In the spring of 1882 a General Order of extraordinary importance was issued by the Secretary of the Navy. This Order, Number 282, created the Office of Naval Intelligence. With its establishment came the systematized employment of naval attaches by the United States Navy.
The date is worthy of note, for it marks, almost to the month, the renaissance of the American navy. The termination of the Civil War and the apparent security of the nation had revived the traditional anti-navalism of the American people. Two war-scares in the time of Grant seem to have done little to save the Navy from the progressive dry rot of indifference and neglect.1 Paullin is of the opinion that less was done under President Hayes toward improving the fleet than had been accomplished under any President since Jefferson.2 This administration, however, marked the nadir of naval deterioration, for in the opening months of Garfield’s brief presidency Secretary Hunt, by instituting the Naval Advisory Board, launched a program of reconstruction and expansion which was not seriously curtailed for forty years. Some of the earliest fruits of this program were the appropriation for the first vessels of the White Squadron, the establishment of the Naval Gun Foundries, the opening of the Naval War College, and the creation of a clearing house for naval intelligence—all the product of the early eighties.
Rapid technological progress, combined with our own backwardness, necessitated an intelligence division. Yet even before the acknowledged age of steam the Navy had sought to acquire knowledge from abroad. In 1827 the Secretary of the Navy, Samuel L. Southard, wrote a letter to the American Minister in London, worth quoting in its entirety. It read:
It is an object of great interest with this department to have accurate information of everything connected with the naval force of other nations; and important benefits may result from your kindness and attention to my wishes on this subject. May I, therefore, beg the favor of you, from time to time, to communicate to me such information respecting the naval force of Great Britain, or other nations, as you may be able to procure without inconvenience; especially respecting the number, situation, use, and employment of their vessels; the number, character, etc., of their navy and dock yards; the number and mode of furnishing their seamen; the means of educating their officers; the amount and character of the expenditures; and, generally, anything which will enable this department completely to comprehend the extent and character of the naval means of the nation. Copies of the annual detailed estimates for the service would be useful.3
Similar letters were sent to Ministers or representatives of the United States at St. Petersburg, Stockholm, Paris, Madrid, Lisbon, Algiers, Mexico, Guatemala, Bogota, Lima, Valparaiso, Buenos Aires, and Rio de Janeiro. Even before this we had maintained agents of one kind or another in foreign capitals and ports. In Revolutionary days, for example, such men as Silas Deane, Arthur Lee, John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin manned our naval office in Paris and supervised the work of adjutants in various French ports and in a few in Spain and Holland. Or one may cite Oliver Pollock and William Bingham, responsible for our naval interests, also during the Revolution, in Louisiana and the West Indies.4 During the Civil War, when our regular naval agents abroad had been for the most part discontinued because of the few American warships remaining in foreign waters,5 the North dispatched William H. Aspinwall and John M. Forbes to England to report the construction of warships in private shipyards and to forestall any attempts of the Confederates to acquire them. The South was served by Captain James D. Bulloch, whose services ashore in this capacity were deemed more valuable than any he could render afloat.6
With the exception of Bulloch these men were not naval officers, and they served, for the most part, not as expert professional observers but as negotiators, purchasing agents, administrators, and diplomats. Indeed, before the advent of steam there was little need for technical observation. But when steam- driven machinery first challenged and then gradually but inexorably routed canvas a relatively static period came to an end, and an endless procession of experiments and innovations in all fields of naval science commanded the attention of maritime powers. The Navy recognized that we might learn from Europe, and especially from Great Britain, and thus in 1854, at a time when our clipper ships held unrivalled sway in the trade lanes, it dispatched Engineer-in-Chief Daniel B. Martin to Europe to study steam machinery, with “especial reference to improvements in screw propellers.”7
The inventions mothered by the grim necessities of war made us the world’s teacher from 1861 to 1865. Thereafter the naval stagnation following the conflict naturally stifled experimentation and research. Nevertheless, a number of outstanding naval officers, constructors, and engineers continued to travel about Europe by order of the Department. James W. King is an example- Shortly after the war he was sent abroad to visit the dockyards of England and France. In 1869, soon after his appointment as Chief of the Navy’s Bureau of Steam Engineering) he returned to Europe to investigate the progress being made with compound engines. Sent abroad again in 1873, he collected information regarding various useful naval appliances; and his visit of 1875-76, when he was directed “to examine and report on ships of war and the mercantile marine,” resulted in a report, by order of the Senate, entitled European Ships of War, which was reprinted in England.8
Between 1870 and 1872 an ordnance mission was maintained abroad. In this connection the instructions given to Commander Edward Simpson, Sr., bring to mind those issued to naval attaches a generation later. “You are at liberty,” wrote Secretary Robeson, “to embrace . . . everything belonging to the profession that may in your judgment be likely to prove of advantage to our naval service, more especially, however, to that branch of it with which you are at present connected.”9 Simpson was furnished with letters of introduction to our Ministers abroad; thus armed, and aided for a time by Lieutenant Commander J. D. Marvin, he pursued his investigations in England, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Austria, Sweden, France, Russia, and Holland.10 He found his work to some extent hindered by the Franco- Prussian War; but late in 1870 the Department ordered Commodore C. R. P. Rodgers, “inasmuch as many interesting events are now taking place in Europe, and, as a great many changes in Naval matters may occur,” to present himself to our Ministers and thus obtain access to foreign naval establishments. Rodgers was expected to procure information regarding such matters as enlistment of seamen, equipment of ships, methods of discipline, management of navy yards, and ironclad vessels; unless otherwise ordered he was expected to confine his operations to England, France, and Prussia.11
Two years later the Secretary of the Navy informed Commander Francis M. Ramsay that the Department had decided to keep an officer in Europe “for the purpose of inquiring into, and examining the various improvements which have been, and are being made in matters relating to Naval Ordnance.” Ramsay was instructed to proceed to England and to report to Captain Simpson “as his relief, and also to our Minister in England, as Naval Attaché to his Legation.”12 To my knowledge, this is the first time that this title was applied to an American naval officer.13 Ramsay’s activities, unlike those of later attaches, were not to be confined to the country to which he was accredited. It is also noteworthy that his name is not given in the diplomatic lists of the Almanack de Gotha and that the Navy Register describes his assignment as merely “special ordnance duty, Europe.”14 Nor does it appear that when Ramsay was called home in 1873 any special relief was provided.
