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Contact Info
Home Town Dayton, Ohio
Last Address Washington, DC
Date of Passing Oct 23, 1927
Location of Interment Arlington National Cemetery (VLM) - Arlington, Virginia
Joseph Theodore Dickman was born on October 6, 1857, in Dayton, Ohio. He was commissioned in the 3rd Cavalry upon graduation from West Point in 1881. He served in the Geronimo campaign and on the Mexican border patrol in operations against the Garza revolutionists and in the capture of the outlaws, Benavides and Gonzales.
While at Fort Riley, Kansas (1893-94) as an instructor at the Cavalry and Light Artillery School, his command was on duty in the Chicago railroad strike in 1894 before he was transferred to Fort Ethan Allen, Vermont.
During the Spanish-American War, Captain Dickman served in the Santiago campaign on the staff of General Joseph Wheeler.
He saw action against insurgents during the Philippine Insurrection in the Island of Panay in 1899-1900 and was promoted to major and lieutenant colonel in a volunteer infantry regiment.
He served as Chief of Staff to General Adna R. Chaffee during the Peking Relief Expedition which followed the Boxer Uprising in China in 1900. While there he saw action in the engagement at Pa-ta-Chao temples, near Peking, on Sept. 26, 1900.
In 1902 he was named to the first General Staff. He graduated from the Army War College in 1905.
He was promoted to Major in March 1906, Lieutenant Colonel in February 1912, and Colonel in December 1914. In May 1917 he was promoted to Brigadier General and in August he became a temporary Major General in command of the 85th Infantry Division, Camp Custer, Michigan.
In November 1917 he commanded the 3rd Infantry Division and took them to France in March 1918. The 3rd Infantry Division saw combat at Chateau-Thierry on May 31 and held the Marne crossings against tremendous offensives while French lines on either side fell back. For this, the 3rd became known as the "Rock of the Marne."
In August 1918 he took over the IV Corps, participating in the St. Mihiel offensive. In October he commanded the I Corps during the Meuse-Argonne offensive.
In November he became the first commander of the Third Army, formed by General Pershing to hold the Coblenz bridgehead and to serve after the war as the Army of Occupation.
After the war, Major General Dickman turned over command of the Third Army to Lieutenant General Hunter Liggett and, as president of a board, prepared and submitted a lessons learned report before returning to the United States to take command of the Southern Department and the VIII Corps Area.
Major General Dickman retired October 6, 1921, but was recalled in 1922 to serve as president of the board charged with the removal of officers from active duty in conjunction with legislation enacted to downsize the force.
Major General Dickman died in Washington, D.C., October 23, 1927, at age 70. He was well-regarded as one of the ablest of officers of the World War, a military scholar, and a natural leader of men.
He was a member of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion, the Society of Indian Wars, the Society of Santiago de Cuba and the Military Order of the World War.
Included among his awards and decorations are: the Distinguished Service Medal; Croix de Guerre, France; Order of Leopold, Belgium; Grand Officer of the Crown of Italy; Commander of the Legion of Honor, France; Knight of the Bath, England; and La Solidaridad, Panama. The honorary degree of LL.D. was conferred on him by the University of Vermont.
Description The Spanish–American War (Spanish: Guerra hispano-estadounidense or Guerra hispano-americana; Filipino: Digmaang Espanyol-Amerikano) was a conflict fought between Spain and the United States in 1898. Hostilities began in the aftermath of the internal explosion of the USS Maine in Havana harbor in Cuba leading to United States intervention in the Cuban War of Independence. American acquisition of Spain's Pacific possessions led to its involvement in the Philippine Revolution and ultimately in the Philippine–American War.
Revolts had been occurring for some years in Cuba against Spanish rule. The U.S. later backed these revolts upon entering the Spanish–American War. There had been war scares before, as in the Virginius Affair in 1873. In the late 1890s, US public opinion was agitated by anti-Spanish propaganda led by newspaper publishers such as Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst which used yellow journalism to call for war. The business community across the United States had just recovered from a deep depression, and feared that a war would reverse the gains. They lobbied vigorously against going to war.
The US Navy battleship Maine was mysteriously sunk in Havana harbor; political pressures from the Democratic Party pushed the administration of Republican President William McKinley into a war that he had wished to avoid.[9] Spain promised time and time again that it would reform, but never delivered. The United States sent an ultimatum to Spain demanding that it surrender control of Cuba. First Madrid declared war, and Washington then followed suit.
The main issue was Cuban independence; the ten-week war was fought in both the Caribbean and the Pacific. US naval power proved decisive, allowing expeditionary forces to disembark in Cuba against a Spanish garrison already facing nationwide Cuban insurgent attacks and further wasted by yellow fever. Numerically superior Cuban, Philippine, and US forces obtained the surrender of Santiago de Cuba and Manila despite the good performance of some Spanish infantry units and fierce fighting for positions such as San Juan Hill. Madrid sued for peace with two obsolete Spanish squadrons sunk in Santiago de Cuba and Manila Bay and a third, more modern fleet recalled home to protect the Spanish coasts.
The result was the 1898 Treaty of Paris, negotiated on terms favorable to the US which allowed it temporary control of Cuba and ceded ownership of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippine islands. The cession of the Philippines involved payment of $20 million ($575,760,000 today) to Spain by the US to cover infrastructure owned by Spain.
The defeat and collapse of the Spanish Empire was a profound shock to Spain's national psyche, and provoked a thorough philosophical and artistic revaluation of Spanish society known as the Generation of '98.[ The United States gained several island possessions spanning the globe and a rancorous new debate over the wisdom of expansionism. It was one of only five US wars (against a total of eleven sovereign states) to have been formally declared by Congress.
