My Charger's Name Was Pegasus: The World War 2 Memoir of a Cavalryman Turned Intelligence Agent

Chapter 1

One reads in the papers, one sees on the people who do skydiving, people who jump off bridges with great elastic cords attached to their feet, people who race cars at breakneck speeds, people who do all sorts of dare devil stunts. We see large audiences getting the biggest kick out of watching two brawny pugilists knocking each other into a pulp. At rodeos we see cowboys risking their lives riding wild bulls or broncos. People do all sorts of things for the thrill and the adventure. Why should anyone want to risk their lives? Why should others pay good money to see them do it?

Then, sometimes, there comes along a situation where one is handed the opportunity of experiencing such risks, thrills and adventure, all at government expense, and many times we find a complete change of attitude. We even find those who tear up their draft cards.

Be that as it may. Recently, I came across reminiscences I had written about My World War Two. I say My World War Two because all of us who participated in that bit of man’s inhumanity to man have their own personal memories of what happened. [Perhaps, because of women’s lib we should edit Robert Burns and say people’s inhumanity to people. Who knows? Perhaps the gals may also want to be included into being inhuman.) In 1940, there were under a half a million souls in the armed services of the United States. By 1945, there were just fewer than fourteen million. This means that an awful lot of guys and gals were snatched out of their routine lives and placed into new and alien surroundings. To some, it was a nightmare of horrors; to others, it was a great and wonderful adventure. 407,000 never came back; 671,000 were wounded. That’s less than ten percent. In the olden days, Johnny went off to war with the flags flying and the trumpets blaring. I guess he felt himself kind of a hero. Obviously, he did consider that he might get killed or wounded but, in the glory of the occasion, he tried to put that out of his mind. Of course, he had more physical contact fighting. He did not have to face those unseen and more sophisticated weapons that one has nowadays. Even then, I guess there were a few Johnnies who thought more about that ten percent and did their utmost to avoid being taken into the service. I often wonder how those who did could live with themselves for the rest of their lives with this on their mind. I imagine that they made excuses and even talked themselves into believing those excuses. On the other hand, who knows? Perhaps they were right in not wanting to risk their skins. Inasmuch as, for every man in actual combat, there are three or four in the back lines supplying the food, the arms, the equipment, the direction, etc., I do not see why a man, when he is recruited or enlisted, is not given the choice of either front or rear line duty. I am sure that there would be plenty of volunteers for the former just for the adventure. There would possibly be many who would volunteer for that front line duty just to appear brave amongst their fellow men but who really did not have the guts to say they would prefer being in the rear.

Be that as it may, I was one of the lucky ones. I was lucky in that my war was not dull and drab; I was lucky I did not stop a bullet or run over a mine; I was lucky that I did see a very small piece of the action; I was also lucky in that I was not given the rear line duty for which I had volunteered. [This was enemy rear lines, not ours.] Reading about these experiences was fun. So many stories get distorted in the telling and the retelling. I decided to edit those memories. I like to think I’m doing this for my grandchildren but generally one’s grandchildren are not too much interested in grandpa’s reminiscences. Let me be honest, perhaps I just wanted to relive that adventure

Back in 1940, most people in the U.S.A., who were reasonably honest, realized that sooner or later the nation would become actively involved in the troubles that were being caused by Mr. Hitler. Mr. Roosevelt, however, was doing his best to try and calm us all down, saying, I hate war and all sorts of baloney. He was also conferring with Mr. Churchill and, I rather suspect, whispering into his little pink ear, Don’t worry, sooner or later something will happen and we’ll be over to give you some help.

Anyway, around that time, I happened to see a movie, starring Clark Gable and Hedi Lamarr, called Comrade X. He was an American newspaper reporter; she was a trolley car driver in Moscow. I do not remember the story at all. I do remember that at the end of the film they were running away from the police, the army, etc. They end up in a Russian Army base and jump into an army tank. Casually, he turns to her and says, How do you run one of these things anyway? Equally casually, she replies, I learned at school, and she starts up the tank and drives it off.

