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FIELD MARSHAL SIR HENRY WILSON
By Major General Sir C. E. Callwell, Scribner’s, New York, $10.
If a true history of the World War is finally written, it will largely develop from the diaries and memoirs of the statesmen, soldiers and sailors who actually conducted the war. The publication of these personal accounts of the war has been hastened by the action of the Russian and German governments in opening their archives to the public and by the desire of many of the principal participants to justify their actions during the great crisis. The publication of the German and Russian accounts also forced other countries to make their official statements earlier than was formerly customary, so that in the short space of ten years the world has been given secret information on state matters concerning the World War that in previous eras perhaps would have never seen the light and certainly would not have been published in the lifetime of most of the actors. Probably more accurate secret information has been published about the World War than about the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.
Among the various books about the World War, the Life of Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson by General C. E. Callwell will take high rank in interest. Wilson occupied positions in the British Army before and during that war which enabled him to know the inner workings of the British government’s policy and the plans of the British Army to support it. During the war, he was so situated and had so many highly-placed confidantes, that he was continually informed of the inner movements in the higher governmental circles of Britain and France, both military and civil. At the close of the war and subsequently until a few months before his death in 1922, he was chief of the Imperial General Staff and largely influenced British foreign policy after the war.
To military readers the career of Wilson will be of absorbing interest; to all of them, the methods he employed to rise to a high place, and his conduct after achieving high place during the trying days of 1917 and 1918, will prove instructive and to most of them will be entertaining.
Henry Wilson was descended from a John Wilson who was with William III during the invasion of Ireland in the year 1690, and from that time his family lived at Currygrane in the County of Longford. His ancestry and his family traditions dictated Wilson’s actions in the Ulster crisis in 1914, and he became the dominating spirit in the quasi Army revolt that followed Asquith’s attempt to coerce Ulster.
Wilson’s action in this crisis brought him into disfavor with Asquith, and in 1915 when Murray was relieved as chief of staff of the British Expeditionary Force, Asquith vetoed French’s recommendation that Wilson succeed Murray.
His youth was marked by no particular incidents, and like many other famous men, his most important youthful efforts were unsuccessful, for three times he failed to enter Sandhurst and twice failed to enter Woolwich. His father was determined that Wilson should enter the Army, so he took advantage of a procedure that permitted entry in the Army through the militia and entered his son in the Longford Militia in December, 1882. While in the militia, Wilson trained with the Royal Munster Fusiliers in the summer of 1884, and in October passed the examination of the regular Army and was assigned to the Eighteenth Royal Irish.
He was transferred to the Rifle Brigade and sailed for India in February, 1885, where he joined the first battalion and took part in the Burma Expedition in 1887. He was seriously wounded and invalided home in November, 1887, and remained on sick leave for an extended period while carried on the rolls of the Rifle Brigade.
He tried for the Staff College in 1891 but failed to get the assignment. Cowans of his brigade, who became quartermaster general of the British Army during the World War, was chosen instead of Wilson. However his persistence was rewarded in 1892 when he passed successfully and reported at Camberly.
Until this time, Wilson’s career had been at best only average. At Camberly, he came under the influence of Colonel Henderson, the author of Stonewall Jackson, a brilliant student, and an inspiring instructor of the art of war. At this time, Henderson was delivering his lectures on military history which were afterwards collected into a book titled The Science of War.
By an interesting coincidence, about the same time Mahan was delivering lectures at our Naval War College which developed into his famous book The Influence of Sea Power on History. Henderson was well acquainted with Mahan’s work and at one time stated that the mission of the British Army was to assist its Navy to gain command of the sea. Probably Mahan was acquainted with Henderson, for at an early date, Henderson’s book was in use' at our Naval War College.
Henderson seems to have been able to inspire his students with his own love of military history and the art of war, and under his tutelage Wilson began the study of war in all its phases and ramifications that only ended with his death. Henderson began the custom of visiting the battlefields of 1870 with his students and lecturing on the actual scene of conflict; when Wilson became commandant of the Staff College he continued and extended this custom.
While at Camberly, Wilson attracted the attention of Lord Roberts, who frequently visited the college, and, made a favorable impression on the instructors though he was not particularly studious or regular in his work.
After leaving the college, Wilson went to the intelligence department of the War Office where he was attached to the French section with Colonel Repington. This assignment further concentrated his attention on the European situation with which he was already acquainted through visits he made to the battlefields of the War of 1870 while at the Staff College. These visits to the European battlefields were the forerunners of many such journeys and thereafter rarely a year passed that Wilson did not go to Europe to study some battlefield or frontier.
