The Soldier’s Shift from Animal to Motor Power
By Lisa M. Mundey
Article published on: September 1, 2025 in the Army History Fall 2025 Issue
Read Time: < 25 mins
Army tanks, supported by cavalry, advance in a downpour during the Louisiana Maneuvers in September 1941. National Archive
As the American people transitioned from animal to motor power, so too did the United States Army adopt motorization and mechanization. Motorization refers to the substitution of motor vehicles for animal-drawn transportation, whereas mechanization denotes the use of mechanical and motorized equipment for combat.1 With more Americans becoming comfortable with motors, increasing numbers of U.S. Army recruits also had familiarity with vehicles. Of course, there were bumps along the path to adaptation of motors, and horse culture proved enduring. Though there is ample documentation of the views of decision makers on the adoption of motor vehicles for transportation and combat, the voices of the enlisted, noncommissioned, and junior officers are far more elusive. A way to try to capture some of these voices is through cultural artifacts such as songs and cartoons, which illustrate the ways in which soldiers accommodated the transition from animal power to motor power: praising and poking fun at both.
Scholars have written much about the U.S. Army’s debates concerning mechanization, particularly within the U.S. Cavalry, with researchers ofen casting the dynamic along a dichotomy of acceptance or rejection, innovators or traditionalists. Scholars contrast promechanization advocate Maj. Gen. Adna R. Chafee Jr. against the stubborn proponent of the horse, the last chief of cavalry, Maj. Gen. John K. Herr. Chafee famously denounced the traditionalism of the Army’s Cavalry School by declaring “the motto of the School says ‘Through Mobility We Conquer.’ It does not say, ‘Through Mobility on Horses Alone We Conquer.’”2 The generals’ contemporaries framed the debate in similar terms. In 1935, Lt. Col. Jonathan M. Wainwright, then assistant commandant of the Cavalry School at Fort Riley, Kansas, noted that “the Cavalry School is accused by the strong proponents of the horse as being too mechanical minded, and, by the stout supporters of mechanization, of being over ‘horsey.’”3 Other scholars recognize that acceptance and accommodation for new technology fell along a spectrum, even for Army decision-makers.4
With the establishment of the American automobile industry in the mid-1890s, Army leaders in the Quartermaster Corps soon began to contemplate what motor vehicles might mean for the service. Could motors replace the mule?5 At the turn of the century, the Quartermaster Corps experimented with internal combustion engines, but the technology initially proved unreliable. Additionally, the Army already had an existing infrastructure to support animal-based transportation, from the animals themselves and the stables that housed them to the forage, wagons, and depots they used. Soldiers from the enlisted ranks through officers knew how to care for the animals and maintain the equipment and facilities. Should the Army adopt motor transport, the service needed not only to invest in the new technology, but also train drivers and maintenance personnel as well as build entirely different infrastructure to support it all. Even civilian infrastructure, such as paved roads outside of city limits, had not been constructed yet.
Horses swimming ashore at landing at Daiquiri, William J. Glackens, 1898
Library of Congress
In the Spanish-American War in 1898, Army troops deployed to Cuba with their horses and mules. With the logistics challenge facing the Army, the animals sometimes had to swim to shore. For instance, when the 10th Cavalry reached Daiquirí, which lacked port facilities, the soldiers could reach shore only by small boats. The animals had to swim, and some drowned in the process when they headed out to sea instead of to land.
Though the war with Spain did not last long, the taking of San Juan Hill near Santiago, Cuba, captured the public’s attention. Led by Col. Theodore Roosevelt, the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry, dubbed the “Rough Riders,” and the 10th Cavalry advanced on the Spanish forces atop San Juan Heights, though the U.S. soldiers mostly advanced dismounted up the lower part of the heights, known as Kettle Hill. Facing jungle vegetation, heavy Spanish fire, and barbed wire, the American troops proceeded slowly. Eventually, the Spanish fled Kettle Hill for higher ground on the neighboring San Juan Hill. American Gatling guns poured fire on the new Spanish position, forcing the defenders to abandon their post to the American troops. The successful assault made Roosevelt a national hero.7 Numerous musical compositions celebrated Roosevelt and his Rough Riders, including “Charge of the Rough Riders,” “Roosevelt’s Rough Riders,” and “Rough Riders in Cuba.” The horses are praised as well in “The Hero of San Juan Hill” with the lyric, “With the flashing of sabres/And the prancing of steeds” as the troops fight bravely, following their leader.8
Animals also deployed with cavalry and artillery units to the Philippines, as the American annexation of the islands following Spain’s defeat prompted armed resistance by the Filipinos. As Lt. Edmund Louis “Snitz” Gruber led a detachment through the Zambales Mountains, located on Luzon, he reportedly heard an artillery section chief call out to his horse drivers, “Come on! Keep ‘em Rolling!” Reflecting on this experience, and with the help of his peers, Gruber composed “The Caissons Go Rolling Along,” published in March 1908, memorializing the horse-drawn artillery. The tune and words spread through the Army:
Over hill, over dale
As we hit the dusty trail,
And those caissons go rolling along.
In and out, hear them shout,
Counter march and right about,
And those caissons go rolling along.
Then it’s hi! hi! hee!
In the field artillery,
Shout out your numbers loud and
strong,
For where e’er you go,
You will always know
That those caissons go rolling along.9
Soldiers stationed in Manila and Corregidor during and after the war enjoyed Army amenities and pastimes similar to their counterparts in the continental United States. They had sports, clubs, and dances. Polo had a particularly lauded place in Army culture, and officers stationed overseas even received extra pay to care for their horses.10
Soldiers from the 16th Infantry and their horses take cover in the San Juan creek while under fre from Spanish troops on San Juan Hill, 1 July 1898.
