Cher Ami: The Hero Pigeon of World War I
Look at’em, plotting to shit on you…
You know pigeons get a bad rap, sure if you live somewhere like New York City they’re pretty much everywhere shitting on everything. Did you know one pigeon produces 25 pounds of the stuff a year?! And they carry diseases! And they fly a little too low for comfort.
I think they do it on purpose. They’re rats with wings and there are people who feed them daily! They’re just bad animals… was the point I was trying to make?
Pigeons get a bad rap, research tells me they’re actually not that bad so let’s find out how useful pigeons were in World War One.
World War I
We open our story in the hellish landscape of World War I, it’s now 1918 and war has been raging for four years between the Central Powers that include, among others, Germany, the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria, against the Allied Powers that among others, including France, the British Empire, and as of 1917 the United States.
The Allied troops could smell victory and decided to launch what would eventually be the final campaign called the Meuse-Argonne Offensive in September of 1918. On October 1st Major Charles W. Whittlesey of the U.S Army is ordered to lead nine companies of about 550 men from the 77th Division into an attack against the Germans in the Argonne forest.
They would be supported by French forces on the left and American troops from the 92nd Infantry on the right. Whittlesey’s men would eventually be called the Lost Battalion so it’s not going to go well but the men were ready to lay down their lives.
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Homing Pigeons
They were given supplies and other essentials including homing pigeons, considered vital in sending messages back to home base. Messages would be written on rice paper, rolled up, and placed in a leg canister attached to the leg of the pigeon. The pigeons were trained to fly back to home base, upon arriving they would hit a bell to alert the troops a message had arrived. I guess pigeons aren’t that dumb.
Pigeons were so instrumental the British government posted up signs warning anyone shooting a homing pigeon would face up to six-month imprisonment. They also offered a reward for any information on anyone who had shot a pigeon.
Hill 198
By the night of October 2nd and through several battles with the German forces, Wittlesley and his men took control of what was known as Hill 198, just one of the first steps in their campaign. The plan would be to ensure the French were moving along on their left and the other American troops were moving along to the right before the troops proceeded forward.
Wittlesley had already lost 90 men in the fighting and food had become scarce, water was luckily found but it wouldn’t last. They needed rations which they hoped to get from the expected French and American troops. It wasn’t until the following morning that Wittlesley would realize those troops weren’t coming and worse still, Germans had taken their place.
His battalion was surrounded.
Through the prior night, the Germans had posted machine guns and barbed wire all along the perimeter of Hill 198. They believed the battalion was a scouting party leading a large force and to prepare for this, the Germans sent a large number of troops to surround the men, cut off their communications, set up snipers, put up mortars, and prevent further forward movement.
Wittlesley needed to reach home base to request reinforcements, rations, and ammunition but any messenger sent was killed or captured. With men dying in the trenches from mortar fire, grenades, and snipers, his only chance to get a message across were the carrier pigeons and the Germans knew this.
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Four Chances
With only four pigeons left, his first attempt was a pigeon with a note asking for support; it was shot down by the Germans fairly quickly. The next attempt met a similar fate although it wasn’t known to him at the time. By the end of the day they had run out of food and medical supplies, more men had died or been captured and help was still not on its way.
The next morning a barrage of artillery fire exploded southeast of the men, they were finally getting the help they needed. They watched as the artillery fire made its way closer to them. And then terror gripped the men when it kept getting closer and a horrific realization dawned on them… the supporting troops had no idea where they were.
The artillery fire reached their position killing and injuring some of the men. Wittlesley rushed to the remaining two pigeons, an unnamed pigeon and a favorite who had already completed 11 other messages, Cher Ami, French for “Dear Friend”.
One of the men chose the unnamed pigeon, pulling it out of the cage at the same time the explosion of a mortar shook the ground, the unnamed pigeon flew off without a message. There’s a reason I’m referring to it as an “unnamed” pigeon.
Their last hope was Cher Ami. Wittlesley wrote a message reading “We are along the road parallel to 276.4. Our own artillery is dropping a barrage directly on us. For heaven's sake stop it.”
The message was added to Cher Ami’s canister and she was sent away. Moments later a mortar attack from the Germans exploded near Cher Ami killing several Americans and hitting her, dropping her to the ground.
“Go to Hell”
Hope was lost for the Wittlesley’s men, they could only continue holding their position, hoping to find more rations and water while evading the barrage of artillery fire from the Germans and Allied troops.
Over the next several days Wittlesley attempted to send other messengers but they were thought to have died. The battalion was now starving, dehydrated, and fending off attacks at regular intervals from the Germans including Germans carrying flamethrowers. Yes, they used flamethrowers.
On the night of October 6th, the Germans sent back one of the captured men with a note asking Wittlesley and his troops to surrender. Rumor has it Wittlesley turned towards the Germans and yelled “Go to hell” but he would dispute this rumor himself.
The Lost Battalion was prepared to die on that hill be it from German fire or from starvation but just a few hours later the Germans began to retreat. They had started facing attacks from the rear, and the French and American troops appeared from a distance to support the battalion. They were saved, they had lost 107 men, 190 were wounded, and 63 were missing.
Dear Friend
But how did they know? Well, unbeknownst to Wittlesley and his men, after the mortar exploded dropping Cher Ami, she was able to get back up, she was severely wounded but like Wittlesley and his men, she had a mission to complete.
She flew 25 miles or 40 kilometers evading German fire all the way to the home base delivering her message. Cher Ami had been shot through the breast, blinded in one eye, and her leg was hanging by a tendon.
Medics quickly worked on her, saving her life, but her leg couldn’t be saved so they replaced it with a wooden one. She was a badass pigeon and I take back every bad thing I’ve said about pigeons.
She was given the French Cross of War medal and the U.S Oak Leaf Cluster medal and sent to the U.S. for retirement. Cher Ami would pass away from her wounds several months later on June 13, 1919.
Her body was then sent to a taxidermist who stuffed and mounted her body for display. Today Cher Ami stands tall in the National Museum of American History. By the way, prior to the taxidermist, everyone thought Cher Ami was a male pigeon, the taxidermist let everyone know she was actually a female pigeon, just some fun trivia.
And that’s the story of how a pigeon became a war hero with a peg leg. As a side note, in the future, we’ll be going through the entire Lost Battalion’s offensive and what occurred during this battle as it deserves its own article or series in the future. The bravery and refusal to surrender those men showed are one of many that helped end World War One.
