Devil Dogs: Fighting Marines of World War I [Hardcover]

George B. Clark (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0891416536 | ISBN-13: 978-0891416531 | Publication Date: December 1, 1998 | Edition: 1

The United States Marine Corps has long enjoyed the reputation of being America's premiere fighting force. Whenever crisis looms one hears the familiar chorus, Send in the Marines. How was this reputation first earned? Many would argue that the Marine Corps stepped up and took its place alongside America's other armed forces in 1918 at Chateau Thierry and Belleau Wood. So fierce was the 4th Marine Brigade in combat that the overwhelmed German defenders dubbed them Teufulhunden, literally Devil Dogs.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Clark, a former Marine and a historian of the Corps, does an excellent job of showing how the identity of the U.S. Marine Corps was forged in the experiences of the American Expeditionary Force in 1917- 1918. Combining published records with private sources, Clark tells the full story of the Corps in the Great War, from the training camps to the front lines, occupation and demobilization. Clark demonstrates that the Marines were no better prepared than their Army counterparts for the trenches of France. Most enlisted men were green wartime recruits, and few officers had experience commanding formations as large as those used in the Great War. The consequences were predictable: time after time, Marine units lost contact with one another and with their supporting artillery, and colonels and majors were remote from the battles their men were fighting. Clark is a stern critic of these command failures. His judgments indeed may be excessively harsh: no WWI army solved the problems of liaison and control. But at the company and platoon levels, Clark tells of how the Marines redeemed their superiors' shortcomings, overcoming uncut wire and damaged machine guns with raw courage buttressed only toward the end of the war by tactical sophistication. The front-line Marines' lot was not unique. What was unique was the way these experiences have become central to the Corps identity. Clark's text establishes beyond question the WWI origins of the synergistic emphasis on small-unit leadership, sharp-end initiative and esprit de corps that, for good and ill, characterizes and defines the U.S. Marine Corps.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Writing in a chatty, sometimes anecdotal style, Clark gives us the most detailed popular history available of the U.S. Marines in World War I. With a maximum strength of 75,000, the corps sent only two brigades to France. Only the Fourth Marine Brigade saw combat, and in France the "Devil Dogs," as the Germans nicknamed them, were a long way from their parent organization, the navy, and close to the army, which did not like marines. Clark includes a thorough account of the marines' most famous action, in the battle of Belleau Wood, as well as of the other six major battles in which they fought, including the bloody and botched, not to mention largely unknown, assault on Blanc Mont. Although rather free with his opinions, Clark has mined every available source and discovered new ones to back himself up. The final product is a collective portrait of men who, though initially unfamiliar with the Western Front and often poorly led by senior officers, prevailed with sheer courage and determination. Roland Green

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 512 pages
• Publisher: Presidio Press; 1 edition (December 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0891416536
• ISBN-13: 978-0891416531
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,780,780 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding - a landmark work, June 24, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Devil Dogs: Fighting Marines of World War I (Hardcover)

From Leatherneck Magazine - March, 1999

The rich thread of tradition has woven itself throughout the tapestry of Marine Corps history. From these threads, Marines of today uphold the standards of service and sacrifice of the past as the proud inheritors of this heritage. Of all the eras of Marine Corps history, arguably the most romantic and colorful would be the involvement of the Marines in the First World War. The Marine Corps of today is still flavored by the traditions and experiences of those years. Words such as Devil Dog and Foxhole still permeate the language of our Marines and students from The Basic School have adopted Belleau Wood and travel over regularly to assist in the maintenance of this hallowed ground, the only wholly-owned American battlefield on foreign soil. By the same token, this has remained one of the least explored eras throughout the history of the Marines.

Certainly, the classics of Asprey's "At Belleau Wood" and Stallings' "Doughboys" stand forth as valuable contributions to the understanding of that history. However, no one has published a comprehensive examination of the actions and service of the 4th "Marine" Brigade until now.

It is with a clear love and empathy for this subject that former Marine, George Clark undertook the monumentous task of shifting through and composing the far-flung resources of documentation into a concise and readable history of the Fourth "Marine" Brigade and it's service from formation until disbandment.

Clark's work, drawn from 25 years of research into the subject, captures the color and character, as well as the facts and figures, of the Marine Brigade as no previous work. Based on contemporaneous unit histories, Marine diaries, personal letters, as well as official documents and correspondence, this book blows open the door and illuminates the incredible story of ordinary men, who, under extraordinary circumstances, left a legacy of valor courage and sacrifice unsurpassed to this day.

Highly detailed and filled with fascinating insights, "Devil Dogs" takes no prisoners. It tells the unvarnished tale of the largely volunteer force, leavened by a strong cadre of seasoned Officers and NCOs, who formed the nucleus of the 2nd Division (Regulars) of the infant American Expeditionary Force. The author offers interesting and thought-provoking opinions of the success and failure of the various Officers who led the Marines in combat in France and makes no apology for ruffling a few feathers along the way.

A rollicking, fun book to read, Clark takes the reader along from the stateside clashes with Pershing and the Army bureaucracy to training in France and through the battles of Belleau Wood, Soissons, St. Mihiel, Blanc Mont and Meuse-Argonne. Chapters also cover the history of Marines in the Occupation of Germany and explore the little known history of the Marines in the Composite Regiment of the AEF - Pershing's Showpiece.

Though not for those wishing a "quick" synopsis of Marine involvement in the Great War, "Devil Dogs" is a must for any student of Marine History or for those wishing to get the full picture of this most colorful era. Clark's work justifiably joins Asprey and Stallings as a modern classic of the American experience in the Great War. With valuable lessons for today's military, it stands as a true picture of the success by leadership, unmatched valor and pure guts, against a seasoned and battle-tested foe.

Patrick Mooney

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellant, June 30, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Devil Dogs: Fighting Marines of World War I (Hardcover)

I support the Leatherneck review and am tempted to rate it 5 stars. It is refreshing to read not only the USMC WW1 history but the authors considered opinions on the battles and personalities involved.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An essential and wonderful book, November 4, 2002

By 

BENNETT H WILLIAMS (LOUISVILLE, KY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Devil Dogs Fighting Marines of World War I (Paperback)

Here is a wonderfully detailed and moving book. It satisfies the serious scholar in its overwhelming details, and yet carries the `human thread' to show the true wonder of what these marines did. My grandfather was with the 6th Marines at Belleau Wood and I guarantee he would have loved and respected this book.