Description:

Wilson War-Dated TLS Regarding "commandeering of the ships now building in our yards"

A 1p typed letter boldly signed by 28th U.S. President Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924), as "Woodrow Wilson" near center right. [Washington, D.C.], September 18, 1917. Typed in blue ink on watermarked stationery with "The White House / Washington" letterhead embossed on the first page. Expected wear including flattened folds, isolated clerical holes at top, and pagination in pencil at bottom. Else near fine. 6.875" x 8.875."

President Wilson wrote this letter to Edward Nash Hurley (1864-1933), Chairman of the U.S. Shipping Board (U.S.S.B.), after reviewing recent correspondence exchanged between the Americans and their British allies.

Wilson wrote Hurley in part: "I have read the letters you spoke of when you were here last evening about the commandeering of the ships now building in our yards, and want to say that I think the necessities and policy of the case could not have been better stated…"

On August 3, 1917, just seven days after assuming leadership of the U.S.S.B., Chairman Hurley issued a controversial requisition order commandeering ship hulls, steel parts, and shipbuilding contracts for ships exceeding 2,500 deadweight tons currently in U.S. shipyards. The shipbuilding contracts were both foreign and domestic. In such a wartime emergency, it was imperative that each and every resource was reserved for the American war machine. Ultimately, Hurley's U.S.S.B. and the Emergency Fleet Corporation commandeered 431 ships--built, partially built, or not yet built--which was the equivalent of over 3 million deadweight tons.

Hurley succinctly stated the objectives of this August 3, 1917 order in Chapter IV, "The Shipping Board and the Emergency Fleet Corporation" of his memoirs, "The Bridge to France" (Philadelphia & London: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1927). Hurley wrote: "Our general purpose was to secure control of the yards so as to be able to assist them in financing and in delivering materials; to prevent the use of the yards, sorely needed for our own purpose, by foreigners, some of whom were our allies but most of whom were neutrals; to permit the simplification of the ships so that they might be more speedily completed and more thoroughly adapted to our own war uses; and generally to permit the Fleet Corporation to place additional direct contracts with the same yards without interfering with any of their other work."

The British were piqued that the requisition order also affected them, and they unsuccessfully tried to persuade the Americans that, since they were allies, the British should still retain ownership of their commandeered ships even if they were controlled and directly overseen by the Americans. Hurley was not convinced, writing in "The Bridge to France": "I came to the conclusion that there was only one safe course to pursue: We must control all ships built in the United States, and to control them they must fly the American flag…I laid this correspondence before President Wilson, so that he might be fully informed of the conclusions that had been reached. He sent me an expression of his approval, saying that he thought the necessities and policy of the case could not have been better stated."

Our September 18, 1917 typed letter signed by Wilson was no doubt the "expression of his approval" described by Hurley in his memoirs.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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