It was complete slapstick comedy but that scene made me think. There is certainly going to be war for the U.S.A. You are just the right age to be taken [twenty-eight]. Just what vehicles could you jump on or into and take over the controls? The answer was skimpy: a car, a bicycle, and a horse [both ride and drive]. So the first thing I did was to buy myself a second-hand motorcycle and then I started taking flying lessons. I don’t know which was the more adventurous. On the motorcycle your solo flight was right from the start; in the plane, you had an instructor beside you for some few hours before the solo. I grant you that handling any kind of military aircraft would not be the same as the small Aeronca in which I was learning. It would, however, give me the feel, some kind of theory, and it was a start.

Then came that fatal day, December 7th, 1941. The Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and all hell broke loose. That event changed a lot of peoples’ lives in the U.S. abruptly. My brother, having been through ROTC training in university, was called up immediately. Inasmuch as it had been a foregone conclusion that I would go into the family business, I thought that college would just be a waste of time. My father, who had not had the opportunity of going to college, told me that I would regret this. He asked me, as a favor to him, to go. As a compromise, we agreed that I should go for one year. If, after that, I wanted to drop out, I could. This I did. Consequently, I had no commission. From the year 1931 until 1940 I was a member of a National Guard unit in New York City called the Squadron A. I confess that this soldiering was not so much for the love of the military. The Squadron was a horse cavalry unit and I was an impassioned horseman. At the Squadron, one could play indoor polo during the wintertime. I could and did keep ponies at the Squadron.

From where this great love for horses came, I do not know. Neither of my parents rode or had anything to do with horses. We never lived in a place where horses were nearby. It must have been born in me. I can remember one Christmas, when Santa Claus was still coming around, going into the living room with the assembled company. There was the tree with all the presents under it. Amongst these, not wrapped, was a rather large fire engine house with fire engines and also a fine looking stable with three horses. I am sure the thought went through my mind, That stable had better be for me or there will be a murder committed before Boxing Day. Luckily, that stable was for me. At any rate, the Squadron A did give me a chance not only to be with horses but also to get some military training. I did spend about nine years there playing soldier. In addition to keeping some ponies of my own there during the winter, on occasion I broke one or two of their young remount colts.

My guardian angel seemed to be sitting on my shoulder. In 1939, I was sent down to work in a subsidiary company whose head office was in Bound Brook, New Jersey. At first I commuted from New York City to Bound Brook. This got to be too arduous so I rented a house in the country near Bedminster. Naturally, this place was right near the Burnt Mills Polo Field. It had plenty of stabling and came with 270 acres of land. This sounds rather affluent but, as I remember, I paid $150 monthly rent. I went to the captain of my troop in the Squadron and handed in my resignation, explaining the circumstances. At that time, I was playing on a team in the low goal indoor polo league that was doing very well. The captain asked me to stay on until the end of the season. I said I would provided that he sign the resignation papers immediately. To this, he agreed and I saw to it that they were processed. Why I did this, I do not know. I guess it was prodding from that aforementioned angel. At the end of the season, we won the league and I went to the captain’s office to say goodbye. The Captain said that he was sorry to tell me but the Squadron had been federalized and I could not get out. I told him that I had seen to it that my papers had gone through and that my resignation had already been granted. What luck that was for me! All three troops of the Squadron were eventually sent to Camp Devons, Massachusetts, some three hundred men or more, all officer caliber, and the Squadron was allotted only a couple of places in the Officer’s Candidate School for the Cavalry at Fort Riley, Kansas, for each class.

