Dos Passos, Mr. Wilson's War (2013)

John Dos Passos.
Mr. Wilson's War: From the Assassination of McKinley to the Defeat of the League of Nations.
New York: Skyhorse Publishing, 2013.

First published: New York: Doubleday, 1962.

Book Information: Publisher; Google Books; Amazon.com.

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Author information:

• John Dos Passos (1896–1970), Wikipedia.
• John Dos Passos, official website of John Dos Passos.

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Wikipedia Articles:

• History of the United States (1865–1918).
• 1912 United States presidential election, Wilson vs Roosevelt vs Taft vs Debs.
• Presidency of Woodrow Wilson, March 1913 – March 1921.
• United States involvement in the Mexican Revolution.
• 1916 United States presidential election, Wilson vs Hughes.
• World War I, 28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918.
  (Such exact dating for WWI ignores the diplomatic and armed conflicts that preceded the main event and the several conflicts that continued into the 1920s.)
• Aftermath of World War I.
• Preparedness Movement, led by Theodore Roosevelt, Leonard Wood, Elihu Root, and others (generally political opponents of Woodrow Wilson).
• Woodrow Wilson, Address to the Senate of the United States: "A World League for Peace", 22 January 1917.
  Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/206603 .
  The "Peace without Victory" speech.
• American entry into World War I, April 1917.
• United States in World War I.
• Woodrow Wilson, Address to a Joint Session of Congress Requesting a Declaration of War Against Germany, 02 April 1917.
  Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/207620 .
• Fourteen Points, Wilson's war aims, announced 8 January 1918.
• Woodrow Wilson, Address to a Joint Session of Congress on the Conditions of Peace ["The Fourteen Points"], 08 January 1918.
  Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/206651 .
• United States campaigns in World War I.
• 1918 United States elections, 5 November 1918.
  1918 United States Senate elections.
  1918 United States House of Representatives elections.
  The Republicans (Wilson's opponents) win majorities in both the Senate and House.
• Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920).
• U.S. delegation to the Paris Peace Conference: Woodrow Wilson, Edward M. House, Robert Lansing, Tasker H. Bliss, Henry White (that is, no Republicans who, when the Conference begins, now control the Senate and thus will decide any treaty's ratification by the United States).
• Treaty of Versailles, signed 28 June 1919.
• League of Nations, established by the Treaty of Versailles; active 1920–1946.
• Lodge Reservations to the Treaty of Versailles.

Some Notable People in Woodrow Wilson's Administration:

• Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924).
• Edith Wilson (1872–1961), wife of Woodrow Wilson 1915–1924; infamous for acting on Wilson's behalf in his presidential duties after Wilson's paralyzing stroke in October 1919 with the connivance of Wilson's physician Admiral Grayson and Wilson's assistant Joe Tumulty.
• Joseph Patrick Tumulty (1879–1954), private secretary of Woodrow Wilson.
• Edward M. House (1858–1938), Texas political fixer; advisor to Woodrow Wilson.
• Cary T. Grayson (1878–1938), physician and assistant to Woodrow Wilson.
• William Gibbs McAdoo (1863–1941), Secretary of the Treasury, March 1913 – December 1918; married Wilson's daughter Eleanor in 1914.
• William Jennings Bryan (1860–1925), Secretary of State, March 1913 – June 1915.
• Robert Lansing (1864–1928), Secretary of State, June 1915 – February 1920.
• Newton D. Baker (1871–1937), Mayor of Cleveland 1912–1915; Secretary of War, March 1916 – March 1921.
• Albert S. Burleson (1863–1937), Postmaster General, March 1913 – March 1921; played a major role in wartime censorship since the Post Office could deny access to the mails for newspapers and magazines.
• Josephus Daniels (1862–1948), Secretary of the Navy, March 1913 – March 1921.
• Bernard Baruch (1870–1960), financier; advisor to Democratic presidents Wilson and Roosevelt; head of the War Industries Board, January 1918 – January 1919.
• Herbert Hoover (1874–1964), head of the Commission for Relief in Belgium; head the U.S. Food Administration; led the post-war American Relief Administration to aid Central and Eastern Europe.
• George Creel (1876–1953), head of the Committee on Public Information (1917–1919) which produced U.S. propaganda for both domestic and foreign audiences.
• John J. Pershing (1860–1948), Commander of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF).
• Tasker H. Bliss (1853–1930), Chief of Staff of the United States Army, September 1917 – May 1918.
• William Sims (1858–1936), Commander, Atlantic Destroyer Flotilla; senior U.S. naval representative in London; Commander of U.S. naval forces operating from Britain; Commander of all U.S. naval forces operating in Europe.

Some Political Opponents of Woodrow Wilson:

• Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919), vociferous opponent of Woodrow Wilson's foreign policy, died 6 January 1919.
• Leonard Wood (1860–1927), Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, April 1910 – April 1914.
• Henry Cabot Lodge (1850–1924), U.S. Senator 1893–1924; Senate Majority Leader 1918–1924; Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations 1919–1924.
• Irreconcilables, U.S. Senate opponents to the Treaty of Versailles.
• Elihu Root (1845–1937), Secretary of War, August 1899 – January 1904; Secretary of State, July 1905 – January 1909; U.S. Senator, March 1909 – March 1915.

I have omitted many significant U.S. events and people that were mentioned either only very briefly in Dos Passos's book or not at all.

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The subtitle From the Assassination of McKinley to the Defeat of the League of Nations seems to imply that the book uniformly covers the period 1901 through 1920. In fact, the period before Woodrow Wilson's presidency is very quickly disposed of in the 30 pages of Chapter One. The remainder of the 498 pages of text deal exclusively with Woodrow Wilson.

Of course, Dos Passos is best known as a novelist; Mr. Wilson's War is straight narrative history; however there are some passages where Dos Passos is setting a scene or giving a general sense of the thinking or experience of a group of people (i.e. not recounting events of particular individuals) where Dos Passos's novelistic writing skill is displayed. It's not an academic historian's book but it's still good as an introductory survey.