USMA Class of 1878.

Thirty-Ninth Annual Reunion Of The Association of Graduates Of The United States Military Academy At West Point, New York
June 12th, 1908.
James Sumner Pettit
No. 2722. Class of 1878.
Died September 4, 1906, at Washington, D.C.
The last Army Register that bore Colonel Pettit’s name sets forth below his name the following data:
Cadet, M.A., July 1, 1874.
Second Lieutenant, First Infantry, June 14, 1878.
First Lieutenant, September 15, 1882.
Captain, First Infantry, October 22, 1891.
Major, June 18, 1900.
Inspector General (by detail, Act February 2, 1901), July 28, 1901.
Lieutenant Colonel, Infantry, August 11, 1903.
Assistant Adjutant General (by detail, Act February 2, 1901), August 21 to August 3, 1905.
Assigned to Eighth Infantry August 11, 1905.
Major Assistant Adjutant General, May 12, 1898. (Declined).
Colonel, Fourth United States Infantry, May 20. Accepted May 28.
Honorably mustered out June 8, 1899.
Colonel, Thirty-first United States Infantry, July 5. Accepted July 6.
Honorably discharged June 18, 1901.

This, in brief, is the official record of Colonel Pettit from the date on which he entered the Military Academy up to and inclusive of his last assignment. But there is much that is official that is hidden away, much that is personal that is familiar only to those who knew him best. It shall be the object of this brief notice to fill out the official record, as given above, by adding thereto such details of a personal nature as may seem proper in this place in affectionate remembrance of his character, aims and achievements.

Pettit was born in New Lisbon, Ohio, on the 4th of August 1856. He was the son of Captain Stacey Pettit, a veteran of the Civil War, whose ancestors came to Ohio from New York in the early part of the last century. Colonel Pettit’s mother was of Scottish descent. She died soon after the outbreak of the war and her two sons grew to manhood under the loving care of a maiden aunt, Miss Mary Pettit, a devout Christian woman, who believed in keeping her wards in the straight and narrow path. Young Pettit was a bright and industrious boy and attracted the favorable notice of his instructors. In 1873 he was graduated from the New Lisbon High School and after his graduation entered a mercantile house in Cleveland, Ohio, but his appointment to West Point from his home district in the same year diverted him from a mercantile career.

He entered the Military Academy in June 1874 and was graduated therefrom four years later, standing number six in his class, in which he had specially excelled in mathematical studies and in drawing. Those of us who were at the academy in the middle 1870s, whose privilege it was to know him in the intimacy of cadet life, remember well his exuberant vitality and his contagious good humor, which so often lighted up for us even the darkest hours of our military novitiate. To the attraction of his genial social qualities was son added that of his mental ability, as it became apparent in the section room and elsewhere, so that he soon acquired a strong personal influence among his associates which never waned. His loyalty to his friends was returned by them in fullest measure. All the honors which his class had to bestow were his unsought and he wore them as he always wore his later honors, modestly and becomingly. As he went forth from the portals of his alma mater, gifted in mental and physical vigor, with faculties trained by years of disciplinary work and endowed with an unusually attractive personality, he gave abundant promise of usefulness and honor in any field into which his energies might be directed.

At the end of his graduation leave he joined his regiment, the First Infantry, at Fort Randall, on the upper Missouri, where for two years he performed the usual duties that fell to the lot of a young subaltern at a frontier post. At the end of that time he was called back to the Military Academy as instructor in the Department of Drawing. Of this period of his life Colonel Larned, the head of the department in which Pettit was detailed, writes:
Pettit was with me for four years, from 1880 to 1884. He was characteristically energetic, bright and efficient and took a great deal of interest in his work in the department. He was always full of vigorous vitality, enthusiastically interested in every professional question that came up for discussion and with the highest ideals of professional duty and responsibility. He was always popular with his brother officers and left here with their affectionate esteem and high opinion of his soldierly qualities.

