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| Eleanor Roosevelt at an air field in Sydney, Australia, 1943. |
by Timothy P. Maga
“About the only value the story of my life may
have,” Eleanor Roosevelt once wrote, “is to show that one can, even without any
particular gifts, overcome obstacles that seem insurmountable if one is willing
to face the fact that they must be overcome.”
Roosevelt’s claim was quite modest. Possessing a multitude of “particular
gifts,” she had a significant impact on issues ranging from mining conditions
to Pacific policy. Indeed, it is her role in Pacific policy during the
critical period of the August 1943 Quadrant
conference that concerns this article. Applying her “particular gifts”
in an effort to improve Australian-American relations, expand Red Cross operations
in the South Pacific, and focus attention on the lack of staple provisions for
U.S. troops in the region, Mrs. Roosevelt met considerable success during an
August-September 1943 visit to the Pacific front. To the First Lady, success in
these areas equaled the successful interjection of humanism in Pacific policy.
Even if that success brought limited results, she reasoned, at least the
humanist cause had been championed. The Pacific tour illustrated her skill in
leading that cause, stimulating a policy shift for the betterment of America’s
conduct of the Pacific War.
Although Mrs. Roosevelt’s interest in the mechanics of
Pacific policy-making was weak, her wartime concern for the welfare of
Americans fighting Japan’s fanatical troops was strong and her desire for a
postwar Pacific free from future conflict was well-known. The First Lady’s
modest public statements concerning her role in Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal
often implied that her concerns and desires might never be translated into
policy. This was not the case. Noting her contributions to the wartime New
Deal, she insisted that she “sometimes acted as a spur, even though the
spurring was not always wanted.”
Yet, her “spurring” approach was not simply a wartime phenomenon, for it could
be traced back to the mid-1920s.
As early as 1921, Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt’s lives
had been altered irrevocably. During a vacation at their summer home, Franklin
contracted a near fatal case of polio. Triumphing over the worst phases of the
disease, Franklin fought to regain the use of his legs, but his physical
prowess remained quite limited. The future president’s political mentor,
Louis Howe, prodded Eleanor, always painfully shy in public, to become an
activist in the Democratic Party and keep the Roosevelt name alive. With a
sense of duty, she made speeches and official appearances, also discovering
that the self-proclaimed “shy and solemn child” was happily giving way to the
politically active woman. By 1925, the Victorian matron who once opposed
woman’s suffrage was an enthusiastic supporter of women’s rights and other
progressive causes. Those other causes included a mixed domestic agenda of
civil rights/civil liberties issues, and economic welfare. Together, these
causes were labeled “humanist” by the future First Lady; however, the term did
not hold the same strong ideological connotations for her as it did to the
French Socialists, for instance, and other European or American ideologues.
She remained committed to selected causes, not rigid ideological guidelines.
Consequently, she was well-suited for a role in the type of “experimental”
government that her husband called the New Deal.
Eleanor’s further discovery that the humanist cause must
include an activist America working for world peace came slowly. Wedding
humanist concern to American foreign policy, particularly in the world of
Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin and Konoye, would be a difficult task indeed. Yet,
Eleanor was an experienced politician by the time of Franklin’s 1932 election
to the presidency. She was well aware of the fact that a president’s wife
embraces social activities, not causes. Nevertheless, she vowed to assist him
during the nation’s worst economic depression in its history. Borrowing ideas
and programs from both the political left and right, Franklin’s New Deal encouraged
activism in the name of “relief, recovery, and reform.” The new president
depended on his wife to gather first-hand information, for he could not. Besides
offering the data that he desired, Eleanor lobbied for immediate measures to
remedy the Depression. Touring the nation, she visited ghettos, prisons, coal
mines, and other depression-wracked areas. These visits, and her public statements
about them, assisted the passage of key New Deal legislative efforts as well as
confirmed the First Lady’s commitment to uplifting the downtrodden.
Applying this commitment to American foreign policy tested
her political mettle. In 1935, while her husband unsuccessfully fought an
isolationist effort in Congress to limit his policy options during foreign
affairs crises, Eleanor assailed the very institution of war. Working through
the National Committee on the Cause and Cure of War, the foreign policy
expression of twelve American women’s organizations, the First Lady decried the
possibility of a second World War and urged world leaders to respect the
peaceful wishes of their subjects. Her passionate appeal against war, and for
the protection of civilian rights should war come, helped the president in his endeavor
to play down his exaggerated image in Congress as a closet Wilsonian
interventionist. Moreover, her appeal continued to reflect a genuine personal
interest in preventing war or protecting civilians trapped in the “madness of
war.”
As early as 1935, she had castigated Japan for its threats
to peace in the Far East and for turning its peacetime industries into war
machines. Time was running out for peace in the Pacific and elsewhere. Berlin’s
sword-rattling over the Rhineland and Tokyo’s threats of a China invasion
worried her, prompting fears of world destruction in the next war.
If we do not find another way to settle our disputes and
solve the problems of our generation, we will probably find our civilization
disappearing also, but that will not happen because we are unable to fight, but
because we do not find a substitute for war.
Between 1935 and 1941, the First Lady’s foreign policy
position remained unchanged as she watched America move from “neutrality” to
“non-belligerency” to “lend-lease” supporter of anti-Axis causes. America’s
entry in a second World War, as she long feared, appeared inevitable. Given the
worsening situation of American-Japanese relations and growing American
concern over a possible Nazi invasion of Great Britain, Mrs. Roosevelt shed
her war prevention rhetoric in favor of refugee assistance. She became an
active supporter of the New York-based Emergency Rescue Committee, whose refugee
assistance operations during the German invasion of France and in non-occupied
Vichy France were highly successful. The First Lady stumped the nation for the
refugee cause during late 1940 and early 1941. Asking for financial
contributions to the Emergency Rescue Committee, the Red Cross and other
refugee-assisting organizations, she also urged all combatants to safeguard the
rights of civilians in the war zones. She even helped form a new committee,
specializing in the immigration of refugee children in Britain to the United
States.
