Charles White Whittlesey
Charles White Whittlesey was by training a lawyer, having graduated from Williams College and Harvard Law School prior to joining the US Army in the spring of 1917, just after the United States declaration of war. Whittlesey was assigned to the 77th Division, a unit made up almost entirely of New Yorkers, most of them immigrants or the sons of immigrants. By the fall of 1917 Whittlesey was a Major in the division, in command of a battalion. In 1918 the 77th was in the front line in France, in the Meuse-Argonne region, preparing to launch an offensive supported by the French on their flank.
In October 1918 the battalion moved forward as part of a major offensive, and Whittlesey and his troops reached their assigned objective. The units which were to have supported them on either flank did not. Whittlesey and his men were cut off, pinned down by German fire from the bluffs above them and on either side, unable to advance or withdraw. They quickly ran out of both food and water and the strength of the German positions made resupply an impossibility. The men were able to crawl, under fire, to a creek to obtain water. The only communication with headquarters was via carrier pigeon.
Whittlesey attempted to dispatch messengers but none were able to elude the German patrols surrounding them. A carrier pigeon he sent to headquarters requesting supportive artillery fire led to the battalion being subjected to friendly fire when the message was misunderstood. The Germans continued to press in, and the American perimeter shrank under fire. On October 7, after being pinned down for five days under fire, Whittlesey received a message delivered by a blindfolded prisoner of war demanding that the Americans surrender.
Whittlesey’s Medal of Honor citation reports that he responded to the surrender demand “…with contempt.” The Germans had asked that he indicate surrender by displaying a white flag. Instead Whittlesey ordered several white sheets which he had already lain out to provide targets for aircraft to drop supplies to be brought back in to prevent confusion over a surrender. The German attacks renewed, supported by flame throwers. Over the course of the several days in which they had endured attacks, Whittlesey’s unit had become known in the press as The Lost Battalion. The Americans were as determined to relieve them as the Germans were to destroy them.
It was the American’s who won out, after a soldier dispatched by Whittlesey finally managed to elude the Germans and reach American units, which he then guided to the Lost Battalion’s position, driving the Germans back. It was found that supplies of food which had been intended for the Lost Battalion had inadvertently been dropped to the Germans. Of the over 550 men trapped by the Germans, more than 350 had been killed, wounded, or captured. Three men of the Lost Battalion were awarded the Medal of Honor, including Whittlesey. In 1921 Whittlesey committed suicide, leaving the German request for surrender to one of his former men who had endured the plight of the Lost Battalion with him.