After his relief from duty at the Military Academy, in the summer of 1884, Pettit joined his regiment in Arizona, where he served for three years, part of the time in garrison and part in the field during the Geronimo campaign, in which he participated from beginning to end. He was mostly engaged in operations in Southwestern New Mexico, where, for part of the time, he had charge of the supply depots at Lang’s Ranch and Cloverdale. Colonel Seyburn of Detroit, who was at this time in the Tenth Infantry and was associated with Pettit in the campaign, writes:
Pettit was by no means restricted to the duty of supply officer, but did scouting work also whenever there was necessity or opportunity. When Crawford was killed by Mexicans in Sonora, news of the fact reached our camp at Lang’s Ranch by courier. Pettit was ordered to take a mounted detachment with supplies and go to the rescue of our troops. We left Lang’s Ranch on January 20, 1886 and found Crawford’s command in the mountains, near Babisbe, Mexico and accompanied them back to our side of the line. * * * * At this time Pettit was at his best physically. He was fairly bubbling over all the time with energy and enthusiasm. He was ready for any and everything and was always busy. He used to spend hours of his spare time in camp sketching and drawing and writing on military subjects. He had a few good books with him which he had brought for study and whenever he could manage he would get surplus reading matter through the line of couriers or by the supply trains. I never knew a man who was so uniformly genial and almost boyishly happy in disposition, regardless of annoying and vexatious conditions and surroundings. Whenever anything droll or funny happened – and such things did sometimes happen, even in the Apache war, - Jim always seemed to get the maximum of amusement out of it and his merry and contagious chuckle was a delight to us all. I was intimately associated with him for many months, but I never knew him to indulge in anything that was 'small.' He had no room in his nature for narrow prejudice. He was generous, perfectly fearless and was quite ambitious in a proper way. He was possessed of one of the brightest and best stored minds and was truly a brilliant and accomplished soldier who proved his great worth to the Army as well as his own fitness for a greater future.

After the termination of the Apache troubles Pettit was sent with his company to Benicia Barracks, whence he obtained a long promised leave of absence. While on leave he was married at Leavenworth, Kansas, to Miss Bessie Sharp, the daughter of Major Alexander Sharp of the Army, who was at that time Chief Paymaster of the Department of the Missouri. On the eve of the day appointed for the wedding, while returning at a late hour from a dinner party, he was challenged by a highwayman to throw up his hands. Pettit however, was not a happy choice for such a procedure and promptly seized his assailant. In the struggle that ensued Pettit was shot and the assailant fled. The wound was a dangerous one and it became necessary to postpone the wedding. Fortunately, however, he wholly recovered eventually and at the end of his convalescence returned to his station accompanied by his bride.

He remained on duty at San Francisco until August 1888, when he was again called to the Military Academy, this time as Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy. He entered upon his second tour of duty at the Academy with mind matured by study and experience and with habits of industry which qualified him in an eminent degree for the responsible duty to which he had been called. His letters at this time show that he regarded his lot as a peculiarly happy one. Engaged in work which interested him, associated with congenial friends and above all else, happy in his domestic relations, it is no wonder that in imagination he tinted the future I the roseate colors of hope. An associate in the department at this period, says:
Pettit was a most able and versatile man, a most clear and efficient instructor. As a tactical officer, as an instructor in the Department of Drawing, as Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy, he was excellent in all, besides doing most valuable work in cataloging the library.

At the end of his tour of duty at West Point he was detailed by the War Department as Professor of Military Science and Tactics at Yale University and remained on this duty from August 1892 to August 1896. His work at Yale was creditable alike to himself and to the government, as indicated by a letter from Professor Chittenden, the Director of Sheffield Scientific School, the Department of Yale University in which Pettit’s work was included. Professor Chittenden says:
The late Colonel James Sumner Pettit, who was connected with the Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University as Professor of Military Science and Tactics, detailed by the United States government during the years, 1892-1896, was a man whose work in military instruction and in military engineering, won the admiration and respect of all students who came under him. He was a splendid type of man as we found him in constant association with him in the details of college life; a man who not only aroused enthusiasm among the students, but who impressed them as a man standing for high ideals in scholarship as well as in the science and art of war. We have never had a man here as military detail who occupied quite the position which Captain Pettit made for himself through his strong personality and high regard for duty.

