"The noise and strain that shattered the nerves of many of his
comrades did not impair Stubby's spirits. Not because he was unconscious of
danger. His angry howl while a battle raged and his mad canter from one part of
the lines to another indicated realization."
- New York Times Obituary
Sergeant Stubby was a stray, homeless mutt who saved more lives, saw more
combat, and performed more badass feats of heroic awesomeness than most people
could ever hope to accomplish even WITH the advantage of prehensile thumbs and
the ability to utilize 100 percent of their brain power without exploding into a
burst of ball lightning.
The American version of Voytek the Soldier Bear,
this fearless, ass-destroyingly ferocious Pit Bull Terrier started his humble
life as most stray animals do – hungry, cold, alone, and stranded in the town of
New Haven, Connecticut. Living garbage can to garbage can without so much as a
doghouse roof over his head, one day this poor dejected little canine happened
to stumble onto the parade ground on the campus of Yale University, where it
just so happened that the men of the 102nd Regiment, 26th Infantry Division were
training for their eventual deployment to fight in World War I. The
so-pathetic-it's-adorable little dog-creature was taken in by a soldier named
John Robert Conroy, who named the pup "Stubby" on account of the thing's little
stumpy gimp tail (or maybe this is a common trait of pit bull terriers, I have
no idea). Conroy started leaving food out and let the little guy sleep in the
barracks from time to time, and before long pretty much every dude in the 102nd
thought this thing was omg totez adorbs, etc. The dog, for its part, was also
like insane-as-hell smart, and I don't mean like, "Oh hey that dog thinks he's
people because he sits in an armchair and licks beer coozies" stuff, but more
like, "Holy crap balls Lassie's trying to tell us that Little Timmy fell down a
well and is being slowly digested by a thousand rabid snakes sent forth from a
rift in the Hellmouth," smart. After just a few weeks of hanging around the
drill field, watching the soldiers do their thing, this friggin' dog/Battle-Cat
hybrid learned the damn bugle calls, could execute the marching maneuvers with
the men, and was – I shit you not – trained to salute superior officers by
raising his forepaw to his brow in what I can only imagine was a sight so
cripplingly adorable that nowadays it would be an obnoxious, long-running
Internet meme on one of these I Can Has Catburger websites.
Private Stubby had free reign to drink out of any toilet bowl on the Yale
campus during training, and when the order came down for the 102nd to ship out
to battle Conroy just stuffed the dog into his greatcoat and smuggled him on
board a ship bound for France. Once the transport was under way, Conroy brought
the dog out onto the deck, and all the sailors all decided this dog was so
totally flippin' sweet that they had a machinists' mate make him a set of dog
tags to match the ones worn by the soldiers. When Conroy got a little sloppy and
his weirdo covert dog smuggling operation was discovered commanding officer,
Conroy gave the order to, "Present Arms," the goddamned dog saluted the
commander. The officer was like "WTF ever" and from that point on Stubby was
officially allowed to follow Yankee Division out to the battlefront.
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