Library of Congress
Soldiers loved their animals. As Marc Blackburn notes, the soldiers’ emotional attachment to the horses and mules “runs all through the archival records of the period and is found in military journals published by the Army, most particularly the Cavalry Journal.”11 Across Army posts, soldiers played polo, went on hunts, and mastered equestrian events. Well before becoming a champion of mechanization in the cavalry, a young Adna Chafee’s talent on horseback earned him a spot on the team representing the United States at the International Horse Show in London, an event celebrating the coronation of George V in 1911.12
While the Army continued to rely on animal power, civilians adopted motor trucks for commercial freight transportation. Once internal combustion engines proved reliable, it became clear that motor trucks could transport heavy loads over long distances safely and more quickly than animals could. Plus, trucks had the advantage of not getting tired. Trucks also operated in all weather conditions, where cold, heat, and precipitation affected animals. Even in safety, trucks had the advantage. Although it might seem intuitive that slow-moving animal wagons could stop more swiftly than a faster moving truck, the opposite proved true. At moderate speeds, a truck stopped quicker.13
As the Quartermaster Corps came to accept the efficacy of motor transport, the true test of its operational worth came during the Mexican Expedition in 1916. At this point, few soldiers had experience maintaining or driving motor vehicles. Such inexperience and lack of care with standard operating procedures led to engine problems, broken suspensions, and other preventable damage. To fnd enough drivers for the expedition, the Army sought experienced soldiers from various Regular Army units, the National Guard, and even civilians.14 Even so, the Army had to rely on soldiers who had never driven before to operate the vehicles. As Tim McNeese reports, the animal-centric culture colored soldiers’ responses: a field artilleryman read up on how to drive, “took a couple of hands-on lessons, and spoke of his truck and fuel as one would a horse and hay.”15 Because there were plenty of horses available with the deployment of four cavalry units to Mexico, soldiers played polo and even went hunting during their downtime.16
Despite the mechanical drawbacks and driver issues, trucks did prove superior to animal-drawn wagons in Mexico and thus the American Expeditionary Forces used them in World War I. Much as it had experienced in Mexico, the Army discovered that it did not have enough vehicles, spare parts, or drivers to maintain the motor pool.17 Te Army’s first foray into mechanized vehicles also encountered difficulties. Though Tank Corps training centers were established in the United States, slow production of the vehicles meant that American troops used French and British tanks. At Saint- Mihiel in September 1918, American tanks suffered mechanical failures and bogged down in mud. Tank units took heavier casualties in the Meuse-Argonne sector in September and October, while continuing to face breakdowns and mud against German trenches.18
Though most of the songs created during and after World War I focused on soldiers’ experiences leaving home, traveling to France, heartbreak, and patriotism, the song “The Yanks with the Tanks (Will Go Through the German Ranks)” celebrated the new tanks. Dubbed “the official song of the U.S. Tank Corps,” it ignored the problems and enthusiastically promoted the service. The lyrics promised that the Americans will “roll right through Berlin.” With their new armor, it claimed, “We’ll go over the top/And we’re not going to stop” until the Germans surrender.19
A 5th Infantry wagon train crossing the desert during the U.S. expedition into Mexico, 6 May 1916.
Library of Congress
A more shocking development stemming from World War I came when horse cavalry was found to be of little use on the battlefield. Though four cavalry units deployed overseas, only the 2d Cavalry Regiment faced limited combat. The rest were scattered across France. Moreover, modern battlefield conditions, such as machine guns, artillery, barbed wire, muddy shell holes, and trenches all posed problems for the animals.20 The war had lasting effects on the Army with both a slow but advancing process of motorization and mechanization and a strong cultural rededication to the horse in combat.
Field artillery was the first combat arm to embrace motorization, even if postwar budgets made the process sluggish. In the early 1920s, the branch started motorizing its headquarters, then corps artillery, and then some of the artillery units stationed in Panama and Hawai‘i. The Quartermaster Corps set up the Motor Transport School at the Holabird Quartermaster Depot in Baltimore, Maryland. It served the active and reserve components and instructed both officers and enlisted in mechanics and vehicle operations. Between 1919 and 1927, the school graduated 1,915 enlisted soldiers as well as 186 officers and 8 warrant officers.21
Although automobiles were still fairly scarce in 1920, with only about one-third of households having a car, by 1930 around 80 percent of households had one.22 This widespread adoption of automobiles “changed the way people worked, conducted their business, shopped for necessities and desires, and spent leisure time.”23 Similarly, adoption of trucks and tractors changed work patterns for businesses and farmers. Trucks allowed greater distances between worksites and encouraged regional commercial and services centers. The adoption of tractors on farms offered significant time savings caring for draft animals. Additionally, farmers did not have to grow feed for their animals, putting more acreage into produce. Many farmers initially did not benefit from these savings because they had an emotional attachment to their animals and kept them.24 A similar pattern emerged in the Army.
The 1925 Fort Bliss, Texas, polo team. Major Truscott is third from left.