During his youth, Wilson had become very proficient in the French language and he increased his command of that tongue by his work in the intelligence department and by his frequent visits to France. He established close relations with the Foreign Office and in later years as director of military operations, he continued this very useful connection by holding a daily conference with the under secretary of foreign affairs, Sir Arthur Nicolson.
Wilson missed the Sudan Campaign and in consequence was passed for promotion by several contemporaries. He served in South Africa as brigade major and was present at the Battle of Colenso in which the British were defeated. After the battle, he wrote, “and they (the Boers) remained complete masters of that side of the stream and I don’t see myself how we are going to cross it to get to Ladysmith.” His biographer strains considerably to give Wilson credit for the subsequent successful passage of the stream. He went from brigade major to temporary duty on the staff of Lord Roberts and made himself so useful that he returned with him as assistant military secretary when Lord Roberts succeeded Woolsey as commander-in-chief of the Army. He had served on staff duty from 1894 to 1901 and, although a favorite of Lord Roberts, the latter made no secret of his opinion that Wilson should return to duty with troops.
All Britain was horrified at the inefficiency of the Army in the South African War and various committees were appointed by Parliament to investigate and report the remedy. These culminated in the so-called “Esher Committee” headed by Lord Esher, which made drastic changes in the organization of the British Army. In his diary, Wilson was very caustic in his comments about the committee until he learned that he would be appointed assistant director of military operations, whereupon he changed his tone and apparently approved of the changes made.
As assistant director of military operations, he had much to do with reorganizing the War Office and held this position until he went to Camberly as commandant of the Staff College with the rank of brigadier general in January, 1907. It was here that he first revealed his real ability. He seems to have been ideally suited for this position and there is evidence outside of his own diary that he was an inspiring teacher of the art of war and increased the usefulness of the Staff College. Many of his students subsequently rose to positions of great responsibility in the Army and they almost unanimously attribute their success to their training under Wilson. It was here that he developed his natural talent for clear presentation of military and political subjects which was so useful to him and Great Britain during the war, and which enabled him to dominate most of the numerous committees on which he served.
In 1909, Wilson paid a visit to the French staff college in Paris where he met Foch, who was then commandant. At this first meeting between these two distinguished soldiers, Wilson made most of the overtures but Foch soon succumbed to the charm of this genial guest and later returned the visit. Foch and Wilson began an acquaintance which developed into a friendship that endured the strain of the darkest days of the war when there was abundant suspicion and distrust between other French and British officers. Rarely in history will be found two such loyal comrades in arms as these two field marshals, and France and Britain sorely needed their conciliatory services in 1916 and 1917 when other British and French leaders were almost hostile.
While at the college Wilson had a discussion with Kitchener that caused ill will between them, which in 1914 was increased by Wilson’s open criticism of Kitchener’s efforts to raise the New Army.
From the Staff College Wilson hoped to go to command a brigade at Aldershot, for he felt the need of service with troops and was offered a brigade by General Sir H. Smith-Dorrien subject to the approval of the chief of the Imperial General Staff, Sir William Nicolson, who, however, had other plans for Wilson and ordered him to the War Office as director of military operations, where he reported in the summer of 1910.
He immediately began to vitalize the plans of the British Expeditionary Force for participation in a continental war as the ally of France, for he was convinced that in the near future war between the Dual Alliance and the Triple Entente was inevitable. His knowledge of continental Europe, particularly the boundaries between France, Belgium, and Germany, was especially useful. He was now well acquainted with Foch and together they became the moving spirits in the various conversations, staff rides, and other undertakings which made possible the rapid transfer of the British Expeditionary Force to France in August, 1914. There is sufficient external evidence to indicate that Wilson should be given the largest individual credit for the proper preparation of the British Expeditionary Force for its part in the 1914 campaign and that to accomplish this task he was forced to overcome severe opposition in and out of the Army. It was during this period that he kept close contact with the Foreign Office through Sir Arthur Nicolson and was probably better informed of the European political situation than many members of the British cabinet.
