Today’s post was written by Dr. Greg Bradsher, retired senior archivist from the National Archives at College Park.
This is the final post in a series about the 25th Infantry Regiment Bicycle Corps and their missions to test the effectiveness of bicycles for military use.
Voyage to St. Louis (final leg), July 16-24, 1897, ~1900 miles (3058 km)
For the 25th Infantry Regiment Bicycle Corps, the roads across Missouri were bad and hilly, and with the exception of a few gravel roads, were the worst on the entire trip. Away from the railroad the country residents were inhospitable, and no reliable information regarding the roads could be gained. The heat for the last three days of the trip was severe and hard on the men.[1]
A less congenial welcome to the bicycle corps came in a part of Missouri which had been pro-Confederate during the Civil War. Late one evening Boos asked an elderly farmer whether the corps could camp on his land. The farmer looked at the soldiers and then asked, “Be you fellows Union soldiers?” “I guess we are,” Boss answered. The old farmer said, “Then you can pile right off a this land.” As the troops started to mount up, someone from the house shouted, “Hey, wait a minute — you can camp there below the pig sty.” [2]
Twenty-three miles west of St. Louis, newspaper reporter Henry Lucas camped with the bicycle corps and prepared to escort the riders into the city. He relayed word to the St. Louis Star that the men were in top physical condition, and their spirits were high. He further reported, “It is no uncommon sight for residents of this city to see a company of wheelmen . . . but in today’s visitors there is a distinctiveness which will mark them at once as different from other riders . . . All belong to the African race except the Lieutenant.” [3]
On Saturday July 24 nearly 1,000 St. Louis cyclists rode out to meet Moss and the Bicycle Corps, and large crowds greeted the weary travelers as they made their way into the city. They reached the Cottage Hotel, in Forest Park about 6 pm. During their trip they had covered 1,900.2 miles. Moss accounted for all their time with the following statistics:
- they had laid over seven days en route. viz.:
- one day- June 16, 24 and July 9;
- 1 ½ days- June 17 and 18
- a third of a day June 30, July 1, 4, I4, 17, 20, 22, and 24.
- delayed:
- 13 hours repairing bicycles,
- 4 hours and seven minutes fixing tires,
- 117 hours for lunch,
- 71 hours and 20 minutes for other causes.
This left 34 days, an average of 55.9 miles (96 km) per day, at 6.3 miles (10 km) per hour. This was “the most marvelous cycling trip in the history of the wheel and the most rapid military march on record,” reported the St. Louis Star. That was all in the past. It was now time to eat. At the hotel restaurant the men sat down to a delicious supper of juicy steak, fresh tomatoes, and buttered bread. The St. Louis Globe-Democrat, which had printed Boos’ dispatches and kept readers informed of the corps’ progress, devoted full pages to the trip on July 25 and July 26. During the next few days as many as ten thousand spectators visited the corps’ campsite and watched exhibition drills. The St. Louis Associated Cycling Corps even sponsored a parade in honor of its military guests. For more than a week the 25th Infantry Bicycle Corps was the center of attention.[4]
Moss was the center of attention, as he was quite willing to be interviewed. The St. Louis Globe-Democrat, on July 27, quoted Moss as stating that on the average, the corps had to dismount every seven miles because of road conditions. He estimated that the men walked between three and four hundred of the 1900 miles to St. Louis. [5]
Moss told one reporter:
When the going was so bad as to be too hard on the machines and the men, we dismounted and walked along the track until the conditions improved. Often we had to walk guiding our wheels along the rail. Again we rode for miles with a continuous jolting that would make a granite pavement seem like glass by comparison. Our tires held out wonderfully well. On June 17 we were in Mullins Divide, in the Rockies, and had to push our wheels through six inches of snow. A week later we were going through the alkali plains of Wyoming with the mercury 111 degrees in the shade. Our plan was to ride so as to avoid the heat of the middle of the day. We generally rode from daybreak until 10 o’clock, from which time we rested until 5, when we remounted and rode until dark. If the nights were pleasant and the roads favorable we pedaled along, frequently by moonlight. Until we struck Nebraska we had several periods of short rations and once no rations at all. The men rode as far as 50 miles without water, with their lips parched and tongues swollen. There was no condition of weather we did not endure, no topographical obstacle that we did not overcome. We wheeled over mountains and deserts, over sand hills and good, hard roads. And right here I want to say that the judgment of some people as to what constitutes a good road is sadly at fault. Frequently we would take some road at the suggestion of the residents of a town we passed through that it was all right, and we found it to be anything but decent. [6]