Her latter activity stimulated the unpopular political
suggestion that the Roosevelt administration contemplated a shift from
America’s closed door approach to immigration. That approach dated back to the
Quota Laws of the early 1920’s. FDR entertained no such thoughts, even though
the First Lady supported a generous immigration policy. In political deference
to the president’s hard line defense of rigid immigration quotas, Eleanor
kept her refugee activities limited to fund drives for overseas assistance and
interceded only in selected visa cases. Despite private appeals to Franklin
for a change of heart, Eleanor could not shake the president’s conviction that
free immigration would only stimulate politically unpopular debates over
employment and race.
Following Pearl Harbor and the American declaration of war, Eleanor’s interest
in wartime civilian welfare broadened to include adequate health care and
provisioning of American troops overseas. As a “mother with sons in the war”
and as a “concerned humanitarian,” she saw this extension of interests as
perfectly logical.
The tales of defeat from the Philippines in early 1942, and later reports from
her Marine Corps son, “Jimmy,” convinced the First Lady that the Pacific had
become America’s forgotten front in terms of troop welfare and morale. By 1943
she began to worry that the Pacific theater might always take secondary preference
to Europe. America’s servicemen in the Pacific deserved a “New Deal,” she
wrote Franklin during July 1943.
Indeed, the Europe First priority in anti-Axis strategy had been concluded in
secret ABC-1 Allied military conference several months prior to Pearl Harbor,
confirmed during the August 1941 signing of the joint American-British declaration
of war aims (Atlantic Charter), and reconfirmed at the post-Pearl Harbor Arcadia conference of Allies in Washington,
D.C. Such priorities directly affected adequate provisioning to American
troops in the Pacific.
The problem was magnified by the impact of the Pacific’s tropical climate on
existing provisions, the remote locations of many battles, and the fanatical
nature of Japan’s prosecution of the war. The Europe First policy disappeared
by 1943 and especially when victory came into grasp in the Solomon Islands
campaign. But the new attention from Washington meant more war material for the
Pacific, not necessarily better health care, food supplies, and other
non-lethal provisions.
Mrs. Roosevelt saw a certain injustice in how her
husband’s administration had helped to create the “forgotten front.”
On the other hand, she did not challenge nor closely analyze the major policies
at hand. The Pacific command did not see themselves as “forgotten” as the First
Lady thought.
Nevertheless, the health and provisioning problems did exist, and the First
Lady proposed to remedy them, somehow, by the end of 1943. In the meantime, she
viewed the entire war as an opportunity to succeed where Woodrow Wilson’s “war
to end all wars” had failed. Her mid-1930’s anti-war zeal returned, and she saw
the successful realization of the Atlantic Charter as the best means to
achieve lasting peace in the Pacific and elsewhere.
Calling for de-colonization, self-determination, and a United Nations to
assure the postwar peace, the Atlantic Charter, despite its name, applied well
to the largely colonized Pacific region. Delays to reaching that new postwar
era of Pacific peace and harmony were obvious. Besides Japan itself, the
Allies were often their own worst enemy. For instance, in 1943, squabbles
between the American and Australian High Commands in New Guinea were delaying
the progress of the war.
The Australian minister in Washington, Sir Owen Dixon, complained to FDR that
strategy debates between America’s General Douglas MacArthur and Australia’s
General George Vasey were, in effect, assisting the Japanese and prolonging the
agony of American-Australian troops in one of the most inhospitable climates of
the world.
Further complaints of America’s reluctance to cooperate with Australian
planning in the Solomon Islands campaign suggested that the Australian-American
relationship was in need of repair.
To the First Lady, the
news of the growing rift between the two largest Pacific democracies came as a
shock. Australia and America must work together, she believed, to assure the
peaceful postwar democratization of the Pacific based on Atlantic Charter principles.
Although censored and cautiously worded, her NBC radio speech of 21 February
1943 stressed the necessity of Pacific power cooperation in the name of postwar
harmony and continued peace. Comparing the Atlantic Charter to the Mayflower
Pact, she claimed that the document embodied the “spirit of humanity,” and
that America and Australia must encourage the people of the Pacific to
determine their own destiny.
Expanding on Minister
Dixon’s argument, Mrs. Roosevelt worried that the Allied squabble contributed
to the misery of America’s troops in the Pacific. Without question, it placed
even greater accent on the need for full Allied and inter-service cooperation
in provisioning troops. She began inquiries into the success or failures of
the Red Cross and other “humanitarian” organizations in the Pacific. And, as
she became more acquainted with the type of war being fought there, she
wondered if this jungle warfare was not “making savages out of American youth.”
If so, the issue of adequate health care and related matters was even more
important. She had to see for herself.
Writing to the president
on 25 July 1943, the First Lady outlined the necessity of improving Australian-American
relations and provisioning Pacific theater troops. Successful prosecution of
the war was at stake, she argued, if both issues were left unaddressed. Postwar
harmony in the Pacific and ex-GI loyalty to the Democratic Party could also be
assured if actions were taken immediately. She recommended a personal visit,
representing the president, to Australia and Guadalcanal. The latter had been
the scene of bloody fighting since November 1942 and was not yet free from
enemy activity. The former remained in the threat of Japanese invasion,
although that threat diminished by the day. She promised comprehensive reports
on the health and provisioning of American forces as well as on the status of
American-Australian relations. Employing both modesty and political disclaimers,
she noted that she did not presume to be a diplomat or a relief specialist.
All she hoped to achieve, the First Lady insisted, was “serious consideration”
of her reports’ recommendations.