No other American naval officer, stationed in the European area, seems to have enjoyed the title of naval attaché until 1882, though even in these niggardly years we sent such observers abroad as Lieutenants French E. Chadwick, B. H. Buckingham, and Edward W. Very, and Commander William N. Jeffers, whose responsibilities were considerably augmented by the expanding exploitation of electricity, then attracting popular attention.15 It was also during this period that the Congressional appropriations for the collection and classification of information from abroad originated, the first dating from June 30, 1876.16 Beyond the European region one officer was recognized as a naval attaché at this time. In 1881 the Secretary of State requested that “a naval officer of adequate rank and reputation” be attached to the United States Legation at Peking and recommended Commodore Robert W. Shufeldt for the assignment. Here the issues were considerably different from those behind Ramsay’s appointment. The United States was seeking a treaty with Korea. For four years Shufeldt labored, first through the Japanese and then through the Chinese, to secure it. His efforts were finally crowned with success, after he had obtained the backing of the powerful Chinese Viceroy, Li Hung Chang, whom he aided in the reorganization of the Chinese navy.17
Thus, by 1882, some of the agencies and techniques for acquiring naval information had been employed, some of them for many years; but as yet there was little continuity of policy. Most of the missions were of a specialized, and all were of a temporary, character, and there existed no central office to systematize and correlate activities relating to general naval intelligence. As early as 1869 the Secretary of the Navy had directed the Bureau of Navigation “to collect information about foreign navies and other naval data.”18 Thirteen years later the Office of Naval Intelligence was set up within this Bureau. It was headed by Lieutenant Theodorus B. M. Mason, who was known as Chief Intelligence Officer, and in 1883 it employed nine junior officers.19 Mason had in 1878 been given leave to travel in Europe, where he was accorded the means, through our legations, of reporting on naval matters; later, while serving off the South American coast, he had prepared several useful reports on the operations in the war between Chile, Peru, and Bolivia.20 An experienced intelligence officer, he deserves much credit for the organization and early development of the Office which, established without legislative sanction, and therefore without appropriations; at first occupied a weak and sometimes orphan-like position. First set up in the Bureau of Navigation, it was transferred in 1890 to the re-established office of the Assistant Secretary, only to be returned to the Bureau in 1898; in 1909 it was placed Under the Aide for Operations and six years later was de- dared one of the nine subdivisions of the Office of Chief of Naval Operations. Since it lacked funds some of its clerks were borrowed from the various Bureaus or from the Washington Navy Yard, while others were paid out of appropriations for the “increase of the navy.”21 Not until after the Spanish- American War did Congress provide for its regular maintenance, authorizing the employment, in 1899, of five clerks, a translator, a draftsman, and a laborer, and granting an appropriation of $9,260.22
The objectives of the Office were comprehensively set forth by Secretary Chandler to Lieutenant Mason on July 25, 1882. The Office was “to collect, compile, record and correct information” on the cruising fleets, war material, and nautical personnel of foreign powers; on the armaments of foreign ports, and on “the facilities of foreign governments for transporting troops and material and for improvising torpedo boats and torpedo defences.” The “facilities on foreign coasts and in foreign ports for landing men and supplies” and “for obtaining coals and supplies in all quarters of the globe” were to be investigated, as were “the actual capabilities of foreign merchant Steamers and the true routes followed by regular Steamship lines.” It was to procure information regarding our own Navy, Merchant Marine, and coastal defenses as well as that “which may be of use to our officers in their professional studies” and to our Merchant Marine.23 Another function of the Office, not mentioned by Chandler, was the promotion of amicable relations between the United States and other nations through the accommodation of foreign naval officers, and especially attachés.24
Although the Office encountered some opposition at first, chiefly from sensitive individuals who feared encroachments upon their jurisdictions, it appears to have soon justified its existence and to have attracted favorable comment at home and abroad. Writing in 1889, Captain John G. Walker, Chief of the Bureau of Navigation, declared that “its value to naval legislation, and to naval administration, is now fully realized,” while in 1896 Secretary Herbert maintained that it was “equal if not superior to any similar office abroad” and that “it would be very hard to exaggerate its importance.”25 As early as 1888 it received flattering notice from the British Army and Navy Gazette, which recommended its methods to the British authorities.26