Moss told another reporter the trip was a success from a military point of view, and said:
The trip has proved beyond peradventure my contention that the bicycle has a place in modern warfare. In every kind of weather, over all sorts of roads, we averaged fifty miles a day. At the end of the journey we are all in good physical condition. Seventeen tires and half a dozen frames is the sum of our damage. The practical result of the trip shows that an Army bicycle corps can travel twice as fast as cavalry or infantry under any conditions, and at one third the cost and effort.[7]
Moss submitted a preliminary report to General Miles in which he requested permission for the corps, which made Jefferson Barracks its home after its strenuous adventure, to bicycle to Minneapolis and then return to Fort Missoula by train. However, General Miles was still out of the country and permission was denied. Instead, on August 4, the Headquarters of the Army issued orders directing Moss and his men to return to Fort Missoula by train. [8]
Return to Fort Missoula
On August 6, Moss and his men boarded a train and began their journey back to Montana. [9] The Washington Post reported that once Moss reached Fort Missoula his first task would be to prepare a detailed report of the trip and forward it to the War Department. The newspaper indicated that “the report to be furnished…would contain more minutiae of the journey than has reached the general public. The quantity of rations carried, the details of their consumption and distribution, the weight of accoutrements and the detailed manner of their shifting, the arrangement of the repair problem so that the entire command was never delayed in progress, the physical condition of the men to cover certain distances in certain time, the effects of hunger and thirst, the adaptability of the wheel to topographion, and meteorological conditions–all these considerations will be discussed in detail from the standpoint of a military expert.” [10]
Once the bicycle corps returned to Fort Missoula it was disbanded and Moss ended his detached service in command of it on August 18.[11] When they had left more than two months earlier the Daily Missoulian had carried a lengthy article describing their departure. Now the newspaper devoted three brief lines to their return. The big news was the discovery of gold in Alaska.[12] “The men of the Twenty-fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Dr. Dollar observed, “were no longer the heroes of the day.”[13]
Back at Fort Missoula, Moss wrote a report about the trip and had it dispatched to the War Department:
The durability, as well as the practicability of the bicycle as a machine for military purposes, was most thoroughly tested under all possible conditions, except that of being under actual fire. The corps went through a veritable campaign, suffering from thirst. Hunger, the ill effects of alkali water, cold, heat and loss of sleep. A number of times we went into camp wet, muddy, hungry and tired. On account of the long intervals between a few of the watering points and the great distance between some of our ration stations, together with the desire to thoroughly test the matter, these hardships were unavoidable.
In Wyoming, South Dakota, and nearly all of Nebraska, the water was alkali, and we suffered considerably from its bad effects. For several hundred miles through these States the only water fit to drink had to be gotten from the railroad water tanks.
He noted that just before leaving Fort Missoula and again three days after reaching St. Louis, the soldiers were weighed and measured. He gave the results. He also noted, regarding the soldiers, that “the carrying of the sick would have been a very serious problem but for the railroad. Several times soldiers were too sick to continue and were put on the train and sent as far as a hundred miles ahead.”
Regarding the bicycles, he reported:
We had quite a number of breakages: frames, spokes, handlebars, balls, etc., etc. Most of them, however, being due to bad riding and not poor machines. They were nearly altogether confined to four or five men, while the rest of the corps went through with few or no mishaps. The cyclist mechanic, Pvt. Findley, who is a fine rider, rode a wheel ten or fifteen pounds heavier than any other in the command, and had only one breakage on the whole trip, which was repaired in four or five minutes. Several of the heaviest wheels (which were ridden by careful riders) stood the trip with only two or three minor accidents.