Courtesy of the National Museum of Polo and Hall of Fame
Though motorization began to be implemented, Army culture continued to cling to animals, particularly in field artillery and cavalry units. On every post, horses and riding facilities were available not only to soldiers but to their families as well. Classes were available to instruct Army spouses and children how to ride.25 Oliver McKee, a reporter from the Boston Evening Transcript, visited Fort Riley and observed that soldiers’ families all rode horses at the post and that “even the youngsters at the post have an eye for horse flesh and know by their first names every animal in the stables.”26 A photograph of the Ladies’ Riding Group mounted outside the West Riding Hall on post attests to McKee’s observations. More than a dozen women sit astride their horses, holding the animals in line for the photograph. Te women appear comfortable and ready for their equestrian jaunt.27 Besides riding, both polo and hunt clubs were popular on Army posts. In the winter months, soldiers put on equestrian displays, sometimes open to the public. Well into the 1930s, one could follow the horse shows, polo matches, and fox hunts in the Cavalry Journal.28
Songs reveled in the old horse cavalry. Along with pride in the regiment, singing together created a bond among soldiers, and the troops often sang together in groups. In 1925, D. Scotti and Joseph G. Garrison presented a nostalgic and idealized view of the horse soldier in their musical composition, “Te Dashing Cavalree.” Te lyrics proclaim how much the cavalryman loves the combat branch and his trusty horse. The cavalryman dashes over hills and plains, where “of bit and spur I’m King.” This verse depicts movement and openness, not the stagnant lines of trenches that had characterized World War I. This imagery also connotes a carefree spirit and taps into the traditional identity of American ruggedness and independence. Te cavalry soldier is not so free that he neglects his obligations. When called to duty, “I will mount with saber, gun and all/ On my charger I will ride with glee.” Yet even though the lyrics present the cavalry as being eager for combat, they assure listeners that the horse soldier would “ne’er forget my loved ones far and near.”29 In this song, cavalrymen exhibit the perfect balance of individualism, responsibility, and martial and riding skill.
The Cavalry School’s yearbook, The Rasp, reflected an enthusiastic spirit for the horse. Located at Fort Riley, students learned horsemanship, participated in horse shows, and played polo. Indeed, the Special Advanced Equitation Class during the 1920s included courses on “Practical Polo” and “Conditioning and Care of Polo Ponies.” Maj. Lucian K. Truscott Jr., a student in the 1925 Troop Officers Course and then an instructor at the Cavalry School, noted that “it was in horsemanship that most of the legends of the school originated.”30 The pages of the yearbooks are filled with pictures of shows, demonstrations, competitions, jumping matches, sketches and photographs of horses, and inside jokes long since lost to memory. The 1924 yearbook even featured biographies of the horses.31 Boston Evening Transcript reporter McKee warned that “unless you like horses you had better steer clear of the Cavalry and The Cavalry School.”32
Nonetheless, soldiers love to complain as much as anyone, even about the things they hold dear. And horses proved just as susceptible to students’ griping as any other classroom exercise. Compared to sliding down the side of a canyon while hanging onto one’s mount for dear life or struggling with a recalcitrant horse on a march, motor vehicles appeared quite comfortable and appealing.33 For all the school’s emphasis on horsemanship and love for one’s horse, they could not deter one officer from writing in the 1921 yearbook, “Tis flesh is all right when it’s on the ground or/Seated in motor car/But it suffers much when it feels the pound of a/Nag whose gait’s a jar.”34
In the 1922 edition of The Rasp, at least three officers poked fun at the cavalry’s role in future wars. They humorously explored in sketches the ways in which the modern battlefield affected the horse cavalry and recognized some of the drawbacks it offered. In one cartoon, a winged horse and rider fy to carry a message to an airplane in the sky. The caption reads, “In case communication between the ground and plane fails, a mounted messenger will be sent up.” A second illustration presents a horse and rider climbing up a telephone pole, an absurd scenario where “a mounted man on a horse equipped with spikes can string wire on telephone poles.” A final sketch features a horse reared up on hind legs and a rider brandishing a sword in a charge, both wearing looks of trepidation. This caption states, “the horse is an offensive animal.”35 No matter the high-level discussions of the future of the horse in combat, these students recognized the incongruity of horses replacing modern technology.
Students at the Cavalry School at Fort Riley, Kansas, poked fun at the ways in which modern technology affected the horse in combat with this sketch in the 1922 edition of their yearbook. Martin, “Three Uses of the Horse in Future Wars,” The Rasp (1922), 40.
U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, Fort Riley, Kansas
Motorization offered some clear advantages over horses. Another sketch illustrates a convoy of motor vehicles returning from “A Tactical ‘Ride.’” In this instance, motor vehicles replaced horses for a field exercise, much to the delight of these soldiers. A student in one car comments, “pretty soft this sort of riding!!” and another one adds “this beats hell outa riding a horse!!”36 These students appear particularly upbeat and positive concerning motor vehicles, at least as it pertained to their rear ends. Another verse suggests that the students at the Cavalry School had their fun with motor vehicles as well. A stanza from “That School at Riley” indicates that after riding tanks and writing about roads, the students took a “joy-ride in an armored car.”37
Motor vehicles arrived on Army posts through private ownership when officers and troops brought in their personal vehicles. A student in The Rasp captured a moment with Maj. Henry H. “Hap” Arnold’s automobile. He wrote, “Major Arnold, on a winter’s night/Parked his auto, turned out the light.” Another officer in the class recently had purchased a new vehicle and was immortalized in the verse, “A nice long gun and a horse to boot/A brand new car, now ain’t he cute?”38 Photographs from the era show parked cars outside buildings and on the roads around post. One striking photograph captures Olympic equestrian Lt. Col. Hiram E. Tuttle’s car covered in snow. Spouses drove families around the post in cars, and automobiles brought crowds to cavalry parades. Fort Riley had also received surplus World War I reconnaissance vehicles, which were employed to drive officers around. Students at the Cavalry School made note of these official vehicles.39 The 1925 edition of Te Rasp featured one speedy vehicle, dubbed “The 8 A.M. Special,” rapidly whisking stern-faced officers somewhere on post.40 As with their fellow Americans in civilian life, soldiers integrated motor vehicles in their personal life. They still worried about what motors meant for their professional lives.
Students at the Cavalry School enjoyed some early experiments with motor vehicles replacing horses on tactical rides in this cartoon featured in their 1928 yearbook. “A Tactical ‘Ride,’” The Rasp (1928), 145.