In the performance of its functions the Office, from the very first, relied principally upon the efforts of naval attaches, stationed abroad. The employment of military and naval attaches by European states dates from the sixties; by 1870 they were maintaining about thirty of these officials in their diplomatic missions.27 The mecca of naval attaches was, of course, London. Thither France had sent an attaché as early as 1870; by 1882 her example had been followed by Russia, Austria-Hungary, Persia, Turkey, Brazil, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Argentina, Japan, Chile, and the United States.28 Very few were sent elsewhere in this period. In 1870 Britain had naval attaches in Paris, St. Petersburg, and Washington; the following year she appointed Captain James G. Good- enough “naval attaché to the Maritime Courts of Europe, with orders to visit the different arsenals of the Continent, and to report to the Foreign Office upon the navies of the European powers.”29 This officer had formerly served in the United States, where he had been sent in 1862 on a special mission to investigate the naval developments fostered by the Civil War; his itinerary had included the transplanted Naval Academy, of which he gained a favorable impression, gun foundries in Pittsburgh, various navy yards, and the camp of the Federal troops before Charleston.30 He returned to England in 1864, but the following year another Briton, Captain John Bythesea, crossed the Atlantic, the first of a long line of officers formally accredited as naval attaches to the United States.31 Great Britain was the only power so represented there until 1873, when Spain and Peru sent attaches. Germany and Brazil followed suit a year later.32
Such were the conditions when, in a letter to the Secretary of State dated October 26, 1882, Secretary Chandler requested that Lieutenant Commander French E. Chadwick, then in Europe engaged upon some important investigations for the Navy Department, “be appointed Naval Attaché to the Legation in London, without pay, to continue during the period for which this Department may desire to continue his services at that point.”33 Chandler’s request was granted, and for over six years Chadwick held the London post. Chadwick had been sent to England with orders, dated July 12, 1882, to report on the coast guard, lifesaving, meteorological, and hospital services; the administration of the lighthouse service; the inspection of vessels, chain cables, and anchors; the examination and certification of merchant marine officers, and other matters. In addition he was expected to obtain from the London embassies of Russia, Sweden and Norway, Denmark, Germany, Holland, and Belgium details regarding the administration of the lighthouse service of those countries, and he was authorized to visit such points in Holland, Belgium, Germany, and Sweden as might yield desired information. Our legation in London was to offer every possible assistance. The appointment as naval attaché was designed further to facilitate the accomplishment of these aims.34
The selection of Chadwick was a singularly happy one. Belonging to the small group of scientific and learned naval officers, which included such men as Mahan and Sampson, he exhibited an unusual talent for observing foreign navies and acquiring information useful for our program of naval reconstruction. His earlier investigations in 1879 regarding European systems for training seamen had resulted in a report which, when published, took its place among the standard works, and this was but one of the products of his pen.35 In his annual report for 1889 Secretary Tracy singled out Chadwick for commendation; referring to the attaché’s “untiring and successful efforts,” he declared that his “extraordinary ability and judgment during six years of difficult service in England and on the Continent have had a lasting influence upon naval development in this country.”36 It was with some reluctance that he was finally withdrawn from London, but his intimate knowledge of foreign naval establishments was to serve him and his country well in such posts as Chief of the Bureau of Equipment, Chief Intelligence Officer, and President of the Naval War College.
Chadwick’s orders were practically duplicated by those, of the same date, issued to Lieutenant John C. Soley, who was assigned to temporary duty in France for the general purpose “of obtaining full and accurate information in reference to the organization of certain branches of the Naval administration in that country.” As in Chadwick’s case, he was to make periodic reports to the Bureau of Navigation, and could depend upon assistance from our legation. Unlike Chadwick, he was not granted the title of naval attaché, and in the biannual issues of the Navy Register in 1883 and 1884 he is listed as on leave of absence.37 The first officer to be sent to Paris as a recognized naval attaché was Lieutenant B. H. Buckingham, who was also accredited to Berlin and St. Petersburg.38 This was in 1885. He had already served an apprenticeship at the Paris Exhibition; and in 1882, with Ensigns George C. Foulk and Walter MacLean, he had traveled from the Asiatic Station to the United States through Siberia and Europe, recording his impressions in Observations upon the Korean Coast, Japanese-Korean Ports, and Siberia, the first work to be published by the office of Naval Intelligence in its General Information Series. After more than three years on the Continent he was sent to London to relieve Chadwick; there he remained until he was detached upon the arrival of the Squadron of Evolution, late in 1889. In the same year he attended the important Samoan Conference in Berlin.39
In the meantime our naval attachés had secured legislative recognition. In 1888 Congress sanctioned an appropriation to be used “in maintenance of students and attachés, and information from abroad, and the collection and classification thereof.”40 This act marks the beginning of the more or less steady expansion of the attaché system. The year 1888 saw Buckingham’s triple assignment conferred upon Lieutenant Aaron Ward,41 and a new post, embracing Italy and Austria-Hungary, was taken by Lieutenant Nathan Sargent.42 Thus the dawning nineties found the Navy represented by three officers in six European capitals. In 1892, probably in recognition of developing political alignments among the European powers, we transferred Germany from the naval attaché who was also accredited to France and Russia to him who was responsible in Austria- Hungary and Italy. Of the six great powers only Britain was considered worthy of the undivided attentions of an American naval attaché.
