The Omaha, Sunday Bee
PART III.
HALF TONE SECTION
FAttKS 1 TO 4.
THE OMAHA DEC
Best & West
VOL. XXXVII NO. 43.
OMAHA, SUNDAY MOIJNINO, APRIL 12, 11)08.
SINGLE COPY FIVE CENTS.
CHARLES R. NO YES SOLDIER THROUGH PEACE AND WAR
Thirty Years of Active Service in Uncle Sam's Army Takes Him Into Many Quarters of the Globe and Calls Him to Perform a Wide Range of Soldiers' Duty
MAJOR CHARLES R. NOTES during thirty years' service
in the United States army has had a breadth of experi
ence with which men in this peaceful, matter-of-fact age
are rarely blessed. ( He has fought red Indians on the
western plains, swarthy Spaniards in Cuba, brown
Filipinos In Luzon and yellow Chinese in Tien Tsin. During the
last four years he haB exercised his administrative abilities as ad
jutant general of the Department of the Missouri. The four years
for which he was assigned to, this duty expired on April 7, when he
was relieved by Major Chase W. Kennedy. Major Noyes will rejoin
his rrglment, the Ninth Infantry, at Fort Sam Houston, Tex.
Charles R. Noyes was born In Springfield. Mass., April 16, 1858.
His father was a graduate of Yale college, a thorough New Eng
ender, true to all the traditions of that erudite section. He had
been engaged in the banking business at Brattleboro, Vt., for a
Mire, later was editor of the Springfield Union and still later was on
the ftaff of the Boston Transcript.
Shortly after the birth of Charles the family moved to Newton,
a small town near Boston, and in that Intellectual atmosphere the
boy lived until his young manhood, with the exception of two years,
1871 to 1873, during which time the family sought its fortune in
Chicago. Traditionally the Noyes family was a family of high
ldt-silfl, of admiration for the arts and sciences and for human ad
vancement. They might have been numbered among the blue stock
ings, for they traced their genealogy back through generations of
honorable ancestors to Nicholas Noyes, a Puritan, who landed on
th" New England shores in the year of our Lord 16a2 and became a
man of solid standing in the community.
With these traditions to live up to, and with a father who was
himself a graduate of prim and proper Yale, the young man natu
rnl'y fell Into the classic education which is to be expected in a
to n so near Boston as Newton'. And he was pursuing his course,
with the Masachusett8 Institute of Technology as a goal, when one
day his father suggested that he take a course at West Point, and
vln due time Charles passed a competitive examination and was
appointed by the congressman of his district to the national military
academy.
Into the Regular Army
lie entered the institution in 1876, pursued his studies there
and nag graduated with good standing in 1879. Among his class
mates were Police Commissioner. Bingham of New York City and
Brigadier General Albert L. Mills, now in the Philippines. In the
class below him was Colonel George W. Ooethals, now in charge of
the digging of the Panama canal. With all these men Major Noyes
was Intimately acquainted.
Upon h!r graduation he was ordered to Join the Ninth infantry,
whkh had Its headquarters then at Fort Omaha and detachments
all over the west where the Indians were still troublesome. Colonel
John H. King was then at the head of the Ninth and the young
officer reported to him at Fort Omaha. He was immediately as
signed to join a company of the regiment then stationed at Fort
MtKlr.ney, Wyo.. near the site of the present town of Buffalo.
"I thought I had come about as far west as white men ever ven
tured when I reached Omaha," says Major Noyes. "But when I
was ordered on nearly a thousand miles further into the wilds to a
point 225 miles from the nearest railroad I began to think I would
never see my friends again. I had been brought up In the lap of
civilization and the plunge into the wilds was sudden to say the
least. Omaha was only a small town then. Farnam street didn't
extend much farther west than Sixteenth street, where the hill was
so high and steep that it formed an effectual barrier."