In reference to the above, President Hadley of Yale University said:
In my opinion it constitutes an entirely true statement of the very high regard in which the late Lieutenant Colonel Pettit was held by all the officers of Yale University.

In a social way as well as in an official way, Pettit became a general favorite in the City of New Haven, as well as in the university and his departure from this field of duty was a source of universal regret to all of his associates, who had learned so well to know him and to appreciate his sterling worth and attractive social qualities.

In August 1896, he returned to his regiment in California, where he remained on garrison duty until the outbreak of the Spanish War, nearly two years later. But the range of his mental activity was not limited to routine duties. In January 1897, the Military Service Institution awarded to him the first prize, a gold medal and life membership in the institution, for the best article on the subject, The Proper Military Instruction of Our Officers, the Method to be Applied, Its Scope and Full Development. The article was published in the journal for January 1897 and attracted most favorable notice. It is characteristic of the author’s analytical methods, of his logical literary style and of the careful thought which he always gave to every subject that came before him for consideration. Many of the best features of the system of instruction which has since been prescribed by the War Department for the officers of the army were advocated by the author in this paper.

The outbreak of the Spanish War in the spring of 1898 found Pettit fit and ready for any military responsibility that might devolve on him. In the beginning of the organization for war he was tendered the appointment of Major and Assistant Adjutant General of Volunteers, but he looked forward to a more active sphere and declined the appointment. On the 12th of May he was appointed Colonel of the Fourth United states Volunteers, one of the ten new volunteer regiments raised by the national government for service in the West Indies. The regiment was organized at Fredericksburg, Virginia, being recruited manly in that state and in Maryland and the District of Columbia. From Fredericksburg the regiment was sent to Jacksonville, Florida, to become part of the force intended for the invasion of Cuba. The collapse of the Spanish resistance after the Battle of Santiago and the destruction of Cervera’s squadron ended hostilities, but the rehabilitation of Cuba remained as a heritage of the war. Pettit’s regiment sailed from Jacksonville on October 10, 1898 and on arriving in Cuba took station at Manzanillo, where it remained, with Pettit in command, until it returned to the United States for muster out in June of the following year.

The duty devolving on the American troops at the time of the occupation of Cuba was fraught with many perplexing problems. The attitude of the Cubans was at first one of suspicion and distrust. The insurgent forces were still under arms and it was only by a tactful handling of the situation by the American authorizes that hostilities could be avoided. For this duty none was better equipped by temperament and training than the commander at Manzanillo. Under his firm and sympathetic administration distrust soon gave way to confidence. The commanders of the insurgent forces in his district soon became his warmest friends. Just previous to the departure of Colonel Pettit with his regiment General Rabi wrote to the Colonel saying that he, General Rabi and his forces of Cubans, desired the departing commander to inform his successor that they would gladly place themselves under his command at any time, to maintain peace and order in the community. The regiment’s departure was signalized by resolutions of the warmest friendship by the municipal council. The Colonel’s portrait was placed, with appropriate ceremonial, on the walls of the municipal hall and Mrs. Pettit was presented with a silver loving cup by the people of Manzanillo as a testimonial of their affection and esteem for her husband and herself.