U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, Fort Riley, Kansas
Although mechanization prompted controversy, the use of motors to transport or assist the horses proved appealing. Trailers were used to transport horses. A yearbook cartoon labeled “Major Bohn’s Return” captures this development. It depicts a farmer and officer riding in the front seat of an open-bed truck. A horse is laying down in back, happily dreaming of oats.41 Soldiers also worried about horses sharing the streets with automobiles. One officer supported transportation for West Point’s polo ponies and show horses. He wrote, “it is dangerous for the pedestrian to walk on the highways in this vicinity, so you can see what chances a string of horses has of going over the roads safely.”42 The Army experimented with horse transportation. For instance, Troop A, 13th Cavalry, successfully marched from Fort Riley to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, with horses riding in trucks.43
Seeing surplus World War I vehicles transporting officers around post, students at the Cavalry School lampooned the practice in their 1925 yearbook. “The Life O’Riley,” The Rasp (1925), 46.
U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, Fort Riley, Kansas
Though motor vehicle technology continued to mature, the earliest vehicles, especially the ones lef over from World War I, were prone to breakdowns. One student criticized the new armored cars in the 1928 edition of The Rasp, lamenting taking off his spurs and hanging up his saddle for the mechanized vehicles. Not only do the machines stall, endure fat tires, and experience grit-filled spark plugs, “Tey cannot jump high hurdles/Cross streams or leap a ditch.” In his view, motors are noticeably inferior to the grace and skills of a trusty horse. He complains further, “To start and stop is not an art/‘Tis Done by a small switch,” thus depreciating the riding skills of the horse soldier. The writer concedes that the horse cavalry did not monopolize pride and morale. He expects that a new armored car component would create its own esprit de corps “like Armored Knights,” then concludes, “But when upon their mission bold/Along some well worn trail/Me thinks this whole idea will prove/Another Holy Grail.”44 His imagery of knights and the quest for the Holy Grail evokes stateliness and bold adventure, but from an era long past and one that has faded into memory. More tellingly, by conjuring visions of the fruitless pursuit of the Holy Grail along that “well worn trail,” the student suggests that mechanization too will prove empty, useless, and a waste of time and energy.
Motor vehicles transported horses, captured humorously in this 1928 yearbook sketch for The Cavalry School. “Major Bohn’s Return,” The Rasp (1928), 204.
U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, Fort Riley, Kansas
This student did surmise correctly that the new mechanized units would begin to assert their own esprit de corps. Although the horse cavalry struggled with their relationship to motor vehicles, those who made the jump to the new technology turned to history for validation. In 1930, Sgt. M. M. Lyle and WO1 John A. Dapp of the 1st Tank Regiment composed the song “Te Tank.” Returning to the days of the First World War, the lyrics connote power and danger.
The song goes on to describe the tank as a “grinding, blinding devil” and “a bloody, blooming war’ior,” powerful and terrifying descriptors. These images are dark and foreboding, evoking fear and helplessness against an unstoppable machine. This song contrasts starkly with the fun, entertaining, and light air of the “Dashing Cavalree.” A jaunt over hills and plains is no match for “a rolling battering ram.”45
O’ She’s a slashing, crashing terror,
day or night
She’s a raging, roaring demon, full
o’ fght
Over the top in no man’s land,
Bellowing doom on ev’ry hand,
She’s a rolling battering ram,
Is the Tank
In the 1930s, the civilian transition to the automobile for personal transportation and the truck for commercial conveyance continued to advance. With more vehicles in use, Americans became increasingly unfamiliar with animals. They simply did not own or use them anymore and thus were no longer acquainted with their upkeep or training. These same civilians became the recruiting pool for the Army.46 So, the Army spent time teaching soldiers how to overcome their fear of horses, how to care for them, and how to ride. For the inexperienced, learning how to ride left them stiff and sore.47 Soldiers’ unfamiliarity with animals was on display when, in 1934, a battery of the 6th Field Artillery had to return to using horses after experimenting with trucks. “Since these soldiers had no training with horses and did not know how to handle the huge Belgians and Clydesdales, accidents were frequent,” according to military historian Edward M. Coffman.48 He suggested also that higher than average desertions in the cavalry and field artillery could be attributed to soldiers’ dislike for the horses.49 Unsurprisingly, when traveling in trucks rather than on horseback from Marfa, Texas, to Camp Knox, Kentucky, in December 1932, soldiers “were pleased with the comforts of riding such a long distance ‘fast and smooth’ in trucks that did not need grooming.”50
Even the newly appointed chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Douglas MacArthur, realized motor cars were there to stay. As Coffman explains, MacArthur “called in the chief of cavalry [Maj. Gen. Guy V. Henry Jr.] and [gave] him a blunt message. He gestured toward the parked cars on the street outside his office and said, ‘Henry, there is your cavalry of the future.’”51 The transition— and acceptance—of mechanization still had a bumpy road ahead, and animals and motors coexisted for several more years. Although Henry did support the mechanization of the cavalry, Coffman also notes that he nevertheless rode horses and participated in horse shows.52 Indeed, soldiers continued to play polo and run hunting clubs. So pervasive was polo as a pastime, the pilots at the Air Corps Tactical School also indulged. As Coffman and Peter F. Herrly observe, “in the Depression, newspaper photos of these foxhunts probably did not enhance the officer image for the general public.”53
With the use of motor transport for horse cavalry in the 1934 Fort Riley Maneuvers, the acceptance of motorization appeared complete. Even the predominant ly proanimal Cavalry Journal acknowledges that without motor transport at the 1934 Fort Riley Maneuvers, the movements of the horse cavalry would have been curtailed by half.54 In appreciation of the cavalry’s move toward motorized transport, M. Sgt. John J. Reardon from the chief of cavalry’s office wrote to the Cavalry Journal, “We can well remember the days—not so long ago—when, going into the field, we depended upon our escort wagon and fourline team of mules to get our camp and field equipment up. We also remember the late arrival of this equipment, with growling bellies and growling soldiers.”55
In contrast, Maj. Wilfrid M. Blundt took the opposite view in his 1935 article in the Cavalry Journal, titled “Motor Truck or Covered Wagon?” He pointed out that motorized transport burdened horsed combat units because they did not have vehicles to replace broken down supply trucks or a proper reserve of maintenance personnel. Although the text of the article is moderate in tone, the author’s accompanying cartoons offer a more biting view of the issue. One frame shows a covered wagon pulled by cheerful horses and directed by a cavalryman. With a fair bit of nostalgia, it suggests that animal-drawn transportation ran smoothly in the days past, keeping everyone happy and encountering little difficulty.