The young man's rank was that of second lieutenant of Company
F, the company at Fort McKinney. Scarcely had he completed the
long Journey thither when orders came for the company to march
the 225 miles to the railroad, take train for Rawlins and march from
there sixty-five miles south to reinforce troops operating in the
vicinity of White river in the campaign against the Ute Indians. He
saw his first service there. Next he was sent to Camp Carllng, near
Cheyenne, Wyo.. and then for two years was stationed at Fort
Sidney, Neb. He was Stationed at Fort Douglas, Utah, In Septem
ber, 18S2. and at Fort D. A. Russell, Wyo., four years succeeding
thai year. During the rioting at Rock Springs and Evanston, when
the miners were protesting against Chinese cheap labor and were
threatening the terrified Mongolians with annihilation, Lfeutenant
Noyes was in command of a Gatling gun detachment.
Services in Arizona
vIn 1886 the Ninth was transferred to Arizona and a year later
Noyes was advanced to be a first lieutenant and saw service at
Whipple barracks. Camp Verde and San Carlos, the latter being
the agency of the Apache Indians. The red men, whom a benevolent
government was trying to instruct in the civlllxed arts of farming
and digging irrigation ditches, .rebelled against the authority fre
quently. Once a warrior named Kid led a band of his brethren into
the mountains and dared the soldiers to come and get them. The
soldiers "called the bluff" and the rebellious Kid was captured
and placed in prison, where he served a long terra; but subsequently
he escaped and was never again captured.
Lieutenant Noyes was called from active service In 1888 to be
instructor In mathematics at West Point, in which duty he con
tinued until June, 1892, when he rejoined the Ninth, which bad
changed station to Madison Barracks, near Sackett's Harbor, N. Y.
The next two years were years of peace and of more or less
monotonous routine of barrack life. Then one day the regiment
was suddenly and unexpectedly ordered to Chicago. Almost before
the soldiers could think what was the cause of this astonishing order
they had boarded a special train and were speeding at express speed
westward. President Cleveland had taken his famously decisive
action and sent federal troops into Chicago to protect life and
property during the big railroad strike there in 1894. During the
ten days that the regiment remained there Lieutenant Noyes acted
in the capacity of adjutant, having been appointed to that office in
18U2. i
When through the country rang that battle cry, "Remember the
Maine!" Lieutenant Noyea was at Mount Pleasant, la., as military
Instructor In the college there, to which duty he had been assigned
a ft w weeks prior to the declaration of war. His first duty in con
nection with the SpanUh-American war was as assistant mustering
officer at Des Moines, mustering in the Iowa National Guard. Upon
the completion of this work in May he was ordered to Joiu his regi
ment at Tampa, Fla., Just embarking for Cuba. On the island he
saw very active service. His regiment was close to the famous
Rough Riders of Roosevelt In the battle of San Juan hill. Major
Noyes' regiment, with the Thirteenth and Twenty-fourth infantry,
formed Wikoff's brigade, which was in the thick of the fight. Wlkoff
was shot and killed at the beginning of the engagement. Lieutenant
Colonel Llsrum of the Twenty-fourth took command and almost Im
mediately was shot. Lieutenant Colonel Worth of the Thirteenth
followed him and was disabled by a severe wound. The command
then, fell to Lieutenant Colonel Ewere of the Ninth. Something of
tho severity of the engagement can be secured by this excerpt from
Captain Sargent's "Campaign of Santiago de Cuba:"
On the Way Up San Juan
"Pushing aside the men of the Seventy-first New York, who still
blocked the path, or stepping over their prostrate forms, these three
' regiments soon forced their way to the front. As they advanced
along the narrow trail the shot and shell and hall of bullets and the
sight of the dead and wounded were enough to make the bravest
men recoil, but the soldiers of this brigade, with the heroic Wlkort
st their head, never for a moment wavered. Arriving upon the left
bank of the San Juan they leaped In, waded the stream and clam
bered up the right bank, where they had a clear view of the block
house and intrenchments of Sin Juan hill scarcely more than BOO
yards away."
Lieutenant Noyes commanded bis company la this battle and he
was not far from the strenuous Theodora Roosevelt In full action on
"
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MAJOR CHARLES R. NOYES, U. S. A.
that memorable day. The day before he had seen the future presi
dent the center of a group of soldiers in the adobe village of Siboney.
Teddy was utilising three and a half minutes which he had failed
to provide for in his day's strenuous routine to describe, to a number
of comrades In khaki the particulars of the battle of Las Guaslmas
in which he had participated.