The front crowns, front axles, and pedals were the parts that gave the most trouble. Had the corps consisted altogether of good. experienced riders, there is no doubt whatever in mv mind but that the number of breakages would have been reduced at least 50 per cent;: they would have amounted to a mere trifle.
Moss acknowledged Messrs. A. G. Spalding & Bros., who supplied the bicycles and other items. He reported that “In all my dealings with them they were exceedingly reliable, generous, and courteous, and it now affords me much pleasure to be able to state to the War Department that their wheels stood the extraordinarily severe test to which they were subjected extremely well, and are without question fine machines.”
Moss then reported on the tire situation, detailing how each brand stood the test.
Then, discussing the trip again, Moss wrote:
So mountainous and hilly was the entire route from Fort Missoula to St. Louis that we did not at any time ride more than seven miles without having to dismount on account of a mountain or a hill. Some of the roads were about as good dirt roads as could be found anywhere in the United States, while others were a disgrace to civilization. As a rule we found the roads an index to the people of the communities through which we passed. Where the roads were properly graded and well worked the inhabitants were well informed, used modern farming implements, had fine windmills and other conveniences. On the other hand, where the roads were in a bad condition and evidently much neglected, the people were narrow-minded, devoid of any knowledge of the topography of the country, and behind the times in everything.
The bicycle will, I think, do more to solve the good roads question in this country than all other factors combined. Indeed. the ‘L. A. W.’ [League of American Wheelmen[14]] colors that flow from my handle bars were the messenger of the deliverance from bad roads. [15]
Moss reported that:
Although a few of the soldiers were very careless in handling their wheels, taken as a whole they stood the trials and tribulations of the trip exceedingly well… Some of our experiences, especially while in the sand hills of Nebraska, tested to the utmost not only their physical endurance, but also their moral courage and disposition, and I wish to commend them for the spirit, pluck and fine soldierly qualities they displayed.
I wish to commend, through the War Department, Asst. Surg. J. M. Kennedy for the assistance he gave me outside of his professional services. On account of sickness and other causes I several times turned the command over to him, and he discharged his duties both as a physician and as commander with a zeal, earnestness and judgment worthy of the highest praise.[16]
After providing thirteen lessons learned from the trip, Moss wrote “Military cycling in our Army is in its infancy, and no one but a person who has had actual experience in this line can fully appreciate the possibilities of the wheel as a machine for military work.” He also noted:
The bicycle has a number of advantages over the horses —it does not require as much care, it needs no forage, it moves much faster over fair roads, it is not as conspicuous and can be hidden from view more easily; it is noiseless and raises but little dust, and it is impossible to determine direction from its track. Furthermore, the fighting strength of a bicycle corps is not diminished by ‘horse holders.’ Under favorable conditions the bicycle is invaluable for courier work, scouting duty, road patrolling, rapid reconnaissances, etc. A bicycle corps as an adjunct to infantry or cavalry could render excellent service where speed rather than number is required, such as taking possession of passes, bridges, and strong places ahead of the command and holding them until reinforcements could be gotten from the main body. On the other hand, in rain weather, over bad roads. etc., the horse is superior. The very thought of the bicycle doing away with the cavalry altogether is ludicrous. Each had peculiar functions, the one is superior to the other. The question, therefore, which confronts us is: Should not a modern, up-to-date army have both, that it might avail itself of the advantages of the one or the other, as the proper conditions present themselves? [17]
Even before his official report was made public, one publication carried part of it. It reported:
In his official report Lieut. Moss says: Except while in the sand hills of Nebraska the health of the command was exceedingly good, and none of the soldiers was in any way disabled or made sore from riding. The trip through the sand hills, however, was extremely tiresome and trying and tested our powers of endurance to the utmost. About three fourths of the corps were sick from the effects of alkali water. The water in Wyoming and South Dakota was also had. In these two States we were sometimes compelled to travel as far as thirty miles without getting water fit to drink. On several occasions we were caught in rain storms between our relief stations, where it was impossible to buy rations, and were consequently compelled to ride miles with little or nothing to eat. …The greater part of the trip was made under the most trying circumstances, through mud, water, rain, sand, over mountains, bad roads, fording streams, etc., the whole time living on the regulation field and travel ration cooked in improvised utensils. The trip has been very satisfactory to me, and has, I think, fully demonstrated the practicability of the bicycle as a means of transit. [18]