Upon the outbreak of the war, he went as deputy chief of the general staff with Lord French to France and was with the Expeditionary Force during the retreat from Mons. He appeared to great advantage during this campaign; all his brother officers testify he was the strong man of the staff and Lord Esher writes “when the climax of disaster came, authority seemed naturally to slip into his hands.” Also Sir Neil Macready, another general staff officer, tells of Wilson “keeping up the spirit of the staff when some of them had forgotten the necessity of appearing cheerful under all circumstances.” During this time, he was extremely valuable in reconciling Joffre and French and acquainting them with each other. He acted as chief of staff during Murray’s (chief of staff) absence in England and during the heavy fighting in Flanders in October and November, 1914, he was frequently with Foch who commanded the French Army next the British. At this time the British and French troops were so intermingled that no order could be issued to the troops of either army without the approval of the commanding officers of both armies. He pays deserved tribute to the German Army in his diary, thus: “October 26. But this German Army is a superb fighting machine.” He was also outspoken in praise of the French: “I get daily, a greater admiration for the French soldier. He is a marvel.” Sir Arthur Murray, French’s chief of staff, was obviously breaking down physically. Wilson was French’s choice for chief of staff but both Asquith and Kitchener were opposed and in January, 1915, French appointed Sir W. Robertson instead. This was a bitter disappointment to Wilson and he never forgave Asquith and appeared to retain some resentment against Robertson.
On January 26, 1915, he was made liaison officer between the British and French armies with temporary rank of lieutenant general. He performed such valuable service here in maintaining harmonious relations between Joffre and French that he was probably more useful to the Entente than he would have been as chief of staff for General French. He had great difficulty in removing the distrust which developed between the British and French Armies during the battles of May, 1915.
The Battle of Festubert by the British in the spring of 1915 was a complete failure; the attack on the Dardanelles was held up; there were rumors of an invasion by the Germans; the shortage of ammunition was exposed by the London Times an<J Parliament was in an ugly mood. There was much happening in political circles in London and much agitation for the formation of a coalition cabinet. Wilson was thoroughly informed of all the details through his many friends in London. In fact, lie was not without influence in the decision to form a coalition cabinet which brought many of his strong Unionist friends into power.
Towards the end of April, 1915, in a long discussion with Kitchener, who advocated a defensive attitude in France and an offensive in the Near East, Wilson pointed out the impossibility of this program unless France and Russia agreed. Joffre had previously indicated to Wilson that if the Allies assumed the offensive in the Near East and remained on the defensive in France, Germany would first beat Russia and then return in force to attack France. An important consequence of this conference was that some of Kitchener’s prejudice against Wilson disappeared and thereafter they worked in closer harmony.
Some of the entries in his diary will dim Wilson’s claim to be a great soldier. Thus he records a brilliant plan for pulling divisions out of France in the winter of 1917 and 1918 to send them to Palestine to knock Turkey out of the war and to return them to France in time to defeat the Germans in the spring of 1918. This suggestion was made when the intelligence department of the British Army was accurately predicting the German attack in 1918 and when the British War Office was not able to get the replacements necessary to keep Haig’s army up to strength. Wilson knew little of the Turkish Army but he knew that they had successfully resisted the British advance and that there would be little fight left in the divisions after they had defeated the Turks. Curiously enough, he had pointed out this very danger to Kitchener in 1915 when Kitchener had suggested moving British soldiers from France to capture Gallipoli and then returning them to the trenches in France.
He also thought that the Germans should attack the Italians in 1918. He forced Haig to take over more of the line in France than Haig considered safe. He permitted Lloyd George to retain reserves in England and to send divisions to Palestine when every soldier was needed in France. He endeavored to make Haig turn over four divisions to Foch for a general reserve and only desisted when Haig threatened to resign. Then when the Germans broke through Gough’s army in France (not attacking the Italians as Wilson had predicted) and the British line collapsed as Robertson and Haig had predicted, he complained in his diary that Haig had not taken the necessary precautions to prevent the fiasco that he had predicted, whereupon he recommended to Lloyd George that Haig be relieved of his command. Lloyd George with a clearer vision of the reaction of British public opinion to such action would not permit Haig’s removal.
Also when Foch refused to consider the possibility of the Germans breaking through in 1918 and decided to risk the war on a stand near Amiens, Wilson prepared a different opinion which would have served to justify his judgment in case Foch was wrong. When Foch proved to be correct, Wilson was slow to realize the change in the situation and as late as October, 1918, he did not realize the Germans were beaten.