The Ninth regiment was selcted to occupy the city of Santiago
after its capitulation and Company C, Lieutenant Noyes' command,
was assigned to occupy the Spanish ships in the harbor until the
navy should be prepared to take charge of them. Lieutenant Noyes
was present when the stars and stripes were first unfurled over the
administration building In Santiago, a ceremony at which General
Shatter presided.
But a stronger enemy than the Spaniards attacked the soldiers.
This was the yellow fever. Lieutenant Noyes was among those
attacked by the malady. He attributes the cause of the disease
entirely to the bites of the mosquitoes, which were very thick and
venomous.
While In Santiago he received his commission as captain in the
regiment, having served it as second lieutenant for eight years and
as first lieutenant for nearly eleven years. After a short leave of
absence following the Cuban campaign he rejoined his Company,
which was sent in December, 1898, to Fort Ontario, N. Y., where It
remained until March, 1899, when it was ordered away to the far
off Philippines to assume its share of the white man's burden.' The
regiment went by way of San Francisco. Shortly after its arrival
in the islands Captain Noyes was appointed to a second term as
adjutant. The regiment participated in campaigns south of Manila
and with General MacArthur along the railroad from San Fernando
to Tarlac, north of Manila. Captain Noyes was frequently under
fire and was commended for meritorious conduct by his regimental
commander. He had command of a battalion duridg the advance
from San Fernando toward Angeles. x
y From December, 1899, to January, 1900, he was stationed at
Tarlac, seventy-five miles north of Manila, which city was regimental
headquarters while the regiment was scattered among surrounding
towns engaged in ferreting out insurgent arms and pursuing
maurauding bands. As adjutant his duty was in garrison rather
than In active field work, requiring constant attention to the many
details of headquarters' administration and to the dissemination
of the'lnstructions and orders of the colonel In the direction of the
field movements of the numerous, detachments in a wide area. The
colonel of the regiment was then Emerson II. Llseum, whose energy
snd activity and excellent direction of operations resulted in the
capture of a large number of Insurgent arms, so that in June, 1900,
the district over which he had control was thoroughly cleaned up.
Campaign in China
The scene changes now to a country of more fascination than
any of those so far visited by this globe-trotting regiment China.
The fact that the Ninth regiment was stationed conveniently on a
railroad in the Philippines was largely responsible for Its drafting
into service with the other powers during the Boxer outbreak in
China. At Manila the regiment took transport for Taku, China,
a little trip of 2,000 miles to the north, up past the Island of For
mosa, with a stop at Nagasaki, Japan, then on through the Yellow
sea past Port Arthur and finally to the open anchorage off Taku,
where sixty men-of-war, transports and supply ships were tugging at
their anchor chains. There the regiment disembarked and was
towel up the river in Junks to the city of Tien Tsin, a human ant
hill ot 1,00,000 people. , ,
There they were met by the allies, Englsh, Russian. Japanese
and French. The Ninth was Just in time to participate in an attack
made on the Chinese In the walled part of the old city on July 13,
1900. The fight lasted all day and part of the night and resulted
in the capture of the Chinese stronghold. Major Noyes as captain
and adjutant was with Colonel Llseum, who led two battalions of
his regiment in a charge made against tin loop-holed walls. Many
of the officers and men fell in this attack. Colonel LI scum was
- killed. Major Noyes was wounded in the arm and the leg. The
latter wound developed serious symptoms. He was removed from
the hospital at Tien Tsin and afterward back to Taku and thence
to Nagasaki, Japan. Then he was sent across the broad Pacific to
the general hospital at Saa Francisco. After two months' recupera
tion he was sufficiently recovered to return and join his regiment.
Landing again at Taku, he proceeded inland through Tien Tsin
and on to Peking, the Forbidden City, the city of mystery, covered
with the dust of centuries yet shining in the celestial sunshine
and gay with the brilliancy of 10,000 roofs made ot glistening red,
blue and green tile. The empress haj fled from the Purple Forbid
den City, which is within the Forbidden City which is within the
Tartar city. The queen ant had flown and all-the other yellow ants
in that great hill were rushing about in consternation. The foreign
troops were encamped within the great walls of the Chinese city.