On September 20, the War Department made public Moss’s report. The New York Times the next day reported that the report was filled with information of the greatest value to bicyclists who contemplate making long trips, noting “every ounce of food eaten, every day’s events, mishaps and experiences are set down with military exactness, yet in a style that makes the subject entertaining reading for wheelmen.” [19]
General Miles returned to the United States from Europe on October 10, 1897. In his report to the Secretary of War he wrote that while in France in mid-September, witnessing French Army maneuvers that:
On the 14th the President of France and the King of Siam arrived for the review, which took place on that day at a point 6 or 7 miles distant from St. Quentin. In this review all the troops engaged in the maneuvers took part. The troops marched past in admirable order, were well equipped for the field, and showed evidence of the benefit of their campaign in their healthful and active appearance. My attention was called to a company of bicycles, probably 100 in number, and a fully equipped balloon train. Organizations of the French troops are supplied with bicycles for use by messengers. The bicycle company referred to is said to have performed on one or two occasions excellent service by its rapid movements. It is understood that the bicycle is growing in favor as a military mode of transportation among the French, which may well be the fact, as their roads are unusually fine, and troops could move with rapidity and in large numbers over such country.[20]
On February 7, 1898, Lieutenant Moss requested permission from the adjutant general to organize another bicycle corps that spring for the purpose of making a trip from Fort Missoula to San Francisco. [21] Col. Burt added an interesting endorsement to the proposal. In a personal letter to George Meiklejohn, the assistant secretary of war, he suggested that the proposed trip would call favorable attention to “colored soldiers” as they passed through the country. Burt observed that:
It is well known there is prejudice against the colored man and when he appears in uniform it is like shaking a red flag against a bull. It is a wise policy to educate the people to become familiar with the colored man as a soldier… Is it not better — is it not fairer to the colored soldier as well as to the people that the masses should be familiarized with the sight of a ‘n—-r’ in uniform? The expedition proposed by Lieutenant Moss would be a fine educator. The one he made last year to St. Louis (think of it — a ‘n—-r soldier’ in ‘sesesh’[22] Missouri!!) had a very happy effect. The men by their behavior won the respect of everybody.
Burt added in a post script: “We don’t use that word ’n—-r’ here. Why I have used it above is to more clearly illustrate my meaning.” [23]
Post Bicycle Corps Service
With war with Spain imminent there would be no further Army bicycle tests.[24] On April 10, 1898, the 25th Infantry Regiment left Fort Missoula for training camps in Georgia and Florida. The regiment would see action in Cuba, and distinguish itself during the Spanish-American War. [25]
In April, Moss was sent to Florida. On April 26, he was promoted to 1st Lt. with the 24th Infantry Regiment, another Black unit. He was in Cuba with his new regiment in June and they were engaged at the battle of El Caney, July 1, and took part in operations against Santiago de Cuba until July 19. He was recommended for brevet captain for gallant and meritorious conduct at the battle of El Caney. [26] Regarding the Black soldiers he commanded in Cuba, Moss, in an address in Lafayette, Louisiana in December 1898, said:
As you know, I went through the whole Cuban campaign in command of colored troops. I need not tell you how magnificently our colored regulars fought-their gallant and heroic conduct is now a matter of history. I have been recommended for two brevets for my services at El Caney, and I can but feel that I owe these honors to some extent to the splendid fighting of the negro soldiers that day commanded. Actuated by a sense of justice, actuated by a sense of giving unto every man what he earns, I have, therefore, never let an opportunity go by without praising my black soldiers for their gallant behavior on that occasion.[27]
