During the Spanish-American War in 1898, the1st United States Volunteer Cavalry played a decisive role in the fighting in Cuba. Woodbury Kane, a soldier from a good family, was in the thick of it instead of just being there with his birthday present – a Colt Automatic Gun Model 1895 machine gun.
What could you do to make the little brother happy? The choice was a little tricky for Sybil and Louisa, especially as the boy already had everything. It had to be useful, durable and of lasting value. They could get something for the trip abroad that he had in mind. There was a store like that in Hartford. And something as mundane as money, well, money didn’t play a role in the Kane family. Born in 1859, Woodbury Kane was one of the eight children of the extremely wealthy and extravagant couple Colonel Delancy Kane and Louisa Kane. In 1878, he enrolled at Harvard University, where he was particularly successful as an all-round sportsman: tennis, football, horse riding, boxing, cricket and polo. At Harvard, he also became friends with Theodore Roosevelt. After completing his studies, he set up as a lawyer in New York and became a director of the Metropolitan Register Company. His considerable fortune gave him the opportunity to keep up with the biggest and finest competitors in ocean sailing, and it is clear that Mr. Kane also made a name for himself as a big game hunter (like his former fellow student Roosevelt).
When the Spanish-American War broke out in April 1898, both biographies took an unforeseen turn. However, some strategic military circumstances were foreseeable: Cuba would become one of the main theaters of war, the USA was superior at sea and could determine the time and place of the conflict, but the Spanish land forces in Cuba would not be easy to deal with. Neither the manpower nor the equipment of the US Army were in good shape at the time. President William McKinley therefore ordered the formation of three volunteer regiments. One, the1st United States Volunteer Cavalry, was to achieve immortal fame, and with it the college friends Theodore Roosevelt and Woodbury Kane. The former was Secretary of State in the Navy Department at the time and was pushing for a military command. Roosevelt campaigned vigorously for the establishment of the1st United States Volunteer Cavalry and shaped its public image. Initially, he was not the commander of the regiment; it was commanded by Colonel Leonard Wood, a deserving officer who had been awarded the Medal of Honor. But for the public and especially the press, Roosevelt, who as Lieutenant-Colonel became Wood’s deputy, was the face of the regiment. When the Arizona Weekly Star newspaper wrote of “Roosevelt’s Rough Riders” on April 21, 1898, the regiment had its nickname, which would soon become an honorary title. The first enlistments were held in Santa Fe (New Mexico), Prescott (Arizona), Guthrie (Oklahoma) and on the Indian reservations. In the end, the regiment included volunteers from 42 US states, four US territories and several foreign countries. With some exceptions, the approximately 200 people in Troops A, B and C came from Arizona, while Troop D consisted mainly of the 83 volunteers from Oklahoma. Troops E, F, G, H and I were made up of people from New Mexico, mainly cowboys. Troops L and M, with 170 people, consisted mainly of Indians. Many of them signed up under false names: some were actually too young, others had warrants out for their arrest, some found their self-chosen “war names” more appealing. Troop K, commanded (initially) by the professional officer Captain Micah John Jenkins, was somewhat different: here were the Easterners: people from the East Coast, with university degrees, often from influential families, usually very wealthy. Some were old college friends of Roosevelt. They were called the “Fifth Avenue Boys”. When Congress increased the regiment’s target strength from 778 to 1,000, it was mainly these volunteers who turned up. Some arrived with their own servants, many with their own horses, a few with polo mallets, one even with a traveling toilet. However, in addition to a good dose of patriotism, they all brought with them a conviction of their own military qualities and an elitist belief in their own claim to leadership.
But Roosevelt did not play along: none of the untested Easterners, university diploma or not, received an officer’s commission, all had to enlist as simple volunteers. This did not dampen their enthusiasm, however, and legend has it that only one of them sulkily refused because he was denied an officer’s commission. This is said to have been John Jacob Astor (who was to go down with the Titanic in 1912), who wanted to donate half a dozen Maxim machine guns in exchange for a post as a major in the regiment. But Roosevelt did not go along with this. He knew that the presence of the “Fifth Avenue Boys” ensured his regiment the attention of the press, support in high circles and material benefits, but the cohesion of the regiment was more important. Roosevelt, who was in charge of the unit’s internal duties, ordered that every volunteer, regardless of rank, was to carry out any task immediately without discussion. Anyone who criticized someone for carrying out those tasks was to carry them out themselves immediately. Volunteer Woodbury Kane was once ordered to cook rice. Naturally, he turned up for kitchen duty perfectly dressed and coiffed. The rice, made from equal parts water, salt and rice, tasted a little strange. Another volunteer spit out the enthusiastically salted porridge and launched into a rant, but then remembered Roosevelt’s order and expressly praised the excellent dish. There was a fundamental problem with the Easteners, they could ride and shoot, had courage and intelligence. But profanities such as making coffee or setting up the tent had been delegated until now. This was now a thing of the past and the Easteners got to know everyday military life from a basic perspective. They proved to be – surprisingly in the eyes of the tough guys from the West – capable of learning, and even the biggest snobs fell into line. As the regiment grew to 1,000 men, sergeant and subaltern officer positions became available and the first Easterners climbed the career ladder. One William Tiffany became a sergeant, Woodbury Kane a lieutenant. Mail arrived fairly promptly with the promotion, two boxes, one for Kane, one for Tiffany. Each contained a Colt Automatic Gun Model 1895 machine gun, which was the official company designation. However, the thing was called a “potato digger” because of its peculiar type of drive. Best regards from home; purchase price: 7,500 dollars per gun. Considering that the regiment’s horses cost 40 dollars per animal, that was formidable. However, the ammunition supply sent with them was not; the machine guns were 7×57 caliber, not .30-40 like the soldiers’ Krag carbines and the officers’ Winchester lever-action rifles. But the noble donors (William Tiffany’s father, the millionaire George Tiffany from Rhode Island, and Woodbury Kane’s older sisters Louisa Langdon Kane and Sybil Kent Kane) didn’t know much about that. Colonel Wood, the regiment’s commander, did.