The Ninth had its tents pitched in the Temple of Agriculture, an
open space nearly a mile square. Upon this space is a magnificent
marble altar. There the emperor has come at sunrise on December
22 of each year for the last ten centuries, a short time in China, and
offered sacrifice to Shang-ti, in order that the crops throughout the
empire may be bountiful and the people have plenty to eat.
- Back to America
0
The United States forces were withdrawn from China in May,
1901, and the Ninth infantry returned to the Philippines, being
assigned to service in Samar shortly after its arrival, with head
quarters at Calbayog. It was during this time that the regiment
lost many men by attacks upon detached companies at Balanglga on
the Gandara river and during the operations of the numerous de
tachments which were constantly endeavoring to find the wily Insur
gents in the fastnesses of Samar.
The regiment returned to the United States In 1902 and was
. reassigned to Madison Barracks, N. Y. It received ovations at
various cities in the state because of Its distinguished services abroad
and particularly In China.
Captain Noyes was promoted to the grade of major in August,
1903, still remaining with the Ninth regiment and in September of
that year was detached for duty at Omaha. On April 7, 1904,. he
received a four-years' detail in the adjutant general's department.
The full term being served, he was reassigned to his regiment and
will rejoin it at Fort Sam Houston, Tex., after a short leave of
absence."
. Major Noyes was married In 1898, Just before leaving for Cuba,
to Miss Gertrude H. Noyes, his cousin, at Kenwood, N. Y. They
have three children, John R., 6 years old; Richard W.", 3 years old,
and Margaret S., 6 months old.
Though Major Noyes will celebrate his 50th birthday anniversary
next Thursday, the birth register alone ma-ks him as that old. In
appearance he is at least ten years younger. He Is a deep student
of army affairs and a broad student of affairs of the world. He has
done considerable writing. When the "Centennial of the United
States Military Academy" was Issued In 1902, Major Noyes was
called upon to write the chapter on "Services of Graduates of West
Point in China." ,
Blind Girl Learns Typewriter and Earns Her Living
Miss Miller First of Her Sex to Enter This Field of Work
NJSW YORK. April 11. The modern edu
cation of blind children alms to give to
them the capacity to become wage
earners. The system has been es
pecially successful at the New York
State School for the Blind at Batavla.
Not only has it trained a large number of
young men and women along Industrial lines, en
abling them to earn their living, but it has also
four graduates going through college, some of
them earning their way. It has opened the way
to the employment of blind persons as stenog
raphers and typewriters.
Miss Elizabeth G. Miller of Buffalo is said to
be the first blind woman to earn her living by
stenography. , To quote O. H. Burrltt, superin
tendent of the Batavla school, who directed her
training, there Is "no other young woman who is
totally blind who is similarly employed anywhere
in the United States or Canada." But the girl
who would follow in her steps must possess the
genius ot hard work, unlimited patience and at
least be endowed with Intelligence equal to' the
average. A great misfortune of the blind is their
frequent feebleness of mind.
Miss Miller worked hard to acquire her ability
to compete with her seeing sisters. She had the
handicap of being obliged to use a shorthand
writing machine, where the seeing writer is bur
dened only with pencil and pad. ,
Miss Miller must write her notes In embossed
dots, the language of the blind known as Braille,
and the dots must be translated Into written lan
guage at the typewriter. The picture of Miss
Miller dictating in the office of the Batavla school
before she secured work In a mercantile house
gives a fair Idea of what the Braille typewriting
machine is.
Miss Miller has passed the same tests given to
socio g students of stenography. Before her grad
uation from Batavla at the regents' examinations
she passed with honor both the 60 and the 100-word-a-minute
test prepared by the department of
education of the state. f
Then came a long and trying period of waiting
before the head of a responsible business estab
lishment had sufficient faith in her work to give
her a" place) She Is now earning $10 a week in a
mercantile house in Buffalo and, living at home,
is practically independent.
v Batavla's achievement in demonstrating that
a blind girl may make her living as a stenographer
is Its chief distinction from other American schools
for the blind. But other schools for the blind '
have been and are sending boys to college.