In August 1898, Moss left Cuba. Back in the United States during October of 1898, he proposed the organization of a bicycle company of one hundred soldiers who would patrol Havana once it was occupied by American troops. After pointing out the advantages of speed and mobility in courier service, he noted that “in case of riots or other disturbances of any kind, a number of cyclists, armed with rifles and rapid fire guns (such guns have been mounted on tandems and tricycles and tested with the greatest success) could be moved to the seat of disturbance with inconceivable rapidity.” He concluded his proposal by noting that “After three years of practical and theoretical work, I have compiled plans for the organization of a cycling service and the specifications for a military bicycle, all of which are at the disposal of the War Department.” Moss’ proposal was rejected. [28] As one scholar observed, the future of military mobility did not lie with the bicycle.[29]
In July 1899, Moss was transferred to the Philippines. In February 1901 he was promoted to captain with the 27th Infantry and on April 5, 1901, he transferred back to the 24th Infantry .Moss would have various assignments in the following years, including another stint in the Philippines; at Fort William Henry Harrison, Montana; at Fort Leavenworth as instructor in the School of the Line and the Staff College; at Washington, D.C. on special duty in the office of the Chief of Staff, in connection with reduction and simplification of Army administrative work; and in the Panama Canal Zone. Moss was most active early in the 20th century with establishment of the American Flag Association. His efforts and those of the association resulted in President Woodrow Wilson in 1916 issuing a proclamation that officially established June 14 as Flag Day. Meanwhile, Moss, would be promoted to major on July 1, 1916, with the 29th Infantry Regiment and promoted to Colonel of Infantry in the National Army on August 5, 1917. [30]
Moss would be assigned to organize and train the 367th Infantry Regiment at Camp Upton, Long Island, New York beginning on September 1, 1917. The regiment would be formally established on November 3, 1917, and Moss named commander. Moss and his regiment sailed for France on June 10, 1918. There, the regiment would undergo additional training and then was assigned to the front. Moss would continue as regimental commander until October 23, 1918.[31]
In the introduction to a booklet concerning his regiment, the 367th Infantry, Moss wrote:
Having been born and reared in the State of Louisiana, whose confines I did not leave until I went to West Point at the age of eighteen, and having served eighteen years with colored troops, including two campaigns, what I say about the colored man as a soldier is therefore based on many years’ experience with him in civil life and in the Army — in peace and in war, in garrison and in the field.
If properly trained and instructed, the colored man makes as good a soldier as the world has ever seen. The history of the Negro in all of our wars, including our Indian campaigns, shows this. He is by nature of a happy disposition; he is responsive and tractable; he is very amenable to discipline; he takes pride in his uniform; he has faith and confidence in his leader; he possesses physical courage — all of which are valuable military assets.
The secret of making an efficient soldier out of the colored man lies in knowing the qualities he possesses that are military assets, and which I have named, and then appealing to and developing them — that is, utilizing them to the greatest extent possible.
Make the colored man feel that you have faith in him, and then, by sympathetic and conscientious training and instruction, help him to fit himself in a military way to vindicate that faith, to ‘make good.’ Be strict with him, but treat him fairly and justly, making him realize that in your dealings with him he will always be given a square deal. Commend him when he does well and punish him when he is refractory — that is to say, let him know that he will always get what is coming to him, whether it be reward or whether it be punishment. In other words, treat and handle the colored man as you would any other human being out of whom you would make a good soldier, out of whom you would get the best there is in him, and you will have as good a soldier as history has ever known — a man who will drill well, shoot well, march well, obey well, fight well — in short, a man who will give a good account of himself in battle, and who will conduct and behave himself properly in camp, in garrison and in other places.
I commanded colored troops in the Cuban campaign and in the Philippine campaign, and I have had some of them killed and wounded by my very side. At no time did they ever falter at the command to advance nor hesitate at the order to charge.
I am glad that I am to command colored soldiers in this, my third campaign — in the greatest war the world has ever known. [32]
Moss, who retired October 31st, 1922, spent the next twenty years writing military-related publications and about the American Flag. He organized and was President General of the United States Flag Association. Moss died on 23 April 1941 and was buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.