With one exception no attaché was during these years accredited to a non-European state. The exception was Ensign George C. Foulk; the state was Korea. Reference has already been made to the unusual task of Commodore Shufeldt. His work was carried on by Foulk. Upon the return of the first Korean mission to the United States, in 1883, he was ordered to accompany it to Seoul and to report to our Minister there, General Lucius H. Foote, as naval attaché under special instructions from the Navy Department. Acting always with Foote’s advice, he was “to proceed to collect for transmission to the Department ... all such information on Korea as may be useful and interesting to this government and the public at large.”43 Korea, having been opened to the West, was at this time an arena in which Japanese and Chinese, as well as British and Russian, interests were contending for supremacy. Foulk, ever a lover of Japan, supported with Foote the pro-Japanese Korean progressives. As persona grata to the Korean King he was not without influence, and although neglected, frequently unpaid, sickly, and surrounded by intrigue, he exhibited creditable skill as a diplomat. When, after disturbances in 1884, Foote left Seoul, Foulk remained as chargé d’affaires.44 In the end, however, the Chinese interests proved too strong for him. The Korean Foreign Office requested his recall, and in 1887 he was ordered to report to the Marion.45 Frustrated in his purposes in Korea, he now sought to be sent as naval attaché to Japan.46 In this, too, he was unsuccessful, though he won commendation for his work in Seoul. He resigned from the service in 1889 and died four years later in Japan, where he had wed a Japanese.47
It was not until eight years after Foulk’s premature attempt to represent the Navy at Tokyo that Commander Francis M. Barber was given this assignment. The victory of Japan over China in 1894 signalized the advent of a new power worthy of international consideration; the presence of our naval attaché in Tokyo in 1895, when the Treaty of Shimonoseki was made, showed that the Navy appreciated this fact. Even so, we left the post unfilled from 1895 until 1898. Thereafter, with new responsibilities in the western Pacific, it was regularly occupied. Barber served also in the capital of the Manchus, as did all our naval attaches to Japan between 1895 and 1914. For some months in 1907 and 1908, when the White Fleet was circumnavigating the globe and visiting Japan en route, Commander John A. Dougherty concentrated on the Tokyo assignment, while Lieutenant Commander Irvin V. G. Gillis took care of Peking. In the following year, however, the two posts were reunited under Captain James H. Sears.48
The year 1895 also marked the temporary recognition of Madrid as an outpost for naval intelligence. Concerned about our deteriorating relations with Spain, the Department added this capital to the assignment of Lieutenant Commander Raymond P. Rodgers, who had represented the Navy in Paris and St. Petersburg since 1892. The same three-cornered duty was originally given to Lieutenant William S. Sims, Rodgers’ relief, but before he reached Paris, in March, 1897, his Spanish appointment was revoked. The post was now considered worthy of a fulltime attaché; Lieutenant George L. Dyer took it over in July, 1897, and remained until the commencement of hostilities.49 So complete was the ensuing naval bankruptcy of Spain that only the exigencies of another and greater war induced us to send a successor to Dyer.
Gathering war clouds account for another temporary appointment a few years later. This time the arena was Venezuela. Here, in order to enforce the payment of debts, Great Britain and Germany co-operated in 1902 to the extent of imposing a joint naval blockade and seizing Venezuelan gunboats. Sensible of the threat to the Monroe Doctrine, President Roosevelt held our warships in readiness in Puerto Rican waters until a proposal for arbitration was accepted. To Caracas we sent Lieutenant Marbury Johnston, first as assistant to our Minister and then as naval attaché. He arrived late in 1902 and remained for nearly a year.50
Aside from this extraordinary assignment the United States accredited no naval attaché to a Latin American capital until 1910. In that year, which marked the centenary of the independence of Argentina and Chile, Commander Albert P. Niblack assumed his duties in Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, and Santiago. One of the most competent and experienced of our attachés, Niblack had already worked in Berlin, Rome, and Vienna.51 Until our entry into World War I we maintained naval attaches in no other Latin American states, and none was sent to a Central American nation until 1930.52 Indeed, if we except the Netherlands, to which Lieutenant Commander Frederick A. Traut, already on duty in Berlin, was accredited in 1911, this completes the list of posts established before 1917.53
The entry of the United States into the war, while it perforce brought about the withdrawal of naval attaches from Berlin and Vienna, stimulated the further extension of the corps. On the Continent our attaches or assistant attachés now appeared for the first time in Christiania, Stockholm, Copenhagen, and Lisbon. For the first time a Marine served as naval attaché: Lieu tenant Colonel James C. Breckinridge, with headquarters at Christiania; and in Lieutenant Commander Edward Breck, at Lisbon, the Reserve officers were for the first time represented.54 In Latin America four states now received their first attachés. To Peru and Ecuador we dispatched Reginald F. Nicholson, a retired Rear Admiral. Lieutenant Commander Carlos V. Cusachs was sent to Havana, where he performed the duties of naval adviser to the Cuban government and of naval attaché, and Lieutenant Charles B. Dana went to Uruguay.55
Thus the system grew, from the isolated Chadwick in 1882 to the corps of a dozen attachés and numerous assistants, accredited to nineteen capitals, during World War I. By 1914, among fifteen nations that maintained 85 naval attaches, the United States was tied with Japan for fourth place. These two countries were content with eight attachés; Britain, Russia, and Brazil employed more.56 In that year eight foreign powers were sending naval representatives to Washington, Austria-Hungary, Brazil, Chile, France, Germany, Great Britain, Japan, and Russia.57 In the major capitals of the world, save for one or two brief interludes, the line of succession of our attaches had been unbroken from the start. When we took up arms in 1917 we had maintained a naval attaché in London for 35 years; in Paris, Berlin, and St. Petersburg for nearly 32; in Rome and Vienna for 29; and in Peking and Tokyo for 19.