Nostalgia colored the view of animal-drawn transport as proceeding more smoothly than modern supply trucks in this 1935 sketch in the Cavalry Journal. Wilfrid M. Blundt, “Motor Truck or Covered Wagon?” Cavalry Journal (Jan–Feb 1935), 14.
Texas A&M University Libraries
In the next picture, a broken-down motor truck sits on the road. A very unhappy horse strains to pull the truck, while his worried rider looks back over his shoulder. Its caption questions, “Economical Use of Transportation?” and Blundt’s answer is clearly in the negative. It also suggests that motor vehicles cause more problems with supply than they solved. A third sketch shows two soldiers hunched over the hood of a broken-down truck with the label, “Fighting Men on the Job.” Blundt did not appreciate the unreliability of the machines and believed breakdowns wasted the time of combat soldiers. It also is mocking mechanical skills as unsoldierly. Finally, the fourth drawing depicts soldiers hiding behind trees in a forest with the caption, “Problem: Find a Trained Soldier.”56 Blundt suggests both that there were few soldiers trained to operate and maintain motor vehicles and that soldiers avoided those duties anyway. Nevertheless, the times were changing.
Motorization affected the course work at the Cavalry School. Along with traditional horsemanship, the school added new courses in radio and motor vehicles to the curriculum and eventually established a separate Motor Department. Instead of fne-tuning riding skills, the Horsemanship Department faculty taught riding basics to officers who had little prior experience with animals.57 Polo, hunting, and horse shows remained popular, but trucks and automobiles sped about post.58 To gain convoy experience, the 2d Cavalry Regiment assisted the Civilian Conservation Corps by hauling supplies via motor transport to their camps.59
As the Army experimented with mechanization, the new machines drew corresponding critical humor from soldiers. Soldiers poked fun at the early versions of J. Walter Christie’s tanks—dubbed “combat cars” to conform with the National Defense Act of 1920, which assigned tanks to the Infantry branch, or “Christies” after the name of their designer.60 They invented new lyrics to Gruber’s field artillery song, “Te Caissons Go Rolling Along,” calling the new tune “Lament of the Cavalry Tanker.” Noting that the vehicles were “first on wheels then on tracks,” the frequent breakdowns meant that the soldiers had to “break our bloody backs” to “keep those Christies a-rolling along.” By the end of the song, the soldiers prayed “Lord keep them rolling/ Keep those Christies a-rolling along.”61
Focusing on the drawbacks of motor vehicle breakdowns, the author looks back with nostalgia on animal-drawn transport in this 1935 sketch in the Cavalry Journal. Wilfrid M. Blundt, “Economical Use of Transportation?”Cavalry Journal (Jan–Feb 1935), 15.
Texas A&M University Libraries
Even the Cavalry Journal, long a bastion of horse advocacy, finally reflected the changing times. In 1938, the publication included on its pages a crest that featured an airplane, machine gun, scout car, and armored car surrounding a horse. Though still focusing on the centrality of the horse, the crest accounted for the modern elements as well. In 1940, the Cavalry Journal acknowledged the motor components of the cavalry by adding to its cover silhouettes of a motorcycle, a scout car, an armored car, cavalry trailer, and other modern equipment. The new icons sped along in a line underneath the Frederic Remington sketch of an equestrian that had featured prominently on the cover for decades.62
During World War II, Fort Riley hosted the Cavalry Replacement Training Center. There instructors educated cavalrymen in both horse and mechanized principles, though no horse cavalry originating from the U.S. saw action in the war. One soldier, J. F. Carithers, trained at Fort Riley as a horse cavalryman. He noted that his fellow recruits, unfamiliar with horses, looked upon them with fear. After his horse instruction, Carithers stayed on post for the Advanced Communications course, where his field experience came in jeeps and command cars. He then headed out to the South Pacific, where he never used his equestrian skills.63
Capt. Robert Meredith Willson tried to imbue the new mechanized units with the history and esprit de corps of the horse cavalry. In “Hit the Leather: Cavalry Song,” dedicated to the Cavalry School, Willson intermingled lyrics for both the old horse cavalry and the new armored branch. He connected elements such as “Now the spurs blend their jingle with the clank of a tank” and “Let every son of a gallopin’ Yank/ jump in a saddle or tank/hit the leather and ride all the way.” His words praise both the horse and tank and give them a common heritage. Willson penned, “Although we’re glad to know the Infantry’s behind us/ They’ll have to eat Cavalry dust to find us”—dust kicked up from either the horses or the mechanized cavalry. In either case, it was better to be in the cavalry than in the infantry. For the tanks he writes, “our mechanized security is money in the bank,” an assertion of assurance and confidence in the new arm. For the horses, he envisions “Let the hoofs ring true/in a wild tattoo,” a statement tinged more with nostalgia than with any sense of the horse’s ability to fight and win the current war. Despite the new machines, Willson assures his listeners, “you’ll recognize the outfit” as cavalry. He had faith that the cavalry in whichever form would, as “Colonel Teddy and Custer know, . . . muster when the great day comes.”64