Granting his wife’s
request five days later, the president welcomed her enthusiasm. He even
expanded some aspects of her visit while quietly eliminating others. The
president particularly liked her Australia suggestion, noting that she must
avoid time-consuming formal welcoming ceremonies in favor of frank discussions
with Prime Minister John Curtin. Nevertheless, he hoped to keep the Australian
visit within a “general” and “somewhat informal” framework, so as not to annoy
or disturb the American Embassy in Australia. The latter was doing a fine job
and would appreciate the First Lady’s visit, he said, but she must be careful
not to “upstage” their work. To FDR, “upstaging” meant the negotiation of any
diplomatic arrangement. The First Lady was not empowered to make such an arrangement,
nor did she ever suggest one. In any event, she intended to encourage, if not
stimulate, a warmer American-Australian dialogue and FDR always applauded the
effort.
Although the First Lady was unaware of the problem, New
Zealand-American relations were strained as well, and for similar
chain-of-Allied command reasons. FDR therefore included a brief stop in New
Zealand on his wife’s itinerary, but hedged on her wish to visit Guadalcanal.
In his personal messages to Eleanor, he noted that the Guadalcanal visit
depended on battle developments and the whims of local military commanders.
Privately, he asked Brigadier General C. R. Smith, Deputy Commander of the
Army Air Corps, to scratch Guadalcanal from the itinerary. It was too dangerous
for her, he complained. Smith was in charge of arranging a successful schedule
for the First Lady; however, FDR permitted him to reinstate Guadalcanal if
total American victory became obvious or if a high-ranking on-site commander,
such as Lieutenant General Millard Harmon or Admiral Chester Nimitz,
personally assured her safety. Both total victory and safety guarantees
appeared unlikely in early August 1943. In fact, Mrs. Roosevelt had proposed an
immediate departure. Hoping to avoid any domestic political opposition to her
visit plans, she hoped to be in the Pacific and writing her reports before the
Republicans could devise an anti-visit position.
In solidarity, the
Republican National Committee had denounced the First Lady’s only other
wartime trip. Traveling to London during the spring of 1943, she had visited
both military bases and hospitals. Health care and general provisioning of
troops were deemed adequate by her, and this short visit only confirmed her
opinion that the Pacific theater needed greater attention. To accent the
point, she later wrote that her Pacific journey was her only “true” wartime
adventure. In any event, the Republicans had opposed the Britain trip on the
grounds of wasteful fuel expenditures and the “unwarranted” use of military
air transports to shuttle the First Lady back and forth across the Atlantic.
Urging voters to write the White House and express their displeasure, thousands,
including many Democrats, answered the call. Some complained of the First
Lady’s “pointless junkets” of “unlimited gasoline” in gas-rationed America.
Others attacked her willingness to be photographed with Negro servicemen,
noting that these “incidents” only fostered “race trouble” at home. Still
others worried if her trip to Britain had had some hidden diplomatic
significance. These writers urged full disclosure as well as a “congressional
clamp” on the First Lady’s travels.
The many protests were fresh in mind when she petitioned
Franklin for the Pacific trip. On the other hand, the president had plenty of
reasons for postponing his wife’s request for an early August 1943 visit. First
of all, the Australian general election was scheduled for the end of the
month. The warmer American-Australian relationship argument might be better
received in Canberra, FDR reasoned, immediately after Curtin’s re-election or
with the installation of a new government. Secondly, the latest Allied war
conference, code-named Quadrant,
was scheduled to begin in Quebec City during mid-August 1943. Britain was
expected to concede to America’s predominant role in the Pacific War there,
hence the issue of Allied unity was also expected to be a major discussion
point. Although American-Australian relations would not play as large a role
as U.S.-Britain or U.S.-Chinese relations at Quadrant,
the president would be happy to announce his wife’s visit to Australia as
symbolic of the type of friendly dialogue that other Allied relationships
should embrace. Thirdly, the president was already concerned about his 1944 re-election
chances. Even though victory remained more than possible, the fourth term campaign
promised to be a difficult one. Consequently, he worried about Eleanor’s
proposed recommendations to the Red Cross and if opposition to the First Lady’s
travels might become a campaign issue.
Norman Davis, director of the American Red Cross and a
long-time New Deal activist, reported to the president that any First
Lady-instigated shift in relief operations would be opposed by the major
contributors and advisory body to the American Red Cross. The majority of those
contributors and advisors, Davis pointed out, were Republicans. They distrusted
the New Deal, he said, and many would be willing to destroy the American Red
Cross during the 1944 election than see it reformed to Mrs. Roosevelt’s guidelines.
While wondering if Davis
had exaggerated the situation, the president had other worries. Indeed, his
wife’s Pacific trip invited political assault, but the public opinion impact of
that assault remained uncertain. Furthermore, Admiral William Halsey, Commander
of U.S. Naval Forces in the South Pacific, informed FDR that Mrs. Roosevelt’s
visit might encounter serious “public relations” problems. There was a rumor,
he noted, that many Marines in the islands were considering fact. The rumor
concerned an alleged remark by Mrs. Roosevelt that the Marines had become
“savage killers” who were ravaged by various tropical diseases. They must be
“quarantined” in the islands, she supposedly said, before they can ever hope
to return to the United States. Halsey admitted that his command had no idea
where this rumor began, but he theorized that it must have originated from a
Japanese propaganda broadcast by Tokyo Rose. In any event, many Marines still perceived it to
be true and had no love for the First Lady because of it.
Certainly there were
liabilities to the trip, but the president trusted his wife’s good political
sense and assumed her adventure promised more good for the administration’s war
effort than harm. The onus was on the First Lady to weigh those
liabilities and decide accordingly. Once informed of the Marines’ rumor, Mrs.