Prior to the outbreak of World War I the practice of accrediting naval attaches to but one power was the exception rather than the rule. From 1885 to 1892 one officer served Paris, Berlin, and St. Petersburg; thereafter the French and Russians continued to share the same man until 1914. Rome and Vienna did likewise from 1888 to 1914. From 1892 to 1907, and again in 1908-09, the surveillance of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy fell to a single attaché. Except for a few months in 1907 and 1908 one attaché had to suffice for both Japan and China until 1914. Argentina, Brazil, and Chile constituted a circuit for Niblack, when he was sent out in 1910. Before 1907 all countries regularly receiving naval attaches, except Britain, shared them. In that year the increasing importance of German navalism was recognized, and Lieutenant Commander Howard was divested of his responsibilities in Austria-Hungary and Italy. Yet within a few years The Hague was paired with Berlin. In 1912 Argentina and Chile received individual attaches, and in 1914 Brazil. With the coming of the war specialization was fostered, for political, military, and technological reasons. Embattled Austria could no longer be expected to share an attaché with neutral Italy. Within a month after the opening of hostilities had well-nigh isolated France from her Russian ally we had Lieutenant Commander Major in Paris and Captain McCully in St. Petersburg. By the autumn of 1914 we had full-time attaches in Tokyo and Peking.58
The wars of the period also furthered the employment of assistant naval attaches, and added naval constructors, interpreters, and other experts to the staffs maintained abroad. As early as 1898, when we were embroiled with Spain, we sent Ensign Arthur B. Hoff to act as assistant naval attaché in London. During the Russo-Japanese War we dispatched assistants to both belligerent capitals. Although we established no new posts in 1914, before the year was out we had sent assistants to Great Britain, France, and Germany, and before the war was over we had stationed them in the capitals of Sweden, Italy, the Netherlands, Brazil, Chile, Denmark, Ecuador, Peru, Spain, Norway, and Japan. It is significant that Lieutenant John H. Towers and First Lieutenant Bernard L. Smith, both specialists in aeronautics, were added respectively to the London and Paris staffs in October, 1914. In time of peace such aides were not usually employed; but it should be noted that as early as 1910 junior officers were sent to the Japanese capital, where, serving under the naval attaché, they studied the native tongue. In 1912 there were two Lieutenants in Berlin under Captain Niblack, and in 1911-12 assistant naval attaches were assigned to Tokyo and Peking, and to Buenos Aires and Santiago.59
To this sketch of the early expansion of the naval attaché system some reference to the qualifications, training, and responsibilities of the personnel is germane. The selection of a naval attaché was, and still is, complicated by the fact that his duties must to some extent straddle two disciplines: those of naval science and diplomacy. Named by the Secretary of the Navy, he must be thoroughly conversant with the latest developments in his profession; commissioned by the Secretary of State and serving under our Ambassadors and Ministers, he incurs both the privileges and the responsibilities of the diplomat. His aptitude in the latter field has sometimes greatly determined his efficacy in the former.
Another factor which in this period affected the appointment of our attaches was the disparity between their allowances and their expenditures. Chadwick’s financial support has already been noted. The appropriation, first voted in 1888, helped somewhat. When Ward and Emory went abroad in 1889 they were granted $100 monthly to cover any extraordinary expense incurred in the line of duty; this was in addition to an allowance for routine and traveling expenses.60 Yet a few years later Sims one of the ablest attaches, delayed accepting the Paris-St. Petersburg-Madrid assignment because he feared that “the expenses . . . would be more than a chap without private means could stand.”61 As late as 1919 the expense allowance was conceded to be at times inadequate; according to the Army and Navy Register it was common knowledge that “an officer assigned to duty as military or naval attaché must be ready to draw on his personal resources at any time for the benefit of his country with little hope that the expenditure of his own funds in any such direction will ever be made good out of the public treasury.”62 Writing in 1919, Admiral Niblack, then head of the Office of Naval Intelligence, declared that “there has seldom been a case where a naval attaché has gone abroad where he could live on his pay and perform the duty expected of him.”63 There is no doubt that this condition contributed to the prejudice that the office was principally ornamental and social in character, and a soft berth for officers of private means.
