Joseph T. Dickman

Portrait of Joseph Dickmans, 1918

Joseph Theodore Dickman (born October 6, 1857 in Dayton , Ohio , † October 23, 1927 in Washington, DC ) was an American officer in the United States Army , most recently major general , who served his country in five wars and first commander of the American occupation forces in Germany after the First World War .

Life

Dickman was born as the eldest son of a German family. During the Civil War , his father served in the Northern Army, and later as sheriff in Auglaize County of Ohio. In 1874 Dickman graduated from Wapakoneta Public High School and then worked for a year as a teacher in a village school before applying for admission to West Point Military Academy . After a violation of the strict regulations, he was expelled from the academy after a short time and worked again as a teacher before he was re-admitted to West Point in 1877. He graduated in 1881 and was assigned to the 3rd Cavalry Regiment as 2nd Lieutenant . After a short period of service in Fort Sanders, Wyoming, he was posted to the Infantry and Cavalry School at Fort Leavenworth and completed the course there in 1883. He then served in Arizona and Texas and was involved in the hunt for the Apache chief Geronimo . Until 1894 he was then in action in Kansas and western Texas and participated in campaigns on the border river Rio Grande against Mexican invaders. In 1894 he was used in the Pullman strike in Chicago . He was then transferred to Fort Ethan Allen , Vermont, where he spent a year. From 1895 to 1898 he served as an instructor at the Infantry and Cavalry School at Fort Leavenworth.

After the outbreak of war against Spain in the spring of 1898, he returned to his regiment, which was soon transferred to Tampa , Florida. Here he was offered an adjutant post in the cavalry division led by General Joseph Wheeler , which was then deployed in Cuba . Here Dickman was promoted to captain after the conclusion of the main campaign against Santiago in July and later also served in the occupation forces. In August 1899 he was recalled to the USA and shipped to the Philippines as Lieutenant Colonel of the Volunteers with the 26th Volunteers . Under the command of General Robert P. Hughes he served here in the Philippine-American War until July 1900 on the island of Panay . At that time he was recalled from the Philippines to act under Adna Chaffee against the rebels in the Boxer rebellion in China. He served as General Chaffee's chief of staff after the capture of Beijing until General Hughes brought him back to the Philippines at the end of the year. Here he served in Manila in staff assignment until the return of the 26th Volunteers to the USA in the spring of 1901, where he was downgraded to his rank of captain.

Dickman returned to his teaching post at Fort Leavenworth and was accepted into the newly formed General Staff of the US Army in 1903 , for which he wrote the field regulations of 1905, among other things. From 1906 to 1908 he commanded as a Major in the 13th Cavalry Regiment , the Fort Myer in Virginia before 1909 for a second tour of duty returned to the Philippines. Here he served as inspector of the cavalry until 1911. Back in the United States he became inspector general of the Central Division with headquarters in Chicago and in 1912 served as Lieutenant Colonel in Fort Robinson , Nebraska. From September 1912 to May 1914 he was a member of the Cavalry Board and visited the European states during this time. He was then assigned to the 2nd Cavalry Regiment and commanded this regiment as Colonel at Fort Ethan Allen from February 1915 to August 1917. In May 1917 he was promoted to Brigadier General of the regular Army and in August 1917 to Major General of the National Army . He was appointed Commandant of Camp Custer, Michigan before being transferred to Camp Greene, North Carolina in November to lead the newly formed 3rd Infantry Division to Europe.

Dickman's division was deployed on the Marne front at Château-Thierry from June 1918 . His answer “nous resterons la” (German: “we will stay there”) to a French corps commander during the Second Battle of the Marne , who was concerned about the situation , became the motto of the 3rd Division. After the end of the battle, Dickman was appointed commander of the AEF IV Corps on August 18 , which he led at the Battle of St. Mihiel in September . From October 13th until the end of the war he led the 1st Corps in the Meuse-Argonne offensive .

After the armistice of November 11th, Dickman was given command of the American Third Army , which he led during the occupation of the Rhineland . In April 1919 he handed the post to Hunter Liggett and served two more months in Europe as chairman of a commission whose work formed the basis for the post-war organization of the army before returning to the United States. Here he was in command of the Southern Department , based at Fort Sam Houston , Texas, with the regular rank of Major General until he retired from active service when he reached the statutory age limit of 64 in October 1921. Dickman was a member of the retired until early 1923 Army Elimination Board . In the same year he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Dayton and, in his acceptance speech and in later writings, spoke out against any involvement of the USA in European entanglements and in the League of Nations . He died of a heart attack in 1927 at the age of 70 and found his final resting place in Arlington National Cemetery .

Namesake

The US Navy's large amphibious assault ship USS Joseph T. Dickman (APA-13) , which was used in several landing operations during World War II, is named after Joseph Dickman.

literature

• Mary Clement Stueve: To Ohio Army Officer of World War I: Major General Joseph T. Dickman. In: Ohio History Journal , Vol. 63 (January 1954), No. 1, pp. 34-66 ( online ).
• George Washington Cullum etc. (Ed.): Biographical Register of the Officers and Graduates of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, since its establishment in 1802. 1891 ff.

Web links

Commons : Joseph T. Dickman  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

• Joseph Theodore Dickman at arlingtoncemetery.net
• Joseph T. Dickman in the database of Find a Grave (English)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Philip A. St. John: History of the Third Infantry Division. Turner Publishing, 1994, p. 7.