As for the 25th Infantry Regiment, it left Cuba on August 13, 1898 and returned to the United States. In June 1899 most of the regiment was sent to the Philippines where it served until the summer of 1902. On April 14, 1902, Col. Burt was promoted Brigadier General and three days later bade farewell to the regiment. In doing so he wrote the regiment “for ten years I have had the proud privilege of boasting that ‘I am Colonel of one of the best regiments in the United States Army, the 25th Infantry.’ This is no idle boast. It is based on your splendid record in the past. An inspector said in his official report about you: ‘This is the finest body of soldiers I have seen in the United States Army.’” [33]
After a short stint in the United States, the regiment was transferred back to the Philippines. Then it was back to the United States and then spent 1913-1918 in the Hawaii Territory. Later that year the regiment was assigned to Arizona and spent many years there. [34] During World War II, the 25th Infantry Regiment was sent to the Pacific Theater. The regiment was inactivated in 1947. A year later, on July 26, 1948, President Harry S. Truman issued Executive Order 9981, which abolished segregation and discrimination “on the basis of race, color, religion or national origin” in the United States Armed Forces.
But not to forget the 25th Infantry Regiment’s Bicycle Corps. In 2000, Montana PBS and the University of Montana produced a documentary film entitled The Bicycle Corps: America’s Black Army on Wheels. Its legacy lives on.
For Additional Reading
George Niels Sorensen, Iron Riders: Story of the African-American Bicycle Corps at 1890s Ft. Missoula, Montana (Missoula: Pictorial Histories Publishing Company, Inc., 2012)
Linda C. Bailey, Fort Missoula’s Military Cyclists: The Story of the 25th Infantry Bicycle Corps (Missoula, Montana: Friends of the Historical Museum at Fort Missoula, 1997)
Alexandra V. Koelle, “Pedaling on the Periphery: the African-American 25th Infantry Bicycle Corps and the Roads of American Expansion,” Western Historical Quarterly, Vol. 41, No. 3 (Autumn 2010), pp. 305-326
Roderick A. Hosler, “Hell on Two Wheels: The 25th Infantry Bicycle Corps,” On Point, Vol. 16, No. 2 (Fall 2010), pp.34-41
Marvin E. Fletcher, “The Black Bicycle Corps,” Arizona and the West, Vol. 16, No. 3 (Autumn, 1974), pp. 219-232.
Mike Higgins, The 25th Infantry Bicycle Corps. http://bicyclecorps.blogspot.com/ (accessed February 1, 2022)
This year, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) has chosen Black Health and Wellness as the theme. We hope you enjoy blogs that reveal stories of Black health and wellness from the records of the National Archives.
[1] The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 34, July 31, 1897, p. 887.
[2] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 19.
[3] Jeanne Cannella Schmitzer, “The Wheels of War,” American History, Vol. XXXIV, No. 1 (April 1999), p. 66.
[4] Jeanne Cannella Schmitzer, “The Wheels of War,” American History, Vol. XXXIV, No. 1 (April 1999), p. 66; Moore, The Great Bicycle Experiment: The Army’s Historic Black Bicycle Corps, 1896-97, pp. 53-54; The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 35, October 2, 1897, p. 71; Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 19.
[5] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 16.
[6] The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 34, August 7, 1897, p. 903.
[7] The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 34, July 31, 1897, p. 887.
[8] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), pp. 19-20; The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 34, August 7, 1897, p. 909; The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 35, September 4, 1897, p. 8.
[9] “Army Wheelmen to Return,” The Washington Post, August 16, 1897.
[10] “Army Wheelmen to Return,” The Washington Post, August 16, 1897.
[11] George W. Cullum, Biographical register of the officers and graduates of the U.S. military academy at West Point, N.Y., from its establishment, in 1802, to 1890; with the early history of the United States military academy, Supplement, vol. IV. 1890-1900, edited by Edward S. Holden (Cambridge: Riverside Press, 1901), p. 582..
[12] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 20. “At 3 o’clock this morning the steamship Portland, from St. Michael (southeast of Nome) for Seattle, passed up [Puget] Sound with more than a ton of gold on board and 68 passengers.” When this magic sentence appeared in the July 17, 1897, issue of The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, it triggered one of the last and greatest gold rushes in the history of North America. https://www.nps.gov/articles/alaska-goldrush-national-historic-landmarks.htm
[13] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 20.
[14] The reader may find interesting Philip Parker Mason, The League of American Wheelmen and the Good-roads Movement, 1880-1905 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1957).