Linguistic competence might well be regarded as a further restriction in the selection of attachés. In individual cases it doubtless played an important part. Sims declared that had he not requested a year’s leave in 1888 to study French in France he would never have been attaché there. Foulk’s linguistic skill furthered his interests in Korea. Aaron Ward, who had attended schools in Germany and France before entering the Naval Academy, spoke French, Spanish, Italian, and Russian fluently. George Dyer had been head of the Department of Foreign Languages at the Naval Academy for three years before he went to Madrid.64 Yet Lieutenant Bernadou, who knew Russian well enough to translate Vice Admiral Makaroff’s Discussion of Questions in Naval Tactics for the Office of Naval Intelligence, served in Rome and Vienna, not in St. Petersburg. In general, linguistic ability was not a prime requisite. In the words of Niblack: “Given the knowledge of methods and the desire to acquire information, the knowledge of the language is somewhat secondary.” It was easier to hire interpreters than trained naval observers.
The principal school for naval attaches was the Office of Naval Intelligence. In organizing this Office in 1882 Secretary Chandler had ruled that “only such officers as have shown an aptitude for intelligence- staff work or who by their intelligence and knowledge of foreign languages and drawing give promise of such aptitude, should be employed,” and further, that a record of such officers be preserved.65 Before assuming their duties abroad officers designated as naval attachés were assigned temporarily to the Office; there they might consult the files and visit other offices of the Department, informing themselves of the latest domestic naval developments, familiarizing themselves with the conditions—especially naval—in the country or countries to which they would soon travel, and ascertaining the requirements of the various authorities. Many of the attaches, however, received more than this brief indoctrination, some spending several years and more than one tour of duty in the Office. For example, Lieutenant John C. Colwell, our representative in London from 1897 to 1900, was attached to the Office from 1885 until 1888, and again in 1893 and 1894; Lieutenant Commander William L. Howard served in the Office from 1887 to 1889 and in 1899-1900 before he was sent to Berlin in 1904; Commander John B. Bernadou went to Rome in 1907 after Washington tours of duty in 1888-91 and 1903-04. Lieutenant Raymond P. Rodgers, sent to Paris in 1892, had headed the Office from 1885 to 1889, and Commander Richardson Clover turned from administering the Office to be attaché to London at the turn of the century.66 The selection of the Chief Intelligence Officers from men already experienced as naval attachés did not, on the other hand, become a fixed policy. Of the fifteen Chiefs between 1882 and 1917 only four, Raymond P. Rodgers, French E. Chadwick, Charles E. Vreeland, and Templin M. Potts, had served such an apprenticeship.67 Obviously the Office did not provide all the instruction. Further training was furnished by the seasoned attaches, who were held responsible for the breaking in of their reliefs. Before a post changed hands, the appointee and his predecessor would work together, sometimes for a month, until the former could reasonably be expected to carry on from where the latter left off.. Together they would visit naval bases, shipyards, and arsenals; necessary introductions would be performed; and the tricks of the trade would be revealed.68
Once indoctrinated, the naval attaché could look forward to from one to three years at his post or posts. Chadwick’s stretch of over six years in London was never equalled by any other attaché; the second longest tour of duty was served by Lieutenant Commander Charles R. Train, stationed in Rome from 1914 to 1919. As a rule such duty came but once to an officer, but there were some exceptions. Niblack represented us in Berlin, Rome, and Vienna in 1897-98, and in Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, and Santiago in 1910-11, whence he again went to Berlin. Sims was at Paris and St. Petersburg at the turn of the century; with our entry into World War I he was sent to London. Lieutenant Commander Irving V. G. Gillis was three times attaché to Peking. Commander Francis M. Barber served in Tokyo and Peking in 1895; at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War he was recalled from retirement and sent to Berlin and her satellite capitals, the first retired officer to join the ranks of attachés. Commander John H. Gibbons, in London from 1905 to 1909, was also summoned from retirement and sent to Buenos Aires in 1917.69
The earliest attachés had the rank of Lieutenant or Lieutenant Commander. If we exclude Ramsay and Shufeldt it was not until 1895 that an officer of higher rank became an attaché. Charles H. Stockton, stationed in London from 1903 to 1905, was the first with Captain’s rank. Before 191.7 no Rear Admiral was so employed. Throughout the whole period the attachés were most commonly picked from the Lieutenant Commander group, but there was a growing tendency to send men of higher rank abroad, and when we entered the war in 1917 we had no attaches of lower rank.70
There can be no doubt that the remarkable modernization and increased efficiency of the United States Navy, first demonstrated to the world in Philippine and Cuban waters, were in considerable measure due to the creditable—and sometimes prodigious—labors of these men, labors so varied, extensive, and complex that they cannot be particularized in an essay such as this. We have already noted the objective of the Office of Naval Intelligence. The extent to which an intelligent and energetic officer sought to achieve them is impressively illustrated in the 22 letterpress books of Lieutenant Sims, comprising 11,000 pages filled by that officer in two years, and devoted to such varied subjects as a new naphtha factory in Russia, a French method of training carrier pigeons, the location and importance of new bases, and, cum grano salts, a proposal to construct a submarine capable of making from 50 to 80 knots when submerged!71 Sims, indeed, was an extraordinary man, but he was trying to surpass the record of his predecessor; and even a casual inspection of the collections of the Office of Naval Records and Library and of the National Archives should counteract the impression that the naval attaché invariably enjoyed a sinecure.