American readers will look in vain for any reference to the effect of the American Army’s advance through the Meuse-Argonne on the retreat of the Germans in front of the British Army. Naturally, Wilson’s book is primarily devoted to the actions of the British Army; still the author notes the American effort in some of his entries and yet does not mention the decisive effect of the advance of the American Army in the Argonne on the general situation in France. Yet as a military expert, he must have realized that the American attack in the Argonne by attracting the German reserve divisions to their front made Haig’s advance possible.
In 1917 and 1918, the times were tense; the French and English people were trying to reconcile cabinet government with military operations; both were dominated in turn by party cliques; both were very weary of the war; both were extremely critical of their leaders, military and civil; there were defeatists in England as well as in France, some of whom were in very prominent places. To Wilson’s credit, it must be said that during this season of despair he never contemplated defeat and when even Lloyd George wavered, Wilson sustained his courage.
These times demanded a dexterous, cheerful, competent, and bold character and Wilson more than any other British officer possessed these qualities. On the whole, he served Lloyd George and his country well. It was no time to be fastidious or over- principled about the means. Lloyd George and Wilson were singularly alike in suppleness and adroitness, and it will always be to their credit that side by side they carried Great Britain through those trying days in the winter of 1917 and the spring of 1918 when the faint-hearted cried for peace at any price, and even the brave whispered in secret of a negotiated peace.
In 1919, 1920, and 1921, Wilson vainly endeavored to get the British cabinet to reduce its commitments in various parts of the world as he plainly saw there were not British soldiers enough to support its policies. Thus Britain in addition to her army in Germany was attempting to secure India, Persia, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Palestine, the Dardanelles, Batum, to provide battalions for plebiscites in Silesia, and to assist Poland. This part of his diary is extraordinarily interesting and gives a remarkable picture of the remaking of Europe after the war.
Wilson’s influence with Lloyd George was obviously waning and as the troubles in Ireland increased, he was bound to draw further away from the entire cabinet which was seeking a solution of the very difficult Irish problem. Any peaceful solution of this vexatious question involved compromises that appeared to Wilson to traitorously abandon loyal Ulster to the Sinn Feiners. He grew more open in his opposition to Lloyd George, and in 1922 he was succeeded as chief of the Imperial General Staff by Lord Cavan.
He was promptly elected to Parliament from an Ulster district and defended the conduct of his constituents in the Commons and advised Craig, the Ulster Premier, on means of defending North Ireland. He boldly challenged the government’s policy of “making peace with murderers,” and when his friends cautioned him that he too might be assassinated he stated he would rather be murdered than to shake hands with murderers.
On June 22, 1922, while returning to his house in London, he was suddenly fired upon by two Irishmen who were apparently awaiting his return; drawing his sword he attempted to attack his assailants but fell mortally wounded. He is buried in St. Paul’s between Lord Roberts and Lord Wolseley, two of his distinguished predecessors.
Solomon himself could not have composed Europe in these post-war years, much of the jealousy and strife was inevitable, and Wilson is too severe in his criticism of the statesmen. The real break came in 1922 when the two great western allies, France and England, disagreed on various questions, which caused France to make a separate treaty with the Turkish Nationalists. The collapse of the Greek offensive in Turkey quickly followed and forced the withdrawal of British forces from Turkey. Lloyd George’s cabinet had lasted longer than any other European government, but it could not endure this loss of prestige and shortly after he resigned the premiership he had held under such trying circumstances. Thus his government did not long survive the death of his brilliant and impetuous chief of the Imperial General Staff, Sir Henry Wilson.
A diary often makes the diarist testify against himself, but when it is published by his family and edited by a sympathetic brother officer, the witness voluntarily offers the evidence and cannot object if it tends to incriminate himself in the minds of careful readers.
Although a valuable and useful officer to his country, Wilson appears, from his own diary, to have been an ambitious, and sometimes not over-scrupulous character, who, throughout his life, developed his natural capacity for making influential friends. In his early career, he used his influence to spend most of his professional life in staff appointments, usually in England. His career enabled him to understand continental Europe and its armies better than most of his comrades, many of whom were in distant lands carrying on England’s small wars, and prepared him admirably for the part he played in the World War.
He shifted his position on two important questions at times when such shifts benefited him personally; thus, though at first opposed to the civil authorities making any military decision against the advice of their military adviser, and though opposed to the employment of the British Army on any of the minor fronts, he joined Lloyd George to overthrow Robertson when the latter refused to detach troops from France to Palestine. As a result of this change of front, he endeared himself to Lloyd George and was later given Robertson’s place as imperial chief of staff. In this transaction, and in his knowledge of statecraft, he is more suggestive of Marlborough than Wellington.