Although quartered for nearly eight months in one of the most unsanitary sections of the island, the health of the regiment remained excellent. Before its departure the military governor of Cuba wrote to Colonel Pettit as follows:
In relieving your regiment (Fourth United States Volunteer Infantry) from duty in this Department, it gives me great pleasure to state that I have found it most efficient and satisfactory in every particular. Your conduct of civil affairs has been all that could be desired. Your success has been attested by the petition which I have recently received from a large number of citizens of Manzanillo, requesting that you be retained there in charge of the district. To the best of my knowledge and belief you leave this Department carrying with you the respect, esteem and good wishes of both the civil and military authorities.

The discipline and appearance of the regiment on its return through Washington received most favorable comment and emphasized its commander’s fitness for the duties and responsibilities of a regimental commander.

The Philippine insurrection which had broken out in February of 1899 had by this time, the summer of the same year, gained such headway that it became necessary to organize twenty new regiments of national volunteers to take the place of the state volunteers in the Philippines whose time had expired and to reinforce the regular troops already in the field. Among the first six Colonels selected for these new regiments was Pettit. He was assigned to the Thirty-first Regiment, which was organized at Fort Thomas, Kentucky and was the first of the regiments to complete its organization and fill its ranks. Many of the enlisted men of his old regiment, which had been mustered out, rejoined him in his new command. On the 19th of August the regiment was notified that it was to sail for the Philippines on the transport Grant, on September 1st, but on arrival in San Francisco and before the date fixed for departure, smallpox made its appearance in the command and it was placed in quarantine, where it remained for nearly two months. This was a grievous disappointment to the regiment, for stirring events were taking place in Luzon, in which it had hoped to bear its part. Regiment after regiment, whose organization was completed weeks after that of the Thirty-first sailed away and left it in San Francisco. Finally, however, it was released, arriving in Manila in November after a stormy passage. By this time the organizations for operations in Luzon had been designated and the Thirty-first was sent to maintain peace in the Moro territory of Minanao. In the autumn of 1899, the insurrection in Luzon was at its height and it was difficult to forecast its ultimate strength and extent. The Visayans were quite as hostile as were the natives of Luzon, but a temporizing polity kept the insurrection in the middle islands in the background. It was regarded as of the utmost importance to our cause to maintain peace with the Moros. But Visayan influence extended into Mindanao and it was apparent that the situation would have to be carefully handled or we might have to add the Moros to the ever increasing number of our enemies. After the embassy of General Bates had secured from the Sultan of Sulu the precarious promise of peace, our troops were sent to occupy Zamboanga and the Moro Islands. This became the field of Pettit’s duty, a field in which he was expected to cull none of the laurels of victorious war, a field calling for disciplined self-control, self-sacrifice and devotion to duty for duty’s sake. How well he met the expectation of his superiors may be inferred from the following order which was published form the headquarters, Department of Mindanao, on May 10, 1901:
General Order No. 20:
The Department Commander wishes to thank herewith the officers and men of the Thirty-first Infantry, United States Volunteers, Colonel James S. Pettit, on the eve of the departure of that regiment for the United States, for their service in this Department and in the Philippine Islands.

It was the fortune of the regiment to have little of the active service for which it is preeminently fitted by fine discipline, thorough instruction and manhood of a carefully selected personnel; but they may return to their homes with the fullest assurance that the services of no other organization in the Philippines has been more valuable than theirs. Scattered among hostile and suspicious peoples, alien in race, religion and habits, by the fine example of its conduct and by just and honorable dealing, it converted these into friends and adherents. It could have rendered no greater service to the country to which it is returning nor to the races with which it has been thrown. From the beginning the duties have been most trying and perplexing, often at lonely and remote stations, in a tropical climate and without respite or relaxation.

It is a pleasure to remember at this time, when so fine a regiment is to be disbanded, that many have sought and will take survive in the permanent establishment.
By command of Brigadier General Kobbe.
John J. Pershing
Assistant Adjutant General.

