. All sacrifices, it seemed, were made for the “emergency” or the “war effort.” Lead had been added to gasoline for years, as it reduced engine knocking while improving engine efficiency. With the reduced lead content, drivers would have to use more gas, which was going for as much as 20 cents per gallon.63

  The war effort permeated nearly all advertising content, as with General Motors Trucks, billed as “Partners in Power for the nation’s defense.”64 And if the male reader wasn’t sure about how to enlist in the war effort, the U.S. Army was running ads everywhere for recruiting purposes, claiming over 100,000 vacancies for “picked young men” and listing various recruiting offices in Boston, Baltimore, Atlanta, and other locations. Young men who signed up right away could expect as a private to make up to $105 per month, “plus uniforms, board, lodging and medical care.”65

  American G.I.s could always count on enjoying a good bowl of Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup or any of the other twenty-one soups available in a can, including Asparagus, Consommé Madrilène, or the good old standby, Tomato.66 Campbell’s had been an American institution since a few years after the Civil War, when the company was launched.

  A new cigarette was being marketed. Spud menthol Imperials, which helped relieve a sore throat, a dry throat, a hoarse voice, or a “thick taste in the morning.”67 At Landsburgh’s jewelry store in Washington, “lovely monogrammed 10-piece cigarette sets” were going for $1.79. Their suggested gift for men was a cigarette box and nine ashtrays.68 As a suggestion for Christmas gifts, Kelly Kar Co, in Los Angeles, offered five hundred used automobiles, the prices ranging from $25 to $1,500.69 But most everybody in the West was making sacrifices.

  Canada was shipping huge amounts of food stuffs to Great Britain to help feed the troops and civilian population. They were shipping so much cheese to England, Canadians were experiencing their own shortage.70 America was sending massive amounts of food stuffs to Great Britain and Russia as well as other participants in Lend-Lease. So much so, the U.S. government was calling on American farmers to increase their output by 15 percent in 1942. “Reports from England state that cheese, dried milk, evaporated milk, dried eggs, fruit and tomato juices, poultry, meat, bacon, lard and pork products are most urgently needed.” Corrugated paper boxes, “cellophane,” tin foil, and other packaging materials were in short supply in America because so much had been shipped overseas.71

  There were only fifteen shopping days left until Christmas, and Americans were making many of their purchases at the growing number of chain department stores. Sears & Roebuck had been around for years, but others that also dotted the cities and towns of America included F. W. Woolworth, Montgomery Ward, The S.S. Kresge Co., and the Ben Franklin Five and Dime.

  In a story earning a minor headline in the Washington Evening Star, the works of a “colored artist,” William Smith, went on display in the Library of Congress as announced by the librarian there, Archibald McLeish. Smith had been near homeless, living in the basement of a theater, subsisting on potatoes, when he got some help up from the Karamu House, a “negro cultural and art center.”72

  As with most Saturday evenings, Americans were either going to the movies or listening to the radio. Nationally syndicated shows included Quiz Kids, Bill Stern’s sports show, Guy Lombardo’s Orchestra, and a top favorite, Your Hit Parade, which featured all the top songs of the week. Also heard on many stations around the country on Saturday the sixth was the show Hawaii Calls, which featured native Hawaiian music broadcast live from the Moana Hotel on Waikiki Beach, hosted by local personality Webley Edwards.73

  Late in the evening of December 5, over Italian radio and later picked up by NBC, it was broadcast that large numbers of Japanese ships were sighted north of Luzon and “south of Formosa.”

  Meanwhile in Honduras it was revealed by the government that Nazi provocateurs had been attempting to destabilize their government as well as other Central American countries “to fight against the United States.”74

  Hitler, though, was greatly occupied with the Russian Front, and went on radio in Berlin to announce he was throwing 1.5 million fresh troops, as well as one thousand big guns and eight thousand tanks, into the fight against Stalin. “It now appears that the Red capital now faces its hour of greatest peril.”75 The tenacity of Germany led Senator Burton Wheeler of Montana to predict that FDR would send at least a “token army” to England, “if the war lasts.”76

  The Russian winter had now registered 31 degrees below zero, even as the Third Reich was marching once again toward Moscow, though the Russians were heavily bombing German truck columns. Hitler was caught in the very pincer he wanted to avoid, with British bombers walloping Berlin every night from the West and a protracted struggle against the Russians in the East. Still, the predicament did not stop Germany from sinking five British ships—including a submarine—in the first few days of December just off the coast of England.77

  Hitler was frankly hoping his Japanese allies would push their invasion of China harder and cross through to Russia, creating a two-front war for Stalin. Nazi Germany had already taken 600,000 Russian troops prisoners of war, and had moved them to camps inside of Germany, where they were treated poorly, at least as compared to the treatment afforded British POWs. Germany claimed they had, all told, taken 3 million Russian troops prisoner.78

  The Germans and Russians traded charges of atrocities committed against their soldiers by the other side.79 The New York Times reported of “cannibalism” among the Soviet prisoners, according to the International Red Cross.80 The Third Reich put many of their prisoners to work in their war industry. “In the great armament plants in Saxony opened for a glimpse to the foreign press, thousands of non-Germans [labor] . . . over roaring abrasive machines . . . then trudge off to their barracks quarters, within the confines of the factory. Besides the silent Poles wearing a purple and yellow letter ‘P’ on their chests, sit those other former British allies, Croats of former Yugoslavia.”81

  Churchill’s government had to imprison one of their own, Adm. Sir Barry Domvile and his wife, Lady Domvile, accused Nazi sympathizers. Lady Margaret Domvile was a German national and her husband had, in 1937, journeyed to the Third Reich as a hunting guest of Heinrich Himmler, head of the odious Secret Police. Though retired, the admiral had once headed the office of British Naval Intelligence. The couple were both active in “the Link,” an Anglo-German group. Domvile had twice been a guest of Hitler’s, including a visit to Salzburg, just one month before the war began. Admiral Domvile was incarcerated in Brixton Prison, along with his son, and Lady Domvile was held in Hol
loway Prison.82

  As a new professional football league was contemplated, the NFL’s regular season was scheduled to end December 7. The Washington Redskins, 1941 also-rans and patsies to the Bears in the 1940 Championship game, losing 73–0, the most lopsided game in league history, were scheduled to play a meaningless game at Griffiths Field at 1:00 p.m. against the Philadelphia Eagles.83

  Starting at quarterback for the Eagles was Jack Banta, a college star whom the Redskins had drafted and then treated badly, and now Banta was aiming for revenge.84 Redskins fans were in no way fanatical about their team. The town was simply too transient; the owner, George Preston Marshall, too odious; the team too spotty; but it was a pleasant way to pass a Sunday afternoon for the high and mighty of Washington, including government officials, military brass, and the like.

  Also a bit undependable was the forty-seven-year-old ditzy socialite Tommy Manville of New York City, who just days after marrying twenty-two-year-old (asbestos) heiress Bonita Edwards found himself divorcing his fifth wife. For his troubles, Manville agreed to pay his wife a $200,000 settlement, not including alimony for their two-week marriage.85 Just as their May-December marriage had been covered in all the papers, so was their May-December divorce.

  Rita Hayworth, dubbed “The Love Goddess” by drooling newspaper columnists, was the top of the heap, flavor of the month, toast of the town actress and celebrity in December of 1941. Her photos and articles appeared everywhere, and readers of family newspapers learned all there was to learn, including her weight, which was 118 lbs.; her height, which was 5’6”; and her measurements, which were 35-25-35.86