Once motor vehicles were entrenched securely in the Army, poking fun at their drawbacks became an officially sanctioned practice. The official Army songbook included yet another parody of Gruber’s field artillery song. In this version, the lyrics proclaimed, “Over hill, over dale, motorized from head to tail/With the caissons and horses all gone.” Just like the earlier “Lament of the Cavalry Tanker,” the soldiers were stuck with broken-down vehicles: “Stop to fx up a fat, or to get the captain’s hat/Motor trucks with the pieces hooked on.” Instead of sounding off one’s numbers, soldiers were instructed to “sound of your klaxon loud and strong (SQUAWK! SQUAWK!).” With a bit of nostalgia the song concludes, “If our engines go dead, won’t our faces all get red!” with the consequence, “For the foreman, of course, will yell at us, ‘Get a horse!’”65 No one expected the field artillery or the cavalry to return to horses, though some traditionalists continued to advocate such a move.66 Perhaps the soldiers knew the “Parody Field Artillery Song” well. A War Department study on the “Attitudes of American Troops” published in December 1943 indicated that marching songs and service songs were popular with service members, apparently as much as the latest radio tunes.67
Both animals and motors coexisted in the decades from the introduction of the automobile to the Second World War. Just like American civilian society, the soldiers of the U.S. Army initially accommodated the new technology, while remaining attached to their animals. As motor vehicles increasingly became prevalent in society, soldiers became more familiar with that technology and less with animal care. With a soldier’s right to complain, both horses and motor vehicles were targets for praise, criticism, and parody in song and cartoons. By the time the Army adopted the lyrics of the present version of “Te Army Goes Rolling Along” in 1952 (also sung to Gruber’s tune), a verse of the song could—without irony—place “San Juan Hill and Patton’s tanks” in the same line, tension between horses and motors already forgotten.68
Notes
1. David E. Johnson, Fast Tanks and Heavy Bombers: Innovation in the U.S. Army, 1917–1945 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998), 98; The Command and General Staf School, The Tactical Employment of Cavalry (Tentative) (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Command and General Staf School Press, 1937), 80; Vincent J. Tedesco III, “‘Greasy Automatons’ and ‘the Horsey Set’: Te U.S. Cavalry and Mechanization, 1928–1940” (master’s thesis, Pennsylvania State University, 1995), 7–8.
2. Johnson, Fast Tanks and Heavy Bombers, 125; Mildred Gillie, Forging the Tunderbolt: A History of the Development of the Armored Force (Harrisburg, PA: The Military Service Publishing Company, 1947), 68; George F. Hofmann, Through Mobility We Conquer: The Mechanization of U.S. Cavalry (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2006), 183. Other key studies on mechanization include Dale E. Wilson, Treat ‘Em Rough! The Birth of American Armor, 1917–20 (Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1989); Timothy Nenninger, “Organizational Milestones in the Development of American Armor, 1920–1940,” in Camp Colt to Desert Storm: The History of U.S. Armored Forces, ed. George Hofmann and Donn Starry (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1999), 37–66.
3. Jonathan M. Wainwright, “Mobility,” Cavalry Journal 44, no. 191 (Sep–Oct 1935), 20.
4. Tedesco, “‘Greasy Automatons,’” 11, 17–18. Tedesco adopts the framework established in Harold Winton, To Change an Army: General Sir John Burnett-Stuart and British Armored Doctrine, 1927–1938 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1988). Whereas Winton’s spectrum runs from reactionaries to conservatives, progressives, reformers, and revolutionaries, Tedesco argues that the Americans fell mostly into the conservative, progressive, and reformer groups. Alexander Bielakowski examines general ofcers exclusively and divides them into three groups: Traditional (John K. Herr and Hamilton S. Hawkins), Progressive (Daniel Van Voorhis, Adna Chafee Jr., Guy V. Henry Jr., and Leon B. Kromer), and Pragmatic (George S. Patton). Alexander M. Bielakowski, “U.S. Army Cavalry Ofcers and the Issue of Mechanization, 1920–1942” (PhD diss., Kansas State University, 2002), 6–9. See also Alexander M. Bielakowski, From Horses to Horsepower: The Mechanization and Demise of the U.S. Cavalry, 1916–1950 (Charleston, SC: Fonthill, 2019).
5. Vincent Curcio, Henry Ford (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 25–27; Marc K. Blackburn, The United States Army and the Motor Truck: A Case Study in Standardization (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1996), 5–6.
6. Blackburn, United States Army and the Motor Truck, 7; Curcio, Henry Ford, 40.
7. Tim McNeese, Time in the Wilderness: The Formative Years of John “Black Jack” Pershing in the American West (Lincoln, NE: Potomac Books, 2021), 205, 212–15. See also Graham A. Cosmas, An Army for Empire: The United States Army in the Spanish-American War (Shippensburg, PA: White Mane, 1994).
8. Henri Hertz Andrews, “Charge of the Rough Riders,” 1900, Dr. Danny O. Crew Teodore Roosevelt Sheet Music Collection, Theodore Roosevelt Center, Dickinson State University, Dickinson, ND (hereinafter Roosevelt Sheet Music Collection), https://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Research/DigitalLibrary/Record?libID=o293262; Sylvester Prout, “Roosevelt’s Rough Riders,” 1898, Roosevelt Sheet Music Collection, https://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Research/Digital-Library/Record?libID=o293314; Frank J. Bohacek Novak, “Rough Riders in Cuba,” 1907, Roosevelt Sheet Music Collection, https:// www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Research/Digital-Library/Record?libID=o293374; Naomi E. Nicholson (words) and Victor Arnette (music), “Te Hero of San Juan,” 1904, Roosevelt Sheet Music Collection, https://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Research/DigitalLibrary/Record?libID=o293373. The spelling of “sabres” appears in the original sheet music.