Roosevelt became even more determined to follow through with the trip and,
especially, to visit the Marines on Guadalcanal. She partially blamed herself
for the rumor, since her concern over the “savage” fighting in the Pacific War
could be easily twisted to fit the Japanese propaganda line. With Brigadier General Smith’s agreement, she
planned to be in the South Pacific islands by 18 August 1943, in Australia by
29 August, in New Zealand by 5 September, and back home by 16 September.
Smith liked the whirlwind schedule, but cautioned her on what she called “a
possible deviation to Guadalcanal” between 25 and 29 August. In reality, she
considered the “deviation” the humanitarian heart of the trip, with the Australian
phase representing her vision of the coming era of postwar Pacific harmony.
On 11 August 1943, the
president announced his wife’s Pacific trip during a closed session of the
Pacific War Council. Meeting since the early weeks of American entry in the
war, the council discussed basic issues of Allied cooperation, assessed the
problems of the “captive nations” and their governments-in-exile, as well as
reviewed the options for swift liberation and victory. More of a sounding board
than a policy-making body, the council was chaired by FDR and included
representatives of the Pacific Allies. The 11 August meeting was their 34th
session, and the president considered it a groundwork for the coming Quadrant conference. Hence, the topic of
Allied cooperation was stressed even more than usual, and FDR echoed his wife
while informing Minister Dixon that U.S.-Australian strategy squabbles were
over and that the future held great promise for the friendly alignment of
American and Australian objectives in the Pacific. Meanwhile, he hinted that
greater attention to the welfare of “our boys” was forthcoming. He did not elaborate.
The cooperative theme of this council session served as a
fine dress rehearsal for the following week’s Quadrant
conference. If anything, Quadrant
demonstrated America’s commitment to continuing cooperation with wartime
allies, but it also suggested that only America had the resources to achieve
total victory. This suggestion was nothing new to the allies; however, Quadrant implied that it also meant
American direction of the victory march to Tokyo.
Hence, Mrs. Roosevelt’s visit to Australia would be an early test of this post-Quadrant reality. Was America’s Pacific
ally truly content with the situation? What was the status of
American-Australian relations? The First Lady had an excellent opportunity to
answer these questions, or even, perhaps, influence the Australian response. In
the meantime, could America mobilize its much-touted resources to boost troop
morale and welfare? The president implied at Quadrant
that it could, and his wife intended to convince him that her implanted
suggestion was correct.
Mrs. Roosevelt officially
began her trip with a visit to Bora Bora, Christmas Island, Fiji and other rear
areas. Many of the men had been told that a VIP was arriving. But, they were
surprised when the VIP turned out to be a “white woman,” much less the First
Lady. Her tour of their bases and hospitals only confirmed her “forgotten
front” thesis, for they had few of the “adequate” medical, food and lodging
provisions that she witnessed in Britain. Meanwhile, her only personal
complaints concerned an insect-infested bed and quarters on Christmas Island,
swelled arms from tetanus and other inoculations, and a worry that she might
need a new wardrobe by the end of the trip. This latter concern had no
connection to fashion trends. She would lose over 30 pounds on her adventure.
The First Lady’s conclusions on the rear area situation were
unflattering to Washington. Besides the provisioning issue, she discovered
high social tensions within the ranks. Somehow, the Red Cross and other
agencies, she noted, must provide recreational facilities to ease the boredom
of rear area duty and relieve the race problem. The matter would be part of her
report to Norman Davis.
But, the combat areas remained her major concern. She flew
to Admiral Halsey’s headquarters on New Caledonia prepared to do battle over
her Guadalcanal itinerary. To her surprise, a polite Halsey promised to work
out the details, but not until after her Australia-New Zealand journey.
America now truly enjoyed the upper hand on Guadalcanal, and more time assured
the First Lady a greater degree of safety. Halsey did not like having to divert
his attentions to the First Lady, and he told the president so. Nevertheless,
he prepared her way for a September 1943 visit.
The Guadalcanal debate and a delay in the final tally of the
Australian election results forced Mrs. Roosevelt to alter her itinerary and
head for New Zealand. Her stop would be brief and she found little time beyond
exchanging pleasantries with New Zealand government officials. Yet, she did
meet with representatives from several women’s groups who promised to “work
toward warm postwar relations.”
On the other hand, she found New Zealand hospitals in surprisingly poor shape
to handle war wounded, and she complained to the New Zealand government for
inexplicably revoking the visas of American nurse volunteers. While publicly
praising New Zealand’s economic advancements, privately she reported “a great
deal of unhappiness” with New Zealand’s treatment of America’s wounded and
those who desired to help them. The strength of anti-American sentiment in New
Zealand disturbed her, and she hoped that it did not foreshadow the Australian
trip.
The First Lady had no explanation for New Zealand’s attitude
and she made no inquiries of the American Embassy concerning it. Like her
husband, she regarded New Zealand as, essentially, another rear area whose complaints
against America took a low precedence beneath the larger problem of
American-Australian relations.
Indeed, her flight to Australia brought more immediate issues to mind. She was
broke. The First Lady left the United States with 55 pounds of luggage, with
much of that weight taken up by her typewriter and Red Cross-styled uniforms.
She had paid great attention to packing this light load, but not to filling her
wallet. Having spent $200 in tips out of her own pocket, she was forced to
radio Washington for more cash. Her Australian visit would last thirteen days.
She confided in Malvina “Tommy” Thompson, her personal secretary and a former
Red Cross activist, that she wondered if the Australians would “accept” her.
The First Lady’s “acceptance” worries were unnecessary.
Given Australia’s connections with the British Commonwealth, she decided to
play the role of a visiting monarch. This stately approach proved to be an
enormous hit with the Australian press, and the crowds at public functions
remained impressive.