The experienced veteran of the Indian wars took a look at the mishap and dryly replied that they would just get the ammunition from the Spaniards.
Tiffany became leader of the machine gun section. It included the two machine guns, 4,000 rounds of ammunition, six crews plus Corporal Stevens. After a month of training, the regiment was sent to Tampa, Florida, and embarked for Cuba – without the horses. Some troops were left behind. On June 22, the Rough Riders landed in Cuba and marched inland. They had their first battle on June 24 at Las Guasimas, where eight Rough Riders fell. What’s more, there was a danger that the machine guns would fall into the hands of the Spanish. A mule driver first lost his nerve, then his pack animals. They got out of sight in the confusing terrain. Roosevelt ordered Fred Herrig, a hunting guide from Montana, to search for the mules with the weapons. Herrig found them. Perhaps the Colt-Brownings then fired their first shots in battle. However, this would not be the first wartime use of the model; on June 14, C Company, First Battalion, US Marine Corps, had already used four USN Model 1895 Colt Browning MGs in .236 caliber in the battle of Cuzco Wells near Guantánamo Bay. The weapons came from the battleship USS Texas. Now the temporary equipping of a landing force with heavy weapons was one thing, the permanent equipping of a cavalry force (albeit on foot) with such weapons was another. Sergeant Williams made do by organizing mules on which the machine guns were loaded. Due to absences in the officer corps (mostly due to illness), there were a number of changes of command. Colonel Wood took over the command of a cavalry brigade, Roosevelt became regimental commander of the Rough Riders, whose1st Squadron was now led by Captain Micah J. Jenkins. Woodbury Kane took command of K Troop. On July 1, the Rough Riders launched their legendary assault on Kettle Hill and San Juan Hill, with K Troop under Woodbury Kane and the Machine Gun Section under Sergeant Tiffany. Both were promoted for their part in the battle: Kane became Captain, Tiffany2nd Lieutenant. The victorious but costly attack (89 men from Roosevelt’s regiment were killed or wounded) up the slopes against the Spanish troops entrenched in blockhouses and trenches earned the Rough Riders their place in history. The Rough Riders also had Colt Model 1895 rapid-fire weapons to thank for the success of the attack, although these were the four Gatling Guns of the Gatling Gun Battery under Lieutenant John “Gatling Gun” Parker of the 13th Infantry. With the four hand-cranked, wheeled .30-40 Krag caliber ball guns, serial numbers 1040, 1041, 1042 and 1043, Parker made a decisive contribution to the outcome of the battle. Parker had been seconded to the cavalry division. On the morning of the day of the battle, he had three ready-to-use Gatlings at his disposal, which he was to deploy wherever it seemed most convenient.
When he supported the attack of the Rough Riders and other units with fire from his Gatlings, the effect was striking. The three Gatlings fired at targets at ranges between 550 and 700 meters, firing 18,000 rounds in eight and a half minutes of continuous fire and inflicting enormous damage on the Spanish. Afterward, Parker’s men brought the Gatlings up the hill, where they massed a Spanish counterattack against the American positions on Kettle Hill and then silenced more Spanish artillery. Roosevelt was so impressed that he sent Sergeant Williams to Parker the next day. The two Colt-Brownings were placed under Parker’s command. This was also a stroke of luck for the Machine Gun Section under Sergeant Williams, because Parker’s tireless men had collected Spanish ammunition, around 10,000 rounds of 7×57. And paradoxically, the Colt Brownings had exactly the same caliber. After that, the MGs made their main contribution to the campaign by being used by their gunners to clear suspicious treetops of any Spanish tree shooters concealed in them. After the regiment was redeployed and disbanded (on September 14, 1898), Woodbury Kane took part in the America’s Cup on the yacht “Columbia” in the summer of 1899 and was also victorious in this contest. Woodbury Kane, who had faced so many dangers, was then doomed by the duck hunt. He returned to New York with a severe cold and died in his apartment on September 5, 1905. However, the machine gun that his sisters had given him still exists today. The weapon with the serial number 161 belongs to the US National Park Service and is on loan to the National Firearms Museum in Fairfax, Virginia. Technical data:
Drive: gas-operated (air-cooled)
Weapon weight: 15.9 kilograms
Tripod weight: 25.4 kilograms
Length (overall): 105 centimetres
Barrel length: 71 centimetres (four rifling)
Cadence: 400 – 450 rounds/minute
Cartridge feed: cloth belts (with 120 or 250 round capacity)
Rear sight: ladder sight up to 2.600 yards (2,377 meters)
Weight of cartridge belt with 250 cartridges: 7.2 kilograms