In the beginning of the war, when he was assistant chief of staff for French, he was opposed to “Unity of Command.” When he was out of employment in 1917, he prepared for Lloyd George’s use a memorandum on a “High War Committee” and had himself made the British military representative on the committee with power to commit the British War Office. In short, he proposed a system of inter-Allied command which made him superior to the chief of the Imperial General Staff. This system was adopted and developed into the Supreme War Council. After he became chief of the Imperial General Staff, he effectively controlled the British representative on the War Council. Even a friendly biographer has trouble explaining these actions.
The author of this book, Major General C. E. Callwell, succeeded Wilson on the general staff in London when the latter went to France as deputy chief of staff. He is familiar with all the British operations during the war. He was personally acquainted with most of the important actors, civilian and military, and there is no one more admirably prepared to write an accurate account of the life of Wilson. He wisely allows Wilson’s own words to tell the story and to reveal Wilson to the reader. In places, his failure to supply dates makes it a little difficult to follow the text chronologically, but in the main, General Callwell has done the military student another service in preparing this book.
The book itself will be of lasting interest for it records almost completely the reactions of one of the most brilliant minds in the British Army to the kaleidoscopic events of the World War; it describes the relations which existed between the high command of the British Army and the British cabinet during this period; it portrays the relationship between the British and French officers, military and civil; it indicates that often there existed more sympathy and understanding between British and French military officials than between British or French military and civil authorities, demonstrating that professional sometimes transcended national sympathy; and it emphasizes the difficulties of making war under representative forms of government and repeatedly demonstrates that factional political struggles over domestic questions will not stop at the water’s edge as the optimists and phrase makers so commonly assume.
W.D.P.
IN THE DAYS OF THE TAIPINGS.—
By H. B. Morse. The Essex Institute, Salem, Mass. $5.00
Reviewed by Captain H. E. Kimmel, U. S. Navy
A romance of China in the middle of the nineteenth century.
The story affords an intimate view of the private family life of a Chinese gentleman; it outlines his education and indicates the opportunities and limitations of his life. The influence on his life and the development of his character due to close friendships with an Englishman and an American are clearly, if not too convincingly, stated.
The history of the family whose fortunes we follow, embraces in a charming and entertaining style an account of the foundation of the family fortune, its development, and the steps taken to maintain and increase the wealth and influence of the family.
The standards of the office-holding class are shown to be so entirely different from our conception of the duties and responsibilities of public servants, as to shed much light upon the fundamental difference between the Chinese idea of government and that of western nations.
The author tells the story of the Taiping rebellion and the part played by Ward, an American adventurer, who possessed qualities of leadership combined with love of action, which enabled him to organize and train a Chinese force which was superior in morale and effectiveness to anything brought against it.
After Ward’s death, Gordon, an English officer (afterwards known as Chinese Gordon) loaned for the purpose, took over Ward’s command and pushed the campaign to a successful conclusion.
The remarkable account of the exploits of Ward and Gordon is essentially true to the recorded facts. It is a chapter of the active part taken by Westerners in Chinese affairs which is not generally available to the average reader, and the author has accomplished a real service to those who are interested in Chinese history.
The author portrays the Chinese character accurately and sympathetically, though he by no means glosses over the inherent callousness and cruelty of Chinese warfare.
While it is a work of fiction, the essential features are so true to fact that it is a work of real historical value.
Mr. Morse’s long residence in China, his service in the Chinese customs service in which he rose to the rank of commissioner, and his other services to the Chinese government have eminently qualified him to speak with authority on Chinese character and customs.
COUNT LUCKNER, THE SEA DEVIL
By Lowell Thomas. Doubleday, Page and Company. Price $2.50.
Reviewed by Lieut. Hanson W. Baldwin, U.S.N.R.
If the late war produced any figure more romantic and interesting than that of Lawrence of Arabia, Count Felix von Luckner, Lieutenant Commander in the German Navy was that man. The exploits of Luckner, pieced together and told in the language of the Sea Devil, by Lowell Thomas, constitute an epic of adventure rivaling fiction’s best. The author says in his prelude:
The ex-Kaiser, the ex-Crown Prince, Hindenburg, Ludendorff, Von Tirpitz, and sundry others of our late enemies have given us their personal accounts of the part they played in the World War. But none had a tale to tell like Count Felix von Luckner. With me the story lies close as a companion piece to the story of Lawrence in Arabia and I pass it on to you in the words of the Sea Devil and, I hope, with something of the tang of the sea.