Her private meeting with Prime Minister Curtin, fresh from his re-election
victory, was also successful. Curtin was flattered by the visit, and he agreed
with Mrs. Roosevelt’s thesis of a coming new era of Pacific peace and harmony.
Although General MacArthur was not mentioned directly, the First Lady admitted
that there were certain personalities who were insensitive to Australian
suffering in the war, but that those personalities also had the best interests
of Allied victory in mind. She tempered the statement by noting that the dark
days of the war were now over and that America and Australia were destined to
share the spoils of victory. Those spoils, she pointed out, were the principles
of the Atlantic Charter and their application in the Pacific via
Australian-American cooperation.
Curtin continued to
endorse the First Lady’s argument, suggesting that the FDR administration had
exaggerated the impact over the New Guinea squabble as well as the entire row
over America’s predominant role in war-making strategy. He turned the
conversation to more specific matters, namely the long-standing Australian
argument concerning the introduction of American-made long-range bombers into
the Royal Australian Air Force. This topic smacked of the type of
agreement-making that Mrs. Roosevelt was expected to avoid; however, she
suggested that her husband was sympathetic to the issue. True Allied
cooperation, she noted, implied that the Australian request would be answered
eventually. Curtin welcomed this diplomatic response. Indeed, the First Lady’s
answer was well put, for her husband granted the bomber request shortly after
her visit.
Mrs. Roosevelt’s tour of Red Cross facilities and military
hospitals was less successful. She did not discover any anti-American
sentiment, nor did she find medical and relief operations as politicized as the
New Zealand situation. She did find shortages of basic medical and other
supplies. This was largely due to the country’s multi-gauge railroad system,
which caused serious delays and even the mysterious loss of supplies. She also
complained of the “sovereign state” approach of Australian government, whereby
different Australian states had different regulations that affected the smooth
operation of medical relief. A joint American-Australian medical bureaucracy,
she thought, operating out of the prime minister’s office, might provide the
necessary coordination and speed for successful medical operations. This certainly
would be in keeping with the spirit of Allied cooperation, and would take the
red tape out of Red Cross activities. She later suggested this plan to Norman
Davis as well.
By the thirteenth day of the Australian adventure, the
weight of the entire trip finally fell upon the First Lady. Weary from it all,
she wrote her closest friend and confidant, “Tommy” Thompson, wondering if the
trip would bring results.
Three letters from you yesterday and two today really make
life much more bearable. I do miss you very much but you shouldn’t be anxious,
they treat me like a frail flower and won’t let me approach any danger. This
royalty business is painful but I don’t know how to avoid it. I think besides
feeling cut off from those I love, the difficulty of knowing whether all the
trouble people have taken is justified by the results is too difficult for me
to evaluate. Sometimes I wonder whether from the public viewpoint the
Congressional group which is now here going the rounds couldn’t do just as good
a job!
Mrs. Roosevelt’s parting to the Australian Prime Minister
included an invitation to visit the White House. FDR had been asking for such
a visit since December 1941, but Curtin always declined. His reasons
concerned the danger facing his country; however, they also implied a certain
distaste for recognizing America’s overall leadership of the Pacific War.
Curtin avoided a straight answer to the First Lady’s parting remark, but it
was the first time that he also avoided a simple “No.” The State Department saw
this as a marvelous development, and the American Consulate General in Sydney
was instructed to compliment the First Lady on her “productive” trip.
America’s representatives in Australia needed little encouragement. Mrs.
Roosevelt appeared to have made their job easier, and they told her so. FDR’s
prediction that she might annoy the American Embassy had been mistaken. “The
success of your visit to Canberra,” the consul general wrote, “was due very
much to yourself and to the warm informality which you gave to the proceedings
everywhere. We Americans are very proud of the American way of life which you
so ably and well represented.”
Perhaps heady with success, the First Lady wired General
MacArthur, asking if she could visit the troops in the New Guinea sector.
MacArthur quickly denied the request, citing safety reasons. The First Lady
wondered if the famous general disapproved of her Australian visit and had
refused the New Guinea request on those grounds.
Given MacArthur’s dislike for Allied military operations, and particularly
American-Australian ones, her suspicions were well-founded. In any event, MacArthur’s
refusal offered greater incentive to his arch-rivals in the Navy, namely
Admirals Nimitz and Halsey, to guarantee the safety of the First Lady on Guadalcanal.
The latter was considered even more unpredictable and bloody than New Guinea.
Consequently, the Navy’s safety guarantee might symbolize a certain competence
that MacArthur’s Army lacked. The Army-Navy rivalry would not end here, but
Mrs. Roosevelt won permission to visit Guadalcanal.
Certainly, American forces had gained more ground on the
large island since the First Lady’s original request to visit it. This did not
mean that her safety was guaranteed. She received her orders to travel
unexpectedly while in transit on New Caledonia. Given only a few hours to
prepare for the journey, she worried that her visit would be too short to do
any good. Indeed, the Guadalcanal trip was characterized by haphazard visits to
field hospitals and mess tents. Two islands considered to the rear of the
Guadalcanal battle, Effati and Espiritu Santo, were also added to the
itinerary, for her plane was required to refuel there. Although deemed rear
areas, these islands still saw enemy action.
On Guadalcanal, the Marines were shocked to see her. No
advance notice had been given. The Marine officers who eventually served as her
escort tried to shield the First Lady from enlisted men’s comments, such as
“Shit, it’s Eleanor Roosevelt!” But, she insisted that she was complimented by
the attention, and she urged the ranking officers not to punish subordinates
for their shocked expressions. One of her first stops of the island was the
cemetery. The sight of the long rows of white crosses, with comments like “My
Best Buddy” carved on them, moved her to tears.
