The fate of the ‘Bonus Army’ of unemployed First World War
veterans.
"...In the late afternoon a mixed force consisting of four
troops of cavalry with drawn sabres, six tanks, and a column of infantry with
fixed bayonets and tear-gas bombs in their belts moved on the Bonus Army camp
at Hard-Luck-on-the-River. At its head, on a white horse, rode General Douglas
MacArthur, Chief of Staff of the United States Army, accompanied by his aide.
Colonel Dwight D. Eisenhower ... The Bonus Army and its dependents were given
an hour to evacuate the camp; then the troops moved in, throwing tear-gas bombs
among those veterans who still lingered on and setting fire to their shacks and
huts. A seven-year-old boy who had returned to recover a toy was bayoneted in
the leg by a soldier; Major George S. Patton, Jnr. personally accomplished the
destruction of a shack which happened to belong to a veteran who, during the
war, had been decorated for saving the major’s life...."
Goronwy Rees,
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