At a later period General Kobbe wrote to Colonel Pettit:
In command of a regiment which you yourself had brought to the highest state of efficiency, it was your good or ill fortune to be ordered to Southern Mindanao and to occupy that section originally and at a most critical period. I consider that more than any other one man you brought order our of chaos and laid the foundation for the good relations that existed between our troops and the Moro and Filipino peoples for more than two years thereafter, by a firm, intelligent and humane administration. While you may consider it unfortunate that the fine fighting force you had organized had, therefore, no chance to distinguish itself in battle, you may be sure that the work inaugurated by you and carried out at Zamboanga under difficult and sometimes almost hopeless conditions was of as high order as that performed anywhere by anyone in the islands.

In May 1901, Colonel Pettit returned with his regiment to Manila en route to the United States to muster out, but his services in the islands were so urgently needed that he was not permitted to return with it to San Francisco, where it was disbanded in the month of June. When the regiment was mustered out, Major Price, the Assistant Mustering Officer, reported as follows:
Colonel Pettit deserves great credit for the high state of discipline and training of his regiment and if possible, greater credit for the discernment and good judgment displayed in selecting his officers. Assisted by a zealous and educated corps of young officers, he organized, trained, instructed and disciplined a regiment second to none in the volunteer service. The high state of discipline and efficiency of this regiment is a monument to the zeal and ability of its commander.

In his endorsement of this report, Colonel Jocelyn, Chief Mustering Officer, added:
I concur in the remarks of the Assistant Mustering Officer upon the favorable condition of discipline and efficiency conspicuous in this regiment.

In July 1901, shortly after his regiment was mustered out, Pettit was detailed under the law which had recently been enacted, for a tour of duty in the Inspector General’s Department and was assigned to duty in the Department of Mindanao, with headquarters at his former station, Zamboanga. Here he was joined by his wife and children, from whom he had been separated for two years. He brought to his new office the intimate knowledge of military administration which resulted from his long and varied service and discharged its duties with the same zeal and energy that had always characterized his service.

In the summer of 1902 the Moros of the Lake Lanao District became hostile and the troops of Mindanao took the field under the Department Commander, General George W. Davis. Pettit took part in the attack on Bayan and Pandapatan, on May 2, 1902 and in the attack on the Butag forts in September of the same year. He was warmly commended by General Davis and on his recommendation Pettit was honorably mentioned in orders, as follows:
Headquarters, Philippines Division,
Manila, Philippine Islands, May 27, 1904.
General Order No 22:
Pursuant to General Order No. 86, Headquarters of the Army, A.G.O., July 24, 1902, the Major General commanding takes pleasure in publishing to the troops of this command the following names of officers and enlisted men who, on the dates and at the places specified, distinguished themselves by especially meritorious acts or conduct in the service.

James S. Pettit, Lieutenant Colonel, A.A.G., while Major, First infantry serving as Adjutant General of the field forces, Seventh Brigade, under Major General George W. Davis, United States Army, retired – for gallant and meritorious services, May 2, 1902, in the Lake Lanao expedition against Moros in Minanao, in volunteering and joining the assaulting troops when the action was hottest and in caring for the wounded under fire.
By command of Major General Wade.
W.A. Simpson
Colonel and Assistant Adjutant General,
Adjutant General.

In the winter of 1902-1903, Pettit returned to the United States after nearly four years of continuous service in the tropics. His fine constitution had apparently carried him successfully through this long and trying period. His promotion to the grade of Lieutenant Colonel, on August 11, 1903, relieved him from duty in the Inspector General’s Department, but his detail for duty in the Adjutant General’s Department followed before his assignment to a regiment.

During the leave of absence which followed his return from Manila, the degree of Master of Arts was conferred on his by Yale University. The warm reception that was accorded to him by his friends at Yale on this occasion was very gratifying to him and attested the high esteem in which he was held by his former associates and their pride in his achievements.

Pettit’s first assignment in the Adjutant General’s Department was at Washington. Here he took an active interest in all that pertained to his department, as well as in the large questions that related to the welfare of the service. It was mainly through his influence and energy that the Infantry Association was formed and the publication of its journal was started. His practical foresight soon assured to it a permanent and influential place among the military periodicals of the day.