Dartmouth has in its sophomore class Joseph
Bartlett, who has passed all examinations with
Phi Beta Kappa rank. Batavla has four boys in
New York universities, and, although, blind, most
of them are earning their expenses by means of
the Industrial education obtained at this school.
Oregory Martin is now a senior in the Uni
versity of Rochester. He stands well In rank
among his seeing brothers and has adopted the
profession of a masseur as a means of paying part,
If not the whole; of his expenses. Sometimes he
makes as much as $12 a week; and he ought to
make more, since for some unexplained reason
the blind boy possesses a more gentle and effec
tive touch than the seeing rubbers,
There are over 1,000 blind masseurs employed
In Yokohama, Japan, where for a while, In order
to encourage 'the blind to take up the work, the
government would not allow seeing masseurs to
work. There are a few in New York City working
with the help of the New York Association for the
Blind, and It has been very hard for them to se
cure employment Blindness Is not only a bitter
handicap to the blind, but In the United States,
when they have proved their ability to earn their
bread la soma branch, cX work the scepticism of
the public has often denied them the oportunity
to work.
John Fowler, another graduate of Batavla, is
a student in Syracuse university. He learned to
tune pianos at the school, and during his first year
in college paid all but $2 5 of his expenses by fol
lowing that trade.
He has distinguished himself for scholarship
and his instructor in mathematics has written to
Batavla that In algebra he considered him the best
of the twenty-eight men in the class. His in
structor in German has written that "his blindness
has been an advantage rather than a disadvantage
for languge work, since the Importance of learn
ing a language through the ear alone cannot be
overestimated."
There are two graduates of the Batavla school
in Columbia university, Benjamin Berlnsteln,
who entered without conditions on the credentials
of the State Board of Regents, and James Mullen,
who passed the examinations successfully. These
boys are qualified to do work to help to pay their
expenses. Berlnsteln can do typewriting, as Miss
Miller does, and has contributed articles to news
papers, and both are eager for something to do to
aid them in paying their way through college.
There has been much experimentation at
Batavia as to the best line of industrial work for
the blind. Broom-making and chair caning have
received much attention, but as a mainstay they
have not been altogether satisfactory.
When there is sufficient musical gift, combined
with mechanical ability, the work of tuning and
repairing pianos seems suited to the Wind. This
has been demonstrated In Boston, where the
Perkins Institution for the Blind has given to
many boys the ability to earn a living in this way,
snd piano manufacturers hav been glad- to em
ploy them. Some of the recent graduates of
Batavla have become free lances as tuners. One
ot these report that he baa earned as much as $24
a week and In spring and rammer averages about
$18 a week.
It sometimes happens that an educated blind
man will work out his own salvation along lines
not suggested by the Intellectual or Industrial
training In the schools. One man In New York
Is the proprietor of a successful livery stable. He
does not drive his horses, but he hires men who
can, and he can' harness and hitch up or unhar
ness and stall his own horses, and be possesses
the business sense to make It pay. But he became
blind in later years.
Glen B. Wboeler, a graduate ot Batavla, de
sired to be a physician after be had tried broom
maklng for a while. He became an osteopath,
married a seeing osteopath, who was graduated
from the same college with him at Kirkville, Mo.,
and the two together have made a success of the
business.
"Financially," he writes to his home school at
Batavia, "we have averaged about $30 a week.
For a month back it has been about $40, and bids
fair to keep up to that figure, or better."
In recent years all educators of the blind have
discovered the value of a vigorous course in
pbyalral culture for their charges.
The usefulness of these movements lies In
making boys and girls self-reliant, in curing them
of the habits they formed as blind children, such
as extending their arms as If expecting to run Into
something. The work in physical training is the
most spectacular thing about Batavla.
' The first out-of-doors meet too,k place last
year, and was such a success that it' will be re
pealed every year. Tbre were ten events and
each blind contestant could only enter in five. If
he won a first place he received five points, three
for second, two for third and one for fourth.
There were three gold and four silver medals
awarded, and the contestant with tha greatest
number of points came first.