So I was given a year and a half respite. During this time, a certain young lady by the name of Shirley Paige and I became engaged. We had set our marriage date in January 1942. Everything was arranged, including a month’s honeymoon in Sun Valley, Idaho. Even the bombing of Pearl Harbor did not change those plans. I had asked my bride whether she wanted to plan our wedding trip or have it as a complete surprise. She replied that all her life things had been planned. She would love to have our honeymoon as a complete surprise. I gave her a choice of winter sports or summer sports. She chose the former. I managed to get her all the way out to Idaho without her thinking she was in the Laurentian Mountains. When we arrived at the Sun Valley Lodge, Shirley almost bumped into Gary Cooper in the entrance. That I had not planned. Anyway, we had a marvelous time with some of the best snow conditions I have ever experienced. At the end of the month, I called up my father and said that, as I was practically on the pacific Coast, I could handle the supervising of the unloading of one of our tank steamers at Seattle, Portland, San Francisco and Los Angeles. He allowed as how this had gone through his mind but he certainly did not want to turn my honeymoon into a business trip. Shirley and I did not mind at all. It just extended the honeymoon.

On our return to the east, my plans had to be resolved. I did not want to be drafted and perhaps end up as a cook in the Aleutian Islands. Our company’s business was the importation of creosote oil for wood preservation—railroad ties, telephone poles, structural timbers, etc. This had also gotten us into the oil tanker steamer business. Because of this, during most of the war, the company ran not only their own few ships, which had been taken over by the government but also a large fleet of government owned ships as well. I might have claimed work in an essential industry and stayed in New York during those war years. The excitement and adventure, however, seemed much more intriguing. I had experience in the cavalry with the Squadron A. Naturally, even 50 years ago, I was realistic enough not to envision myself, with saber in hand, leading the charge of the light brigade and capturing Mr. Hitler in his bunker in Berlin. On the other hand, I did know some officers in the cavalry with whom I had played polo. I called one of them up in Fort Riley, Kansas, and asked whether it was possible to fly out there and enlist. In this way I could pick my spot and, if they were still training horse cavalry, I could be in my element. Learning that I could enlist out there, I went out to Fort Riley.

At this time, the cavalry was fast becoming mechanized but they were still training horse units and turning out horse cavalry officers. Unfortunately, I did not think to bring along with me some of my Squadron uniforms. Not having gone through an enlistment center, my first few days, I had to drill in civilian clothes. I remember going out in the rain in a brand new pinstriped suit—part of my trousseau—custom made shoes and saying to myself, What the hell, I shall not be needing these things for some time to come. I was right. I did not need them for about three and a half years.

Before I continue, let me recount an episode that happened one time when I was in the Squadron. Every summer we had to go to camp in the northern part of New York State for a period of two weeks. This was just like being in the regular army with the same attitude being displayed by enlisted men, even in the Squadron A, which was more like an exclusive club than a National Guard unit. One had to be proposed, seconded, and have three letters of recommendation to go along with your request for membership and members were a very fine group of men. Even there, during camp, there was plenty of goldbricking. For the uninitiated, goldbricking is doing as little work as possible. One year, however because of business, I could not spend the full two weeks at camp. I came up for the second week only. When I arrived on the Saturday afternoon in my tent, my equipment was certainly in no shape to stand inspection on Sunday morning. My troop, K troop, was the spit and polish troop of the regiment. Everything had to be polished to the nines. I set to work right away cleaning leather and brass with a vengeance. I happened to say to my tent mates at large that I could never get all my equipment, plus a rifle and pistol, done in time… whereupon a miracle happened. Someone said, Here, I am doing nothing. I can do your rifle for you. Another said he would clean my pistol. Never does this happen in the Army. I was astounded.

The next day, when the tent was being cleaned, the tent sergeant did not have to tell anyone to do anything specifically. Everyone pitched in to help. There was no goldbricking. I tried to analyze how this had come about. I soon learned. There was a new member who had just joined. His name was Ed Andrade. Ed had volunteered to do everything. He helped everyone. Suddenly, the nicer fellows in the tent started to protect Ed, saying that he had done enough. They would do this or that. After a bit, they ganged up on the goldbricks. Before long, everyone was pitching in and doing his share and perhaps a little bit more.