And with the tang of the sea, he tells this incredible tale of the “used to be days” of war time when anything was possible.
Luckner, as an officer aboard the Kron Prinz, participated in the Battle of Jutland but it was not in this battle that his fame was gained. The exploits of the Emden, the Moewe, and the Wolf encouraged the German naval authorities to such an extent that it was decided, late in 1916, to attempt the despatch of another raider. But so tight had the British cordon of the blockade become that it was deemed almost impossible for the ordinary cruiser, or auxiliary cruiser, to slip through undetected, Germany at that time possessed no coaling station anywhere in the world except in home waters, so that a sailing vessel was thought better suited than steam for the exploit. A staunch American clipper ship, the Pride of Balmalm, was seized in a German port and converted into an auxiliary cruiser, armed with one small gun and manned by officers and men of the regular German Navy. Von Luckner was placed in command, because, as he explained it, he was the only officer in the Navy who had had previous experience with sail. The ship was fitted with a motor and large supplies of bombs, machine guns, rifles, and explosives were carried. Subterfuge and disguise as a neutral merchantman were used in slipping through the blockade and thereafter whenever necessary.
On December 23, 1916, the Pride of Balmaha, re-christened Irma for blockaderunning purposes, and disguised as a Norwegian merchantman, slipped out into the North Sea and commenced to run the gauntlet in the height of a hurricane. The storm subsided—the Irma fell in with a British cruiser, the Avenger, but passed inspection due to her excellent disguise. Once past the dreaded cordon the ship, now free, set sail for the South Atlantic and her amazing career of destruction. The names Pride of Balmaha and Irma were forgotten and the ship was renamed the Seeadler (Sea Eagle) and commanded by the Sea Devil proceeded to justify its name.
The Seeadler maintained a destructive career for months, ranging the South Atlantic and Pacific, dodging cruisers and sinking merchant vessels. She scuttled $25,000,000 worth of shipping, and wrought incalculable damage by delaying hundreds of cargo vessels from venturing out of port, and raising the rates of marine insurance. After a cruise as full of excitement and thrills as the voyages of Captain Kidd and Sir Francis Drake, the Count’s raider was wrecked on the coral reefs of a South Sea Isle.
Luckner with five men sailed and rowed for 2,300 miles in an open boat across the South Pacific from Mopelia, the coral atoll where the Seeadler was wrecked by a tidal wave, to the Fijis. His design was the capture of some sailing vessel to replace his wrecked raider, but in the attempt he and his five men were themselves taken captive. Confined in New Zealand as a prisoner of war, the Sea Devil contrived to escape and, together with other prisoners, captured a small two-masted schooner, the Moa. Luckner’s freedom was limited and brief, however, for after eight days he was recaptured and remained a prisoner in the “land down under” until the end of the war.
The first few chapters of the book deal with the career of the Sea Devil in his younger days, when, disguised as Phelax Leudige, he left his nobility behind him and ran away to sea to gain the experience before the mast which was to serve him so well later on in his life.
Here is a book calculated and designed to entertain, amaze, and interest the reader. It is easy reading but below the apparent careless and free style of the author there runs a continuity and grace which bind the chapters together into one cohesive, finished product. There is a suspicion that the Sea Devil is not, cannot be entirely as the author has pictured him, but the book is not intended as a biography—merely as a glimpse into a few of the extraordinary episodes in the life of this extraordinary man, Count Felix von Luckner; cabin-boy, able seaman, dishwasher, Salvation Army lieutenant, lighthouse keeper, big game hunter, champion wrestler, mate in the mercantile marine, officer in the Imperial Navy, and finally, hero of Germany.
The story is of interest not only for itself but for the message it brings; the fulfilment of the best traditions of the sea and the careful observance of the rules for the conduct of maritime warfare. Luckner seems to have lived up to the highest naval code, that of an “officer and a gentleman.” His "Aufzviedersehn" to Lowell Thomas is one, which in these days of inferiority complexes, all Americans should take to their souls :
I want to tell you Americans how lucky you are to live in a great country .... with the broad Atlantic for a boundary on one side and the Pacific on the other. Yours is a great inheritance. You should make yourselves worthy of it.