9. “Te Army Goes Rolling Along,” Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/collections/patriotic-melodies/articles-and-essays/armygoes-rolling-along/, accessed 30 Apr 2025. In 1917, John Philip Sousa wrote a march for the lyrics and it became “Te Field Artillery Song.” “Te Army Song,” U.S. Army, https:// www.army.mil/values/song.html, accessed 18 Apr 2025. For the Philippine War, see Brian McAllister Linn, The Philippine War, 1899–1902 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2000); David J. Silbey, A War of Frontier and Empire: The Philippine-American War, 1899–1902 (New York: Hill and Wang, 2008).
10. Brian McAllister Linn, Guardians of Empire: The U.S. Army and the Pacifc, 1902– 1940 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1997), 120. He notes that the ofcers received the subsistence pay for the horses immediately but had to wait until fve years of service was complete to receive extra pay for wives.
11. Norman Miller Cary Jr., “The Use of the Motor Vehicle in the United States Army, 1899–1939” (PhD diss., University of Georgia, 1980), 83.
12. Gillie, Forging the Tunderbolt, 27.
13. Blackburn, United States Army and the Motor Truck, 8
14. Cary, “Use of the Motor Vehicle,” 95, 99; Blackburn, United States Army and the Motor Truck, 19.
15. McNeese, Time in the Wilderness, 321. See also Blackburn, United States Army and the Motor Truck, 18–22; Julie Irene Prieto, The Mexican Expedition, 1916–1917 (Washington, DC: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 2016).
16. McNeese, Time in the Wilderness, 343–44. The 7th Cavalry, 10th Cavalry, 11th Cavalry, and 13th Cavalry deployed.
17. Blackburn, United States Army and the Motor Truck, 32; A. Ludlow Clayden, “Must Train Military Truck Drivers,” The Automobile 36, no. 16 (19 Apr 1917): 768; Rpt, “Report of the Inspector General,” War Dept Annual Rpts, 1919, vol. 1, part 1, 651, Folder: War Department Annual Reports, 1919, Box 196, Motor Transport, US Army Chronological File, 1890–1947, Historical Manuscript File, Ofce of the Chief of Military History, Record Group (RG) 319, National Archives, College Park, MD (NACP).
18. Dale E. Wilson, “World War I: The Birth of American Armor,” in Hofmann and Starry, Camp Colt to Desert Storm, 1, 7, 14, 21–28; Hofman, Through Mobility We Conquer, 63.
19. “World War I,” The Library of Congress Celebrates the Songs of America, Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200197499, accessed 1 May 2025; Jimmie Shea, “The Yanks with the Tanks Will Go Through the German Ranks” (New York: Broadway Music Corporation, 1918), Library of Congress, https:// www.loc.gov/item/2009371498/, accessed 1 May 2025. The original lyrics use the word “Boches,” a derogatory term for German soldiers.
20. Johnson, Fast Tanks and Heavy Bombers, 124; Hofman, Through Mobility We Conquer 60–62. The 2d Cavalry, 3d Cavalry, 6th Cavalry, and 15th Cavalry deployed with the American Expeditionary Forces.
21. Blackburn, United States Army and the Motor Truck, 53, 57; Rpt, “Report of the Quartermaster General,” War Dept Annual Rpts, 1928, Folder: War Department Annual Reports, 1919, Box 196, Motor Transport, US Army Chronological File, 1890–1947, Historical Manuscript File, Ofce of the Chief of Military History, RG 319, NACP.
22. David E. Kyvig, Daily Life in the United States, 1920–1939: Decades of Promise and Pain (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2002), 21.
23. Ibid., 22.
24. Ibid., 34–36.
25. Edward M. Cofman, The Regulars: The American Army, 1898–1941 (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2004), 252–53.
26. Oliver McKee Jr., “With the ‘Cavalree’ at Fort Riley,” Boston Evening Transcript, reprinted in Cavalry Journal 34, no. 138 (Jan 1925): 72.
27. Photo, “Ladies Riding Group Outside West Riding Hall, 1920s–30s” (HCAB 4391), Photos, Buildings, U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, U.S. Cavalry Association (USCA), Fort Riley, Kansas.
28. Cofman, The Regulars, 254, 258, 260; Johnson, Fast Tanks and Heavy Bombers, 125. The Cavalry Journal offers a steady report of polo matches and horse shows by regiment. The journal also ofers numerous articles on these subjects, such as “Hunts at Fort Riley,” Cavalry Journal 40, no. 164 (Mar–Apr 1931): 54; Maj. W. M. Grimes, “Fox Hunting in the Army,” Cavalry Journal 43, no. 181 (Jan–Feb 1934): 9–12; Capt. Clark L. Rufner, “Polo in the 5th Cavalry,” Cavalry Journal 46, no. 200 (Mar–Apr 1937): 130–32; James V. Morrison, F Troop–The Real One (Hiawatha, KS: R. W. Sutherland Printing, 1988), 58.
29. Lucian K. Truscott Jr., The Twilight of the U.S. Cavalry: Life in the Old Army , 1917–1942 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1989), xiv; and D. Scotti and Joseph G. Garrison, “Te Dashing Cavalree,” in Maj. Vern D. Campbell, “Armor and Cavalry Music Part II,” Armor 80, no. 3 (May–Jun 1971): 33–34.
30. Truscott, Twilight of the U.S. Cavalry, 85.
31. R. M. Eichelsdoerfer, ed., The Rasp: The Cavalry Service Annual (Fort Riley, KS: U.S. Army Cavalry School,1924), 13, 15, 44–59.
32. McKee, “With the ‘Cavalree’ at Fort Riley,” 71.
33. “Magazine Canyon Slide,” in The Rasp: The Cavalry Service Annual, ed. W. R. Pope (Fort Riley, KS: U.S. Army Cavalry School,1926), 246; “Dismount and Pull,” in The Rasp, ed. Richmond, Bauskett, Gregory (Fort Riley, KS: U.S. Army Cavalry School,1921), n.p.