[15] The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 35, October 2, 1897, p. 71.
[16] The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 35, October 2, 1897, p. 72.
[17] The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 35, October 2, 1897, p. 72.
[18] The United States Army and Navy Journal, and Gazette of the Regular and Volunteer Forces, Vol. 35, September 4, 1897, p. 8.
[19] “Bicycles Useful to an Army,” The New York Times, September 21, 1897, p. 5.
[20] Report of Major General Nelson A. Miles, Commanding U.S. Army, of his Tour of Observation in Europe May 5 to October 10, 1897, Adjutant General Office, M.I.D., War Department Document No. 96 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1899), p. 60.
[21] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 20.
[22] The shortening of the word Secessionist; often used as an insult for someone who supported the Confederacy during the Civil War..
[23] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), pp. 20, 23, n. 32.
[24] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 20.
[25] Moore, The Great Bicycle Experiment: The Army’s Historic Black Bicycle Corps, 1896-97, p. 60; Nankivell, Buffalo Soldier Regiment: History of the Twenty-fifth United States Infantry, 1869-1926, pp. 65-85.
[26] George W. Cullum, Biographical register of the officers and graduates of the U.S. military academy at West Point, N.Y., from its establishment, in 1802, to 1890; with the early history of the United States military academy, Supplement, vol. IV 1890-1900, edited by Edward S. Holden (Cambridge: Riverside Press, 1901), p. 582; George W. Cullum, Biographical register of the officers and graduates of the U.S. military academy at West Point, N.Y., from its establishment, in 1802, to 1890; with the early history of the United States military academy, Supplement, VIA-VIB 1910-1920, edited by Colonel Wirt Robinson (Saginaw, Michigan: Seemann & Peters, Printers, 1920), p. 715; The Adjutant General’s Office .Official Army Register for 1916, War Department Document No. 498, December 1, 1915 (Washington, D.C. Government Printing Office, 1916), p. 440.
[27] The Lafayette (Louisiana) Gazette, December 17, 1898, in Chalk Courchane, “25th Infantry Regiment of Fort Missoula, the story of its service in the West, the Bicycle Corps, and adventures in Cuba and the Philippines. In the Pacific Northwest in 1888,” http://www.oregonpioneers.com/bios/25th_Infantry_Regiment_1888.pdf
[28] Charles M Dollar, “Putting the Army on Wheels: The Story of the Twenty-Fifth Infantry Bicycle Corps,” Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Spring 1985), p. 20.
[29] Coffman, The Old Army: A Portrait of the American Army in Peacetime, 1784-1898, p. 357.
[30] The Adjutant General’s Office .Official Army Register for 1916, War Department Document No. 498, December 1, 1915 (Washington, D.C. Government Printing Office, 1916), p. 440; George W. Cullum, Biographical register of the officers and graduates of the U.S. military academy at West Point, N.Y., from its establishment, in 1802, to 1890; with the early history of the United States military academy, Supplement, VIA-VIB 1910-1920, edited by Colonel Wirt Robinson (Saginaw, Michigan: Seemann & Peters, Printers, 1920), pp. 714-715
[31] Emmett J. Scott, A.M., LL.D., Special Assistant to Secretary of War, Scott’s Official History of the American Negro in the World War (Chicago: Homewood Press, 1919),.p. 190; George W. Cullum, Biographical register of the officers and graduates of the U.S. military academy at West Point, N.Y., from its establishment, in 1802, to 1890; with the early history of the United States military academy, Supplement, VIA-VIB 1910-1920, edited by Colonel Wirt Robinson (Saginaw, Michigan: Seemann & Peters, Printers, 1920), p. 715.
[32] Emmett J. Scott, A.M., LL.D., Special Assistant to Secretary of War, Scott’s Official History of the American Negro in the World War (Chicago: Homewood Press, 1919),.pp. 194-195.
[33] Nankivell, Buffalo Soldier Regiment: History of the Twenty-fifth United States Infantry, 1869-1926, pp. 86-113.
[34] Nankivell, Buffalo Soldier Regiment: History of the Twenty-fifth United States Infantry, 1869-1926, pp. 115-159.