Constant travel and attendance at official functions devoured the attaché’s time. Even in peacetime the naval enterprises and policies of strange lands, in an age which produced the dreadnought, the torpedo, the submarine, oil fueling, electrification, wireless communication, and the seaplane—to mention but a few developments—challenged his alertness and professional and diplomatic resources. When war came the pace quickened and the responsibilities increased. Then, as happened during the Spanish-American War and to an even greater degree after 1914, he found that to his regular duties were added such assignments as the purchase of war materials and the forwarding of precise reports of marine activities. Others must have thought what Sims, in characteristic fashion, wrote: “I don’t like the job so far. Your work is never done, and never will be ... I will be very busy for at least a year, and after that just busy.”72
In the development of the Monroe Doctrine it became evident that there were two dominating motives underlying it all: (1) the desire for national safety against foreign aggression, and (2) the realization of our paramount standing in this hemisphere.—Dealey “Lectures.”
1. The Virginias episode of 1873 was followed in 1875 by another threat of war with Spain, which caused the Navy Department to concentrate the fleet at Port Royal, S. C., and to order home some ships from Europe and South America.
2. C. O. Paullin, “A Half Century of Naval Administration in America, 1861-1911,” (part V: ‘‘Naval Ships and Congressional Investigations, 1869-1881”), U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings, Sept., 1913, p. 1219.
3. Ibid., 1252-53
4. See Dictionary of American Biography.
5. Paullin, op. cit., (part I: “The Navy Department during the Civil War, 1861-1865”), U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings, Dec., 1912, p. 1326.
6. J. H. Latané, A History of American Foreign Policy, 429.
7. General Letter Book, No. 50 (May 9, 1854), in Naval Records Collection of the Office of Naval Records and Library, National Archives.
8. L. R. Hamersly, The Records of Living Officers of the U. S. Navy and Marine Corps (5th edition, 1894), 364. King’s The War-ships and Navies of the World (1880) was referred to in the House of Commons as the best available authority. He also wrote The War-ships of Europe (1878).
9. Report on a Naval Mission to Europe, especially Devoted to the Material and Construction of Artillery (Washington, 1873), 1,3.
10. Ibid., I, 9-11. Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 1, pp. 276-77 (Naval Records Collection, National Archives).
11. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 42, p. 63 (Nov. 8, 1870), Bureau of Navigation Records, National Archives.
12. Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 3, p. 73 (Sept. 6,1872).
13. Henry P. Beers, in his “Development of the Office of Naval Operations,” a manuscript in the Naval Records Collection, National Archives, states that the Navy desired to send an attaché abroad in 1869.
14. Register of the Commissioned, Warrant, and Volunteer Officers of the Navy of the United States, including Officers of the Marine Corps and Others, hereinafter cited as Navy Register (July 1,1873), 10.
15. For Chadwick, see below, p. 666. Buckingham and Very were ordered to report to U. S. Commissioner R. C. McCormick for special duty at the Paris Exhibition in 1878. Jeffers was permitted to go where he saw fit, provided that he should visit the Electrical Exhibition at Paris. Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 7, p. 438 (Feb. 20, 1878); Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 49, p. 310 (Dec. 21, 1877); ibid., No. 52, p. 152 (June 7, 1881).
18. U. S. Statutes at Large, 1875-77, 44th Cong., Sess. I, chap. 159, p. 66.
17. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 52, p. 38 (Mar. 18,1881); C. O. Paullin, Diplomatic Negotiations of American Naval Officers, 1778-1883, 303-4. For Shufeldt’s diplomatic career see ibid., 293 et seq.; also Dictionary of American Biography.
18. Beers, op. cit., 15.
19. For the General Order No. 292 (Mar. 23, 1882) establishing the Office see M. S. Thompson, General Orders and Circulars Issued by the Navy Department from 1863 to 1887, 208. In 1885 the War Department set up a permanent Military Intelligence Bureau; see Dictionary of American History. In 1911 “Chief Intelligence Officer” was changed to “Director of Naval Intelligence.”
20. His historical sketch of this war was published as Vol. II, War Series, Office of Home Intelligence.
21. The civilian staff was, of course, small. One stenographer, two clerks, and a laborer comprised it in 1889. See Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy (1889), 308.
22. U. S. Statutes at Large, 1897-99, 55th Cong., Sess. Ill, chap. 187, p. 874; Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy (1898), I, 322; ibid. (1899), 464-66. By 1916 this appropriation had risen to only $12,300; for the fiscal year 1945-46 it is $158,500. These appropriations were in addition to those for “maintenance of attaches and others abroad,” which date from 1888.
23. Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 12, pp. 56-57 (July 25, 1882). See also Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy (1883), I, 26.
24. Ibid. (1920), 157.
25. Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy (1889), 299; ibid. (1896), 49. See ibid. (1898), I, 379 for a more critical appraisal.