When I went into the Army, I decided I would enjoy myself doing whatever I might be asked to do, be it pitching horse manure, peeling potatoes, or cleaning latrines. After all, the Good Lord had given me more of the better things in life so far. With this attitude, it was not difficult in whatever outfit to which I was sent to pull an Ed Andrade. I have told this to Army men. Invariably, I see that same look in their eyes. That skeptical look says, Brother, that sort of thing will never happen in the regular Army. Generally I let it go at that. I feel like saying, O.K. Brother, just try it sometime. You’ll be surprised. Anyway, I say it does and I had fun making it work.

Going into the Army at the very bottom level, one could expect to be on the receiving end of a lot of guff. One might as well see the funny side and accept things with a twinkle in one’s eye. This could prove to be very disarming as well.

There are some who say that they hated the time they spent in the Army. Those seem to be the ones who could not adjust to the circumstances. Those seem to be the ones who have no interest in their fellow man. For me, it was like sitting at a sidewalk cafe watching the crowds go by. Here you could observe guys from all walks of life. What continuous drama passed in revue! What great comedy, at times pathetic, always at hand! Sometimes you could be there to help, or to encourage, or to understand.

Chapter 2

I had arrived at Fort Riley and was installed in an empty barracks a day or two before a new contingent of trainees came into the Replacement Training Center. Officially, I enlisted on March 31st, 1942. There were a certain amount of formalities through which I had to go. I was still in civilian clothes and felt a little out of place. Not having gone through an induction center, I had no uniform. The new trainees arrived from an induction center. Few, if any, had had anything to do with the military. My Squadron A experience came in handy. Soon my barrack mates were asking me how things should be done.

At one point, I was lying on my cot reading something, when a timid looking kid came up and said that he had been told to get a cot, mattress and blankets. He asked me where he should go for them. I told him that they were stacked up in a barracks at the end of the street. I was about to go back to whatever I was reading when I reminded myself that this was not what I had planned to do. I jumped up and said, Here, I’ll show you where they are and I’ll help you bring them back. We got the equipment and were toting it back.

On the way, looking straight in front of him, very timidly, he said, I have a problem. I waited for him to continue. He seemed to be screwing up all his courage. Finally he said, I wet my bed at night. I kept a straight face, although I admit I wanted to cry out, Boy, you don’t have a problem. You have the solution to all your problems. I had heard that this was a legitimate reason to be released from Army duty. Then it struck me that perhaps he knew this as well and this was his pretext to get out of the Army. No! He could not have been that good an actor.

Regardless, he seemed to be reaching out for a helping hand. I told him that this was a case for the medics. I knew that it would be difficult for him to go there by himself. So, after we deposited his stuff in the barracks, we went to the medics. I told my newfound friend to wait outside and I went in. After a bit, I saw one of the doctors. I explained why I was there. The doctor smiled. I think I got a more kindly reaction from him that I did from the fellow outside. The doctor told me that this was a problem and that some men did try to use this as a way to malinger. They had, however, their ways to find out the legitimate cases. [Ever since then, I have been sorry I never asked him how. I have often wondered.) Anyway, I brought the fellow in and that was the last I ever saw of him. I do remember thinking how silly it was to recruit an insignificant little guy, such as he, into the Army to fight a war. By the end, I learned that some little guys like that sometimes could show much more courage and guts than some hulk of a macho.

The sergeant who took charge of our group was the stereotype of a first sergeant. Of course, in the Army one has to have discipline and, in training raw recruits, it seems to be necessary to put a certain amount of fear into those disciplined. I realize this. However, in civilian life, the one thing I cannot stand is to hear someone tongue lashing in public another who cannot respond or fight back. I am afraid all the good manners that were beaten into me as a child fly out the window and I take great glee to go to their defense. Also, I am lucky to be in a position to do it.

I shall never forget an instance after the war. I believe it was in the early ‘50s. Grace Kelly had just married Prince Rainier and at the same time she was starred in a movie called The Swan which had just been released. Everybody wanted to see that film. Shirley and I were coming back from Europe on the passenger liner, United States. On board were ex-President and Mrs. Truman. In