Chapter V
Army: MITC, Camp Ritchie
We arrived at Camp Ritchie, Maryland not too long after Drew Pearson, a muckraking Washington, D.C. columnist for the Washington Post and a White House sycophant, had published his exposé of the lavish, country-club atmosphere and life-style he had uncovered at Camp Ritchie. By the time we arrived life on the base had become quite a bit more guarded and Spartan.
Master Sergeant Frank S. Leavitt, better-known as the professional wrestler and motion picture actor Man Mountain Dean, allegedly controlled Camp Ritchie with an iron fist. We were informed that Man Mountain had saved the life of Brigadier General Charles Y. Banfill, Camp Ritchie's Commanding Officer, during World War I, and thus had free reign at Ritchie and could do no wrong. We learned very quickly through the camp grapevine, that just about anything involving personnel which required approval at Camp Ritchie would first have to cross Man Mountain's desk and win his O.K. I witnessed a first-hand example of this process.
Just like at CCNY, because of my Infantry training and non-commissioned rank, I had been put in charge of my barracks. One of the my charges, Private (Pvt.) Wilson, spoke English with a very thick German accent. He had changed his name, was overweight and suffered from very flat feet. He was only able to attend classes located within reasonably-short walking distances from the barracks or via some sort of transportation. If any field exercises requiring long hikes were scheduled, he was allowed to remain in the barracks and spend his time cleaning.
On one such occasion, as we were leaving on a field trip, I instructed Pvt. Wilson to be sure to do a thorough job of sweeping and mopping the floor, cleaning the latrines and dusting in every nook and cranny because the barracks had been scheduled for inspection while we were in the field. He was good-humored and always answered me with, "Zu Befehl (At your command) Korporal Fogel," clicking his heels while saluting. Motivated by a desire to protect his privilege of not taking hikes, he made sure that he always did a very satisfactory and thorough job in keeping the barracks in tip-top shape. But, this time upon our return, I could see that the barracks remained messy. I found Wilson lying on his bunk; obviously, very little, if anything, had been cleaned.
As I approached him to ask him what had happened, I could see immediately that, instead of a Pvt. Wilson, I was now face-to-face with 2nd Lt. Wilson. He explained that his parents had greased the palms of some influential people at Camp Ritchie with a rather large sum of money to award their son a 'spot' (rather than earned) commission. He said that he had waited for our return to inform me personally that he was moving into Officers' quarters that evening, and that henceforth, I was to address him as 'Sir' and Lt. Wilson.
On one lapel of his fatigues he wore a gold 2nd Lt. bar and on the other the Infantry branch insignia consisting of crossed rifles. It was common practice to wear insignia other than that of Military Intelligence which, in those days, displayed a Sphinx on a shield. It was mandated by written orders that no personnel at Camp Ritchie was allowed to speak of or display any outward sign of the fact that their branch of service was Military Intelligence. Even wives and parents were not supposed to know.
I addressed him as 'Sir' and Lt. Wilson as he had insisted and suggested that instead of wearing the Infantry insignia, he might consider having one made which displayed a crossed broom and a mop with a bucket in the middle. He laughed. We had always gotten along well and he appreciated the fact that I had never subjected him to ridicule as some others had done on a regular basis.
He was a well-educated and intelligent young man with a healthy sense of humor; he needed the latter because his rather awkward, not-overly-attractive appearance caused some insensitive persons to make unkind remarks about him. His family had recently immigrated to the United States as political refugees after escaping from Nazi Germany.
It was a well-known and accepted fact that Wilson was not the first nor the last student to obtain a commission at Camp Ritchie in that manner. Corruption was not an anomalous occurrence at the MITC. In addition to being commissioned, obtaining promotions, extra leave and other perks all carried a price tag and could be purchased by anyone willing and able to pay the going rate. Many with the means did just that. Unfortunately, my parents were not able to afford such a luxury on my behalf.
