Kermit Roosevelt Sr.
 Kermit Roosevelt Sr.    (soldier, businessman, writer, explorer) | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | October 10, 188 Oyster Bay, New York, U.S. |
| Died | June 4, 1943 (Age Expression error: Unexpected < operator.) Fort Richardson, Alaska |
Cause of death | suicide |
| Alma mater | Groton School, Harvard College |
| Parents | • Theodore Roosevelt • Edith Roosevelt |
| Children | • Kermit Roosevelt Jr. • Joseph Willard Roosevelt • Belle Wyatt "Clochette" Roosevelt Dirck Roosevelt |
| Spouse | Belle Wyatt Willard Roosevelt |
Roosevelt family businessman, soldier, explorer, and writer - and possible spook. | |
Kermit Roosevelt Sr. was an American businessman, soldier, explorer, and writer. A son of Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States, Kermit graduated from Harvard College, was active in both World Wars (with both the British and U.S. Armies), and explored two continents with his father. His son Kermit Roosevelt Jr. was a US spook involved in Operation Ajax, the 1953 Iranian coup d'état.
Kermit Roosevelt Sr. fought a lifelong battle with depression and died by suicide while being station with the US Army in Alaska during World War II.[1]
Round the world travel
He is reported to have been accompanied on a round the world hunting trip by Lewis Thompson Preston Sr.[2]
World War I
From 1914 to 1916, Roosevelt was assistant manager for National City Bank in Buenos Aires.
In 1917, as he was about to be transferred to a Russian branch, the U.S. entered the World War. He attended the Plattsburg School for officers from May to July 1917 but resigned from the U.S. Army to join the British Army. On August 22, 1917, Roosevelt was appointed an honorary captain in the British Army.[3] He saw hard fighting in the Near East, later transferring to the United States Army.
Roosevelt joined the British Army to fight in the Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq) theater of World War I. He was attached to the 14th Light Armoured Motor Battery of the Machine Gun Corps, but the British High Command decided they could not risk his life and so they made him an officer in charge of transport (Ford Model T cars). Within months of being posted to Mesopotamia, he mastered spoken as well as written Arabic and was often relied upon as a translator with the locals. He was awarded a Military Cross on August 26, 1918.[4]
Roosevelt relinquished his British commission on April 28, 1918, and was transferred to the AEF in France.[5] In 1918, he learned that his youngest brother Quentin, a pilot, had been shot down over France and had been buried by the Germans with full military honors.[6]
He was commissioned a captain in the United States Army on May 12, 1918, and commanded a Field Artillery Regiment of the 1st Division. He participated in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive near the end of the war. He returned to the United States on March 25, 1919, and was discharged from the Army two days later.[7]
World War II
By October 14, 1939, when Britain was at war with Germany, Roosevelt had negotiated a commission as a Second Lieutenant in the Middlesex Regiment with the assistance of his friend, Winston Churchill, who was by then First Lord of the Admiralty.[8]}[9] His first task was to lead a contingent of British volunteers for the Winter War in Finland.[8] According to a contemporary story published in Picture Post, he had resigned from the British Army to lead the expedition.[10] However, before the expedition could be launched, Finland made peace with Russia. Roosevelt participated with distinction in a raid into Norway and was later sent to North Africa, where there was little action at the time.[8]:230 While in Norway, he was injured during the Battle of Narvik.[11][12] He resumed drinking and was debilitated by an enlarged liver complicated by a resurgence of malaria. At the end of 1940, he returned to England and was discharged from the army on health grounds on May 2, 1941, by which time he had once again reached the rank of captain.[8][13] Roosevelt appealed this discharge all the way to the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, who upheld the medical discharge.
When he returned to the US, he turned to drinking to forget his problems. His wife enlisted the help of his cousin, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who ordered the FBI to track him down, and he was brought back to his family. In late April 1942, his brother Archibald sought to have him committed to a sanitarium for a year; at month's end, he agreed to a four-month stay at an institution in Hartford.[14]
Intelligence officer?
Possibly as a footnote to other activities, Wikipedia notes that in 1942, President FDR "gave him a commission as a major in the United States Army, and had him transferred and posted to Fort Richardson, Alaska, where he worked as an intelligence officer and helped establish a territorial militia of Eskimos and Aleuts."
References
- ↑ William E. Lemanski, Lost in the Shadow of Fame: The Neglected Story of Kermit Roosevelt: A Gallant and Tragic American 2011.
- ↑ Lewis Thompson Preston Sr.'s obituary, New York Times, February 11, 1937
- ↑ https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/30304/supplement/9925
- ↑ https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/30865/supplement/9966
- ↑ https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/30656/supplement/5128
- ↑ Grosvenor, Edwin S. (2018). "The Heartbreaking Loss of Lt. Quentin Roosevelt". americanheritage.com. American Heritage Publishing Co. Retrieved 29 August 2019.
- ↑ Frederick Sumner Mead, ed. (1921). Harvard's Military Record in the World War. Boston: Harvard Alumni Association. p. 824
- ↑ a b c d Edward Renehan, 1998, The Lion's Pride: Theodore Roosevelt and His Family in Peace and War, Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press, ISBN 9780195127195 and 0195127196, see [1] accessed 16 June 2015.
- ↑ https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/34709/supplement/6938
- ↑ "Volunteers For Finland". Picture Post. March 16, 1940.
- ↑ Karl Ernest Meyer; Shareen Blair Brysac (2006). Tournament of Shadows: The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia. Basic Books. p. 499. ISBN 978-0-465-04576-1.
- ↑ Sylvia Morris (19 February 2009). Edith Kermit Roosevelt: Portrait of a First Lady. Random House Publishing Group. pp. 500–501. ISBN 978-0-307-52277-1.
- ↑ https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/35153/page/2576
- ↑ https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=71XFh8zZwT8C&dat=19420501&printsec=frontpage&hl=en
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