34. “Gaits A Jar,” in Richmond, Bauskett, Gregory, The Rasp, n.p.
35. “Three Uses of the Horse in Future Wars,” in The Rasp: The Cavalry Service Annual, ed. John T. McClane (Fort Riley, KS: U.S. Army Cavalry School, 1922), 40. Emphases in the original.
36. “A Tactical ‘Ride,’” in The Rasp: The Cavalry Service Annual, C. L. Cliford (Fort Riley, KS: U.S. Army Cavalry School, 1928), 145.
37. “That School at Riley,” in ibid., 183.
38. “Idols of the Air,” in The Rasp: The Cavalry Service Annual, ed. E. L. N. Glass (Fort Riley, KS: U.S. Army Cavalry School, 1927), 171–72.
39. Photograph: Car Outside Arnold Hall taken in 1920s (HCAB 4109), Photos, People, The U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, USCA, Fort Riley, Kansas; Photograph: Scout Cars 1930s (HCAB 1455), Photos, People, The U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, USCA, Fort Riley, Kansas; Photograph: Snow on Hiram Tuttle’s Car, 1930s (HCAB 4352), Photos, People, The U.S. Cavalry Memorial Research Library, USCA, Fort Riley, Kansas; Pope, The Rasp, 44, 137, 182; Truscott, Twilight of the U.S. Cavalry , 73.
40. “The Life O’Riley,” in The Rasp: The Cavalry School Annual , ed. R. S. Parker (Fort Riley, KS: U.S. Army Cavalry School, 1925), 46.
41. Frank M. Harshberge, “Major Bohn’s Return,” in Cliford, The Rasp, 204.
42. Ltr, Capt. Martin, West Point, to Lt. Col. J. J. O’Hare, Ofc of the Ch of Cavalry, 4 Oct 1920, Untitled Folder, Box 48, Document File, 1923–1942 451.3-451.4, Ofce of the Chief of Cavalry, RG 177, NACP.
43. Ltr, Col. Aubrey Lippincott, 13th Cavalry, to Ch of Cavalry, 20 Aug 1928, Folder: Motor Transportation-Maneuvers, Box 35, Document File, 1923–1942, 451, Office of the Chief of Cavalry, RG 177, NACP.
44. Swede Nelson, “Armored Cars,” in Cliford, The Rasp, 199; Morrison, F Troop, 52.
45. Quoted in Campbell, “Armor and Cavalry Music, Part II,” 34.
46. Cary, “Use of the Motor Vehicle,” 227.
47. Cofman, The Regulars, 308–9.
48. Ibid., 267
49. Ibid., 313.
50. Ibid., 271.
51. Ibid., 270.
52. Ibid.
53. Edward M. Coffman and Peter F. Herrly, “The American Regular Army Officer Corps Between the World Wars: A Collective Biography,” Armed Forces and Society 4, no.1 (Fall 1977): 58.
54. “The Cavalry Maneuvers at Fort Riley, Kansas, 1934,” Cavalry Journal 43, no. 184 (Jul–Aug 1934): 5, 12–14.
55. M. Sgt. John J. Reardon, “The Evolution of Transportation,” Cavalry Journal 44, no. 187 (Jan–Feb 1935): 46.
56. Wilfrid M. Blundt, “Motor Truck or Covered Wagon?,” Cavalry Journal 44, no. 187 (Jan–Feb 1935): 14–16.
57. Joseph I. Lambert, One Hundred Years with the Second Cavalry (Fort Riley, KS: Copper Printing, 1939), 237; and Col. Dorsey R. Radney, “Old Wine in New Bottles,” Cavalry Journal 50, no. 5 (Sep–Oct 1941), 44.
58. Morrison, F Troop, 50–65.
59. Ltr, Col. Selwyn D. Smith to Maj. Gen. Guy Henry, Ch of Cavalry, 8 Aug 1933, Box 6, Document File, 1923–1942, 320.3-322.02, Office of the Chief of Cavalry, RG 177, NACP.
60. Hoffman, Through Mobility We Conquer, 30.
61. Ibid., 165–66.
62. Crest drawing, Cavalry Journal 47, no. 205 (Jan–Feb 1938), 31; and Cover, Cavalry Journal (Jul–Aug 1940).
63. Rufus S. Ramey, He’s in the Cavalry Now (New York: Robert M. McBride, 1944), 25, 34–35; and J. F. Carithers, “The Last of the Horse Soldiers,” Western Horseman 59, no. 3 (Mar 1994), 150–52.
64. Meredith Willson, “Hit the Leather: Cavalry Song” (New York: Carl Fisher, 1943).
65. “Parody Field Artillery Song,” in The Army Songbook , The Adjutant General’s Office, compiler (Washington, DC: Department of War, 1941), 13, 14.
66. See John K. Herr, The Story of the U.S. Cavalry , 1775–1942 (Boston: Little, Brown, 1953).
67. “Soldiers’ Songs,” in What the Soldier Thinks: A Monthly Digest of War Department Studies on the Attitudes of American Troops l, no. 1 (Dec 1943), Surveys on Troop Attitudes, 1942–June 1955, Report No. C-106 to 5-300, 11, Research Division, Assistant Secretary of Defense (Manpower, Personnel, and Reserve), Secretary of Defense, RG 330, NACP.
68. “The Army Song,” https://www.army.mil/values/song.html.
Author
Dr. Lisa M. Mundey earned her PhD from Kansas State University. She has worked in government and academic history and has published on the American antimilitarist tradition, the U.S. service member experience in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Cold War history. She volunteers at the New York State Military Museum.