Guadalcanal’s largest field hospitals were located next to
the cemetery. She found rudimentary provisions there as well as one Marine who
wanted her ejected from his ward. The “quarantine” rumor was alive and well on
Guadalcanal. She countered it by speaking about her son’s role in the First
Marine Division, and that only Tokyo Rose would have attacked her interest in
Marine welfare. These pronouncements were effective, and the disgruntled Marine
at the cemetery field hospital later posed for pictures with the First Lady.
Although she spent less than twenty-four hours on the
island, she considered it a valuable experience. The provisioning situation
was as poor as she expected, and more medical personnel were needed. Meanwhile,
she contemplated again the “savagery” of the Guadalcanal campaign, remembering
the sight of dozens of hospitalized young men who had been driven insane by the
battle. Despite the hardships, she concluded that the American military had not
been changed or negatively influenced by the fanaticism of the enemy. What was
required, she firmly believed, was the prevention of any future war of this
sort.
Arriving back in Washington two weeks later than originally
planned, the First Lady was presented with hundreds of protest letters. Most of
them maintained the same arguments that opposed her Britain trip. This time,
however, the protests were matched by hundreds of letters which expressed
support for the trip as well as worries about the “forgotten front.” The press
was more supportive as well. America’s most beloved wartime correspondent,
Ernie Pyle, praised the Pacific trip as a fine move that might eventually
translate into better conditions for Pacific theater troops.
Such praise and predictions apparently gave Mrs. Roosevelt strength to complete
her lengthy report to Norman Davis, for it was submitted as early as 30
September 1943.
“The job everywhere in the Southwest Pacific is bigger than
anyone at home realizes,” she wrote to Davis, “just as the entire fighting job
in that area is bigger than people at home realize.”
Besides summing up her entire adventure, the First Lady’s report called for
“immediate and significant” shipments of medicines, food, and a host of provisions.
She recommended the elimination of the current Pacific area administration of
the Red Cross, and its replacement with young, energetic relief workers who
would increase their operations “ten-fold.” Intensive lobbying of the Federal
government for general improvements to the Pacific soldier’s welfare must be
led by humanitarian organizations, she concluded. Meanwhile, she would
continue to lobby for Allied cooperative efforts that might improve the lot of
the common soldiers and promise a “happy” post-war Pacific.
In turn, Davis submitted the report to the White House and FDR echoed many
Americans by labeling his wife’s trip a complete success.
The nature of this success did not become apparent until
mid-1944 and planning for the American liberation of the Mariana Islands. By
that time, Red Cross operations had indeed increased ten-fold. Few Republican
contributors bolted the cause of Mrs. Roosevelt’s recommendations. Congressional
authorizations for the provisioning of Pacific area troops were also
increased, and General Holland Smith of the U.S. Marines claimed that the
dichotomy between European and Pacific theater provisioning and medical
operations was over. More to the point, in June 1944, the military could also
claim during the invasion of Saipan in the northern Marianas that its military
and general provisioning situation was, for the first time, on equal footing.
These claims were never 100% accurate, but there were enough improvements to
warrant prideful statements.
Australian-American relations enjoyed a honeymoon of sorts
following the First Lady’s trip. The Curtin-FDR dialogue was warmer and more
open than ever before, but the approaching Allied victory made this easier to
achieve.
In short, Mrs. Roosevelt’s trip served as a springboard to a shift in
provisioning policy and Australian cooperative relations. That shift had been
already contemplated by the president as his comments and approach at the 34th
session of the Pacific War Council and Quadrant
indicated. Hence, Mrs. Roosevelt’s trip, as far as the White House was
concerned, was useful.
To the First Lady, the trip had been an amazing experience.
Nevertheless, she would make a third wartime journey. This time the destination
was the Caribbean. But, it was her second wartime adventure that remained
special to her. Several years after the war she described it as her “mission”
to the Pacific, implying its diplomatic nature.
Indeed, the trip offered her a certain diplomatic training. Be it with the
Australians, the New Zealanders, or even the U.S. military in the Pacific, the
First Lady demonstrated her early talents in dealing with disparate points of
view yet never losing sight of her cause and objectives. Her trip was not a
watershed in the history of the Pacific War, but it did place needed focus on a
number of issues that the Roosevelt administration found difficult to resolve.
Once again, the First Lady acted as the “spur” for the benefit of peace and
“humanism.” She met success, and the benefits of that success would be
appreciated by the American and Allied combatants of the Second World War in
the Pacific.
Quotations of Eleanor Roosevelt,
Box 1 of the Biographical Files of the Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin D.
Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, New York (hereafter referred to as FDRL). Much
has been written about Eleanor Roosevelt and her commitment to various causes.
This article is based on the rarely consulted records of the First Lady’s
Pacific interests as well as her husband’s private papers. Although they do
not examine the details and significance of Mrs. Roosevelt’s 1943 “mission” to
the Pacific, the following works are most relevant to the tale: Blanche Wilson
Cook, “Turn Toward Peace: Eleanor Roosevelt and Foreign Affairs,” Joan Hoff
Wilson and Margorie Lightman, Without
Precedent: The Life and Career of Eleanor Roosevelt (Bloomington, 1984), pages
108-121, and Joseph P. Lash, Eleanor and
Franklin (New York, 1973), pages 879-891.
Quotations of Eleanor Roosevelt,
FDRL, Box 1, Eleanor Roosevelt Biographical Files. With characteristic
modesty in her public writings, she claims to have had little or no impact on
foreign-policy related issues. Eleanor Roosevelt, This I Remember (New York, 1949), pages 222-247.
For an interesting summary of
her views on “humanism” or “humanist causes,” see her correspondence to Norman
Davis, director of the American Red Cross, 6 August 1943, FDRL, Eleanor
Roosevelt Papers, Box 2982-Pacific. For a cogent account of Eleanor Roosevelt
as an early political asset to FDR, see James MacGregor Burns, Roosevelt: The Lion and the Fox (San
Diego, 1956), pages 87-88, 90-91, 107.
