Free PATTON: A BIOGRAPHY by Alan Axelrod

War Department was about to detail Patton to Front Royal, Virginia, to purchase horses for the army. It is a measure of the general’s regard for Patton that he personally saw to it that the order was rescinded and then directed the adjutant general on May 18 to send Patton a telegram, ordering him to report to him, Pershing, in Washington. The responsibility that had suddenly fallen to Pershing was awesome indeed. The army of 1916, from which the Punitive Expedition had been drawn, consisted of about 133,000 officers and men, and its high command occupied itself not with plans for major warfare, but with such issues as Patton’s new saber design and the new manual that accompanied it. Now, through a combination of conscription and patriotic enlistment, the army would grow explosively to 4.5 million men by November 1918. Some 2 million of these soldiers would be sent to Europe under Pershing’s direct command.
    Patton’s focus was how best to exploit his great good fortune to be a member of Pershing’s inner circle. It would take months to send the whole army to Europe, but he, George Patton, having been promoted to captain on May 15, would be going “over there” almost immediately as part of the very first wave of Yanks. Papa was not so lucky. No one had a job for him in Washington, so he, his wife, and Nita returned to California, where Nita divided her time between volunteer war work and writing long letters to Pershing. Patton was one of just 60 officers and a mix of 120 enlisted soldiers and a handful of civilian clerks who embarked with their general for Liverpool aboard the liner Baltic on May 28.
    The Baltic docked at Liverpool on June 8. From there, Pershing and his staff entrained for London and were welcomed at Euston Station by the American ambassador and others. Pershing was sumptuously accommodated in the luxury of the Savoy Hotel, while Patton and 67 men assigned to his command were sent to quarters in, of all places, the Tower of London. On June 13, Pershing and his staff left London for Paris. Patton took no pleasure in the celebrated City of Light, because there his war instantly bogged down, becoming a tedious matter of managing orderlies, looking after guards, and dispatching drivers.
    It was July before Pershing even approached the actual front and took Captain Patton with him as his aide-de-camp. With Pershing, Patton inspected a contingent of newly arrived American troops training at St. Dizier. To Patton, the officers seemed lazy and the troops sloppy. The sight of these indifferent officers pretending to lead halfhearted half-soldiers must have seemed to Patton a vindication of his hard riding of West Point underclassmen during his brief stint as cadet second corporal. Here were the consequences of failing to be “too damn military.”
    Another, equally significant epiphany was to come. By September, Pershing felt that he had trained a sufficient force at last to begin combat deployment. It was decided to put the first Americans in the relatively quiet Lorraine sector, and so, on September 1, Pershing moved his headquarters and staff from Paris to Chaumont. This small city quickly became a complex of training camps and military specialty schools, through which the growing stream of Americans soon passed. In addition to continuing his service as one of Pershing’s aides-de-camp, Patton was appointed post adjutant on September 13, charged with commanding the 250-man headquarters company and a motor pool of about 90 automobiles. It was not a satisfying assignment, and a cranky Patton rode his men hard, insisting on absolute efficiency and the flawless observance of discipline, soldierly appearance, and military courtesy. Whatever his men thought of this, Pershing was greatly impressed, and because it was certain that the Chaumont headquarters was going to grow both quickly and extensively, Patton was now in a perfect position for a larger command and a rapid promotion to major.
    Proximity to the