In the spring of 1904, Pettit was relived from duty in Washington and assigned as Adjutant General of the Southwestern Division, with headquarters at Oklahoma City. There he remained until the termination of his tour of duty as Adjutant General, in August 1905, when he was assigned to the Eighth Infantry. His failing health rendered it impracticable for him to join his regiment, so he was detailed for duty as instructor with the organized militia of the District of Columbia. While on this duty he won the Seaman prize, offered through the Military Service institution, for the best paper on the subject, How Far Does Democracy Affect the Organization and Discipline of Our Armies and How Can Its Influence Be Most Effectually Utilized? He read the paper before the annual meeting of the Institution at Governor’s Island. The article was widely published and criticized. Its terse and vigorous literary style and the logical array of facts which the author presented in support of his contention were bound to attract comment. His conclusions as to the effect of Democracy on the organization and discipline of armies were not wholly flattering to our national faith in our military efficiency. The article and its author furnished the text for many a pot boiler in the daily press that was eloquent in its denunciation of the officer who had dared to suggest to Democracy that its military methods were always wasteful and rarely efficient and to point out to it the remedial action that should be applied.

But notwithstanding Pettit’s mental activity, even in these days of declining health, it soon became apparent that this activity was but the flicker of an expiring flame. He had returned from his long service in the tropics with health impaired by conditions against which even his excellent constitution was not proof. The state of his health gave some anxiety at the time of his return from Manila, but after a short sojourn in the homeland the unpleasant symptoms passed away and it was thought that his health had been completely restored. But in the spring of 1904 it became necessary for him again to seek medical advice. Alarming conditions were discovered and he learned at best he had but a year or two of life remaining and that only with deteriorating health. In all my acquaintance with him I know of nothing finer than the way in which he met the announcement; a little startled at first, as if adapting himself to the changed outlook, but he faced it without an apparent tremor. His interest in his work seemed as strong as ever. His cheerful spirit still remained. His genial social qualities lost none of their attractive force. I was associated very closely with him at this time in some committee work on which we were engaged, but only on one or two brief occasions, in referring to his little family and its future, did he show the slightest indication that the thought of the coming separation weighed upon his spirits. His inability to accompany his regiment to the Philippines was a source of regret to him, but he realized that to attempt to do so would but add to the cares of his comrades and that his services would be of little value and so, gathering about him those who were dearest to him, he calmly waited the inevitable end. He passed away in Washington on the 4th day of September 1906 and sleeps in the classic shades of Arlington, where so many of his friends and comrades have found their last resting place.

Pettit may be said to have died in the meridian of his powers. Endowed with mental ability of a high order, trained and disciplined by constant study and effort, with judgment matured by varied and valuable experience, his fiftieth year would have found him entering on a field of widening influence, in which much might have been expected of him if his life and health had been speared. Like many of his comrades, he fell a victim to the stress of tropical service, as clearly a sacrifice on the altar of his country as if he had fallen on the field. In his devotion to duty he never spared himself. His ardent temperament always spurred him on to increased effort. He was preeminently a man of action. With a keenly analytical mind, he sought the truth as one seeking a pearl of great price. The keynote to his character was his simple, unpretentious honestly. He was incapable of deceiving himself as he was of deceiving others. His mental processes and his moral conclusions all rang true. In his public life he was a credit to the state, an honor to his Alma Mater and an inspiration to her younger sons to follow in his footsteps. In his private life he was a staunch and loyal friend, a faithful and loving husband, an affectionate father, ever mindful of the claims of those who loved him. In all the relations of life his was a noble manhood. To his family that he loved so well, he bequeathed but few of this world’s goods, but he left them a name that is honored wherever he was known and that will be long held in loving remembrance by those who knew him best.
W.P.E.