The significance of Eleanor
Roosevelt as the “legs of the President” was a common theme of the First Lady
herself and especially other female personalities in the FDR administration.
Eleanor Roosevelt, This Is My Story
(New York, 1937); Frances Perkins, The
Roosevelt I Knew (New York, 1946), and Grace Tully, FDR, My Boss (New York, 1949).
For her views on war and the
growing problem of Japan, see: Eleanor Roosevelt, “Because the War Idea is
Obsolete,” Rose Young, editor, Why Wars
Must Cease (New York, 1935), pages 20-29, and This I Remember, page 235.
For a review of the First Lady’s
role in refugee assistance, see my chapter on the topic in America, France, and the European Refugee
Problem, 1933-1947 (New York, 1985).
Diary of Trip to Southwest
Pacific, 1943, Mid-August 1943 entries, FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box
2982-Pacific. The First Lady typed over forty pages of personal comments and
recollections during her Pacific journey.
Eleanor to Franklin, 25 July
1943, ibid.
The lack of provisions for
American forces in the Pacific has been a rare topic of concern for the many
historians of the World War II Pacific theater. The work of John B. Lundstrom
is a notable exception, however. See his The
First South Pacific Campaign: Pacific Fleet Strategy, December 1941-June 1942
(Annapolis, 1976).
Eleanor to Franklin, 25 July
1943, and Franklin to Eleanor, 31 July 1943, FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers,
Box 2982-Pacific.
John Costello, The Pacific War (New York, 1982), pages
398-406.
Speech by Eleanor Roosevelt, NBC
Radio Broadcast, 21 February 1943, and Mid-August 1943 diary entries (Pacific
trip), FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Boxes 3048-Speeches and 2982-Pacific.
William Manchester, American Caesar, Douglas MacArthur
1880-1964 (New York, 1983), pages 354, 367-370, 373-374, 379, 381-383,
406-407, 409; Ronald H. Spector, The
American War with Japan: Eagle Against the Sun (New York, 1985), pages
214-218.
Records of the 34th
Meeting of the Pacific War Council, 11 August 1943, FDRL, Map Room, Box
168-Pacific War Council, 1943.
Draft notes and Speech by Eleanor
Roosevelt, NBC Radio Broadcast, 21 February 1943, and Mid-August 1943 diary
entries (Pacific trip), FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box 3048-Speeches and
Box 2982-Pacific.
See note above and Eleanor to
Franklin, 20 August 1943, ibid.
Norman Davis, to whom the First
Lady confided many of her deepest hopes for the Pacific trip’s success, would
be the major recipient of these reports. He welcomed her efforts and
commitment. Davis to Mrs. Roosevelt, 6 August 1943, FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt
Papers, Box 2982-Pacific.
Franklin to Eleanor, 31 July
1943, ibid.
FDR to Brigadier General Smith
and Brigadier General Smith to Mrs. Roosevelt, 6 August 1943, ibid.
Eleanor Roosevelt, This I Remember, pages 260-277. FDRL
maintains a bulging file of “Letters Critical to the Trip” (Britain)
alongside its Pacific “Letters” collection, Box 2982.
Secretary of State Cordell Hull
to Nelson T. Johnson, American Consul General-Sydney, 7 September 1943, and
Pacific Trip Reports (Australia): Eleanor Roosevelt to Davis, 30 September
1943, ibid, and Box 3049-Pacific Trip Reports.
See above note and Mid-August
1943 diary entries (Pacific Trip), ibid.
Halsey and FDR exchanged several
notes on the First Lady’s visit, 15 August 1943, ibid.
FDR to Halsey, 15 August 1943,
ibid.
Mid-Late August 1943 diary
entries (Pacific Trip), ibid.
See above note. Her belief that
the Pacific would eventually embrace peace and cooperation via local democratic
action remained unshakable. See her opening comments in India and the Awakening East (New York, 1953).
Records of the 34th
Meeting of the Pacific War Council, 11 August 1943, FDRL, Map Room, Box
168-Pacific War Council, 1943.
Maurice Matloff, Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare,
1943-1944 (Washington, D.C., 1959), pages 220-221, 235; “Quadrant Results and the War Against
Japan,” U.S. Navy Intelligence Report, 1 September 1943, FDRL, Map Room, Box
169-Naval Aide Files.
Pacific Times clippings on her visits to Bora Bora, Christmas
Island and Fiji, 29 August 1943, and Late August 1943 diary entries (Pacific
Trip), FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box 2982-Pacific.
Pacific Trip Reports (Rear
Areas): Eleanor Roosevelt to Davis, 30 September 1943, ibid., Box 3049-Pacific
Trip Reports.
Report on the Progress of Mrs.
Roosevelt’s Trip, Office of General Douglas MacArthur (Brisbane) to General
George Marshall, 20 August 1943, FDRL, Map Room, Box 47-Mrs. Roosevelt.
Statement by New Zealand Women’s
Service Association (Auckland), 2 September 1943, FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt
Papers, Box 2982-Pacific.
Late August 1943 diary entries
(Pacific Trip) and Pacific Trip Reports (New Zealand): Eleanor Roosevelt to
Davis, 30 September 1943, ibid., and Box 3049-Pacific Trip Reports.
See above note and Records of the
35th Meeting of the Pacific War Council, 29 September 1943, FDRL,
Map Room, Box 168-Pacific War Council, 1943.
Early September 1943 diary
entries (Pacific Trip), FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box 2982-Pacific.
“Welcome, Mrs. Roosevelt.” This
September 1943 editorial in Brisbane’s Sunday
Mail examined the popularity of the First Lady’s presence in Australia.