I was also in much better physical shape than most, despite my relatively exercise-free stopover while stationed at CCNY. In New York City at a store-front shop on Times Square uniformed servicemen and women could tank up on free Pepsi Cola - a practice that took a heavy toll on my physical condition. At Camp Roberts we had exercised daily, often double-timing in the rugged hills in back of the base in over 100° heat. As a member of the camp training cadre, while in the field, in order to keep a single-file column of trainees from lagging behind and remaining close to one another in very rough terrain, I had to run from the head of the column to the rear constantly.
Infantry soldiers were required to be strong and have a great deal of stamina in order to survive the rigors of living in an animal-like state while in the front lines in combat. I had never been in better shape, even in the days when I played volleyball, rowed on the crew or ran in cross-country races. I, also, have never again attained such top physical condition at any time during my many years of life.
As to other subjects we studied, such as the fundamentals of intelligence: collection, evaluation and dissemination, etc., I relied on my native intelligence and the reasonably-good study habits that I had formed in high school and at the college level. Although German was spoken to some degree at home, I had striven to overcome being that German kid whom some less-sensitive individuals called 'Boche,' 'Fritz,' 'Kraut,' 'Heinie,' 'Hun,' 'Jerry,' 'Fritzie,' 'Hermann,' 'Lugerhead,' and 'Katzenjammer' in addition to several other less-savory names.
Bias was alive and well during my early years in the United States. It was openly displayed against immigrants who had come from a former World War I enemy country or from a Germany now under Nazi control. I don't have to be lectured about the evils and pain of discrimination! I experienced it first-hand. My greatest desire was to be known as an 'American' kid, and I answered my parents and their friends in English when they spoke German to me. I did take two years of German in high school since I considered it a snap course for which I didn't have to study very hard.
The two quarters at CCNY had required quite a bit of classwork using the German language. Lectures were largely in German. Frankly, most of the professors, former native Germans or Austrians, were much easier to understand when they spoke German than when they attempted to use the English language. We were encouraged to attend German-language movie theaters in downtown New York City to hone our German language skills. Most of the instructors were German and Austrian refugees who had held high positions in government before being threatened with imprisonment because they had dared to question or disagree with the actions of 'Der Führer' and his henchmen.
When they did lecture in English, I was reminded of a class in Economic Geography I had taken at UC Berkeley in 1941 in Wheeler Auditorium packed with 2000 other students. The instructor was a Hollander who had an extremely thick Dutch accent. Fortunately, I was able to buy Fybate Notes (written notes taken by a graduate student sitting in on the class) at the University Bookstore within two days after a lecture and also get a little clarification from a Teaching Assistant (TA) in groups of 50 who couldn't have cared less about us. Otherwise, I wouldn't have had clue as to what the man had said.
The advantages that I had over my fellow students at Ritchie were somewhat diminished when it came to the actual interrogation phase of our instruction. We had to query live individuals (actors) playing the roles of prisoners of war (PWs) by asking the right questions and then understanding the answers. For the most part, knowing in advance what type of information was needed, I was able to formulate proper questions; but, when it came to understanding the answer I was often at sea.
The school threw some German and Austrian dialects at us that almost defied comprehension. I remember one actor who assumed the role of a PW from Austria, who was supposed to have been a farmboy from some remote village before being drafted into the German army. His dialect was so guttural and thick, I swear he didn't utter a single German word. As far as I was concerned, he might have been speaking Outer Mongolian. Fortunately, when I was questioning real PWs in real situations in the European Theater of Operations (ETO) in 1944 and 1945, I was spared encountering that kind of individual. But, this was exactly where my fellow students at Camp Ritchie shone, since most of them were recent arrivals from German-speaking countries and had attained a fairly high degree of education in their native countries. I can imagine that some foreigners, who were otherwise quite proficient in English when they arrived here, would have a difficult time understanding someone from the Deep South in the U.S., especially a Cajun from Louisiana.