26. Army and Navy Gazette, Oct. 6, 1888, p. 786.
27. Capitaine Beauvais, Attachés Militaires, Attaches Navals, el Attachés de L’Air, 42-43. Fifty years later there were some 300 military and naval attaches; in 1936 more than 450, including those for air.
28. See the issues of the Almanack de Gotha of the period.
29. The Journal of Commodore Goodenough, edited with a memoir by his widow, 103.
30. Ibid., 61-62; and see Dictionary of National Biography.
31. Who Was Who, 1897-1916.
32. See the Almanach de Gotha.
33. Executive Letter Book, No. 35, p. 151 (Oct. 26, 1882), Naval Records Collection, National Archives. “Without pay” means that he received no pay beyond that of his rank. He was allowed to draw upon an account with a London banking house, however (Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 12, p. 293, Dec. 5, 1882).
34. Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 12, pp. 32-33 (July 12, 1882) and p. 118 (Aug. 22, 1882); Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 33, p. 369 (Oct. 28,1882).
35. Senate Executive Document, No. 52, 46 Cong., 2 Sess. Chadwick was an ardent student of history; his numerous publications between 1892 and 1916 include works on the Civil War and on Spanish-American relations. See Dictionary of American Biography.
36. Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy (1889), 7.
37. Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 12, pp. 30-32 (July 12, 1882), p. 117 (Aug. 22, 1882), p. 161 (Sept. 21, 1882); Officers’ Letters, Sept. 1882, No. 7, in Naval Records Collection, National Archives.
38. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 56, p. 65 (Nov. 11, 1885).
39. Hamersly, op. cit., 185.
40. U.S. Statutes at Large, 1887-89, 50th Cong., Sess. I, chap. 991, p. 459.
41. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 58, p. 241 (Dec. 26, 1888); Army and Navy Journal, July 13,1918, p. 1754.
42. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 58, p. 196 (Nov. 20, 1888).
43. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 54, p. 317 (Nov. 1, 1883); Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 14, pp. 27-28, 52 (Nov. 3 and 12, 1883). Foulk, as noted above, had just returned from a trip through Korea and Siberia.
44. Officers’ Letters, Dec. 1884, No. 348. For a detailed account of Foulk’s work see F. H. Harrington, God, Mammon, and the Japanese; also Dictionary of American Biography.
45. Harrington, op. cit., 221-25
46. Letter of Lt. (j.g.) George C. Foulk to Secretary Whitney, Nov. 8, 1887 (Class 2, ZB, Naval Records Collection, National Archives).
47. Dictionary of American Biography.
48. See List and Station of the Commissioned and Warrant Officers of the Navy of the United States and of the Marine Corps, on the Active List, hereinafter cited as Navy List (July 1, 1895), 8; ibid. (July 1, 1907), 10, 15; Navy Register (Jan. 1,1909), 10.
49. Ibid. (Jan. 1, 1893), 16; ibid. (Jan. 1, 1896), 12; ibid. (Jan. 1, 1898), 16; Navy List (July 1, 1897), 13, 56; E. E. Morison, Admiral Sims and the Modern American Navy, 48-49, 54.
50. Navy List (July 1, 1903), 12, 97; Army and Navy Register, Mar. 24, 1934, p. 232.
51. Navy List (June 1,1910), 24; Dictionary of American Biography.
52. Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy (1930), 111.
53. Navy List (June 1, 1911), 34.
54. See Official Congressional Directory, editions of 1917 and 1918; A. P. Niblack, The Office of Naval Intelligence —Its History and Aims, 10 (this contains a very useful list of attachés); Navy Directory (June 1, 1918), 25.
55. Navy List (Dec. 1, 1917), 71; Navy Directory (Sept. 1,1918), 62; ibid. (Nov. 1,1918), 77.
56. Beauvais, op. cit., 49. We had more military attachés than any other power.
57. Official Congressional Directory, editions for 1914.
58. See Navy Register, Navy List, Navy Directory, passim.
59. Navy List (July 1, 1898), IS; ibid. (July 1, 1904), 16, 18; ibid. (Oct. 1, 1914), 73; ibid. (Mar. 1, 1910), 74; ibid. (Feb. 1, 1912), 65; ibid. (June 1, 1911), 78.
60. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 59, p. 126 (Nov. 21, 1889); ibid., No. 58, p. 241 (Dec. 26, 1888).
61. Morison, op. cit., 48.
62. Army and Navy Register, Dec. 7, 1912, p. 614.
63. Niblack, op. cit., 6.
64. Morison, op. cit., 48; Army and Navy Journal, July 13, 1918, p. 1754; Hamersly, op. cit. (6th ed., 1898), 162.
65. Letters to Naval Academy, Commanding, and Other Officers, No. 12, p. 57 (July 25, 1882).
66. See Navy Register and Navy List for years mentioned.
67. See list in Niblack, op. cit., 4.
68. Appointments, Orders, and Resignations, No. 62, p. 305 (May 17, 1893); Morison, op. cit., 49.
69. See Navy List, Navy Directory, and Navy Register, for years mentioned.
70. Ibid., passim.
71. Morison, op. cit., 55-56.
72. Ibid., 49.