Ibid.
For background on the bombers
issue, see: Owen Dixon to Secretary of State Hull, 21 August 1943. See also
Early-Mid September 1943 diary entries (Pacific Trip), FDRL, Map Room, Box
12-Misc. Folder, and Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box 2982-Pacific. The rapid
improvement in American-Australian relations during late 1943 is accredited
to dramatic American initiatives in Forrest C. Pogue, George C. Marshall: Organizer of Victory, 1943-1945 (New York,
1973).
Early-Mid September 1943 diary entries
(Pacific Trip) and Pacific Trip Reports (Australia): Eleanor Roosevelt to
Davis, 30 September 1943, FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box 2982-Pacific and
Box 3049-Pacific Trip Reports.
Noted in diary entry for 10 September
1943 (Pacific Trip), ibid., Box 2982-Pacific. For the First Lady’s relationship
to Thompson, see: Joseph P. Lash, A World
of Love: Eleanor Roosevelt and Her Friends, 1943-62 (New York, 1984).
Secretary of State Cordell Hull
to Nelson T. Johnson, American Consul General-Sydney and Johnson to Mrs.
Roosevelt, 7 September 1943, FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box 2982-Pacific.
Early-Mid September 1943 diary
entries (Pacific Trip), ibid.
The issue of inter-service
rivalry and personality squabbles has been examined in a variety of World War
II-Pacific texts; however, the negative impact of that issue on American
strategy is a major theme of John Costello’s Pacific War, pages 104, 222-226, 250-251, 314-315, 392-393, 449,
456-457, 481, 569, 640.
Eleanor Roosevelt, This I Remember, pages 307-309;
Mid-September 1943 diary entries (Pacific Trip), FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt
Papers, Box 2982-Pacific.
See above note and Ernie Pyle
press clipping from November 1943, ibid.
Cover letter to Red Cross
reports, 30 September 1943, ibid., Box 3049.
“Provisioning Assessment,
1943-1944,” War Department Report, 13 November 1944, FDRL, Map Room, Box
12-Misc. Folder. See also the Marianas campaign chapter in Holland Smith, Coral and Brass (New York, 1949).
FDR to Curtin, 10 July 1944,
FDRL, Map Room, Box 12-Misc. Folder.
Biographical Files of Eleanor Roosevelt,
FDRL, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Box 1.
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| Eleanor Roosevelt's itinerary for her Pacific trip. |
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| Major General Maxwell Murray (left) and Admiral Aubrey Fitch greet one another as they prepare to welcome First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, exiting the aircraft, to Espiritu Santo in the New Hebrides, 1942. |
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| First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt talks with a wounded American soldier during her 1943 visit to Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. |
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| Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt talking to Mrs Janet Fraser at Auckland Airport, 1943. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt at the naval base Auckland. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt in Red Cross uniform at Guadalcanal, September 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt in Bora Bora, 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt with a soldier on Christmas Island, 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt in Canberra, Australia, 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visiting a U.S. military base in the Fiji Islands in August 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt speaks to sailors and Navy personnel at a naval base in Brazil. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt eats dinner with U.S. Army servicemen based in the Virgin Islands. |
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| Mrs. Roosevelt speaks with soldiers at Pearl Harbor. |
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| Franklin D. Roosevelt’s better half, Eleanor, visited the UK in 1942. Here she is having a good old giggle with the girls of Britain’s Red Cross. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visiting hospitalized U.S. serviceman during her Pacific trip. |
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| Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt on a visit to Australia during World War II, meets with Australian sailors and soldiers. Photo taken probably September 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of President Roosevelt and Jean Marie MacArthur, wife of General Douglas MacArthur. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of President Roosevelt and Jean Marie MacArthur, wife of General Douglas MacArthur. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt signing "Short Snorter" note in 1944. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt at Army Ranger training exhibition in Washington, D.C., 5 February 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt flew with one of the Tuskegee Airmen, 1941. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visiting hospitalized U.S. serviceman during her Pacific trip. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt presenting medal to American soldier. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt sharing dinner and conversation with American soldiers. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt sharing dinner and conversation with American soldiers. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visiting hospitalized U.S. serviceman during her Pacific trip. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visiting hospitalized U.S. serviceman during her Pacific trip. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visiting hospitalized U.S. serviceman during her Pacific trip. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt presents medal to hospitalized American soldier. |
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| September 15, 1943. Lieutenant General Millard F. Harmon, Commanding General of the South Pacific, Eleanor Roosevelt and Admiral William F. Halsey, Commander, South Pacific Force. In the background is a C-47 airplane with nose that is titled “Our Eleanor”, piloted by 1st Lieutenant Roger J. Bernard, Manchester, New Hampshire, in which Mrs. Roosevelt traveled. The aircraft, provided by the 13th Troop Carrier Squadron, was used for Eleanor Roosevelt's flight to Espiritu Santo in the South Pacific, as part of her wartime tour to boost morale. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt talks with a American soldier acting as a guard at a stop during her trip, with the remains of a Japanese Zero fighter in the background. |
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| Admiral Halsey with Mrs Roosevelt in a small boat during her Pacific trip. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt talking with Black American servicemen. |
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| Mrs Roosevelt with American servicemen watching a show. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visits convalescing GIs in the 39th General Hospital, Auckland, New Zealand. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visits convalescing GIs in the 39th General Hospital, Auckland, New Zealand. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt visits with a wounded American soldier at a hospital in the South Pacific in 1943. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt addresses Negro troops at Penrhyn Island during her 1943 South Pacific trip. |
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| Eleanor Roosevelt (center) and Mary McLeod (second from left) greet guests at the opening of Midway Hall, one of two residence halls built by the Public Buildings Administration in 1943 for black women in government service. |
