My Brother, Theodore Roosevelt

by Corinne Roosevelt Robinson

In the midst of all the excitement, we occasionally snatched a moment for a quiet luncheon. “Fine!” he writes me on November 5. “Yes,—Thursday,—the Langdon at 1:30. It will be fine to see Patty Selmes.” How he did enjoy seeing our mutual friend Patty Selmes that day! As “Patty Flandrau” of Kentucky she had married Tilden Selmes just about the time that Theodore Roosevelt had taken up his residence in the Bad Lands of Dakota, where the young married couple had also migrated. Nothing was ever more entertaining than to start the “don’t you remember” conversations between my brother and his old friend Mrs. Selmes. Each would cap some wild Western story of the other with one equally wild and amusing, and the tales of their adventures with the Marquis de Morés would have shamed Dumas himself!

Another little note came to me shortly after the above, suggesting that he should spend the night and have one of the old-time breakfasts that he loved. “Breakfast is really the meal for long and intimate conversation.” He writes the postscript which he adds he knew would please my heart, for one of my sons, owing to a slight defect in one eye, had had difficulty in being accepted in the army, but through strong determination had finally achieved a captaincy in the ammunition train of the 77th Division. My brother says in the postscript: “I genuinely admire and respect Monroe.” About New Year’s eve a letter came to my husband from him in answer to a congratulatory letter on the fine actions of my brother’s boys. “Of course, we are very proud of Archie, and General Duncan has just written us about Ted in terms that make our hearts glow. Well, there is no telling what the New Year has in store. The hand of Fate may be heavy upon us, but we can all be sure that it will not take away our pride in our boys. [My son Monroe was expecting to be sent soon to France in the 77th Division, and my eldest son, who had broken his leg, was hoping to get into a camp when the leg had recovered its power.] I cannot tell you, my dear Douglas, how much you and Corinne have done for us and have meant to us during the last six months. Ever yours, T. R.”

In the “Life and Letters of George Eliot” she dwells upon the fact that so many people lose the great opportunity of giving to others the outward expression of their love and appreciation, and as I re-read my brother’s treasured letters, I realize fully what the authoress meant, and how much the giver of such honest and loving expression wins in return from those to whom the happiness of appreciation has been rendered.

The year 1917 was over; the American people once more could look with level eyes in the faces of their allies in the great world effort for righteousness. In the midst of thoughts of war, in the midst of clamor of all sorts, in the midst of grave anxiety for the sons of his heart, wearing a service pin with five stars upon it—for he regarded his gallant son-in-law Doctor Richard Derby as one of his own flesh and blood—Theodore Roosevelt still had time to speak and write on certain subjects close in another way than war to the hearts and minds of the people. Writing for the Ladies’ Home Journal an article called “Shall We Do Away with the Church?” he says certain things of permanent import to the nation.

“In the pioneer days of the West, we found it an unfailing rule that after a community had existed for a certain length of time, either a church was built or else the community began to go downhill. In these old communities of the Eastern States which have gone backward, it is noticeable that the retrogression has been both marked and accentuated by a rapid decline in church membership and work, the two facts being so interrelated that each stands to the other partly as a cause and partly as an effect.” After reviewing the self-indulgent Sunday in contradistinction to the church-going Sunday, he says:

“I doubt whether the frank protest of nothing but amusement has really brought as much happiness as if it had been alloyed with and supplemented by some minimum meeting of obligation toward others. Therefore, on Sunday go to church. Yes,—I know all the excuses; I know that one can worship the Creator and dedicate oneself to good living in a grove of trees or by a running brook or in one’s own house just as well as in a church, but I also know that as a matter of cold fact, the average man does not thus worship or thus dedicate himself. If he stays away from church he does not spend his time in good works or in lofty meditation.... He may not hear a good sermon at church but unless he is very unfortunate he will hear a sermon by a good man who, with his good wife, is engaged all the week long in a series of wearing and hum-drum and important tasks for making hard lives a little easier; and both this man and this wife are, in the vast majority of cases, showing much self-denial, and doing much for humble folks of whom few others think, and they are keeping up a brave show on narrow means. Surely, the average man ought to sympathize with the work done by such a couple and ought to help them, and he cannot help them unless he is a reasonably regular church attendant. Besides, even if he does not hear a good sermon, the probabilities are that he will listen to and take part in reading some beautiful passages from the Bible, and if he is not familiar with the Bible, he has suffered a loss which he had better make all possible haste to correct. He will meet and nod to or speak to good, quiet neighbors. If he doesn’t think about himself too much, he will benefit himself very much, especially as he begins to think chiefly of others....

“I advocate a man’s joining in church work for the sake of showing his faith by his works; I leave to professional theologians the settlement of the question, whether he is to achieve his salvation by his works or by faith which is only genuine if it expresses itself in works. Micah’s insistence upon love and mercy, and doing justice and walking humbly with the Lord’s will, should suffice if lived up to.... Let the man not think overmuch of saving his own soul. That will come of itself, if he tries in good earnest to look after his neighbor both in soul and in body—remembering always that he had better leave his neighbor alone rather than show arrogance and lack of tactfulness in the effort to help him. The church on the other hand must fit itself for the practical betterment of mankind if it is to attract and retain the fealty of the men best worth holding and using.”

Space forbids my quoting further from this, to me, exceptionally interesting article which closes with this sentence: “The man who does not in some way, active or not, connect himself with some active working church, misses many opportunities for helping his neighbors and therefore, incidentally, for helping himself.”

And again, in an address at the old historic church of Johnstown in Pennsylvania, he makes a great plea for the church of the new democracy, and lays stress upon the fact that unless individuals can honestly believe in their hearts that their country would be better off without any churches, these same individuals must acknowledge the fact that it is their duty to uphold, by their presence in them, the churches which they know to be indispensable to the vigor and stability of the nation.

In the first week of February, 1918, he had arranged to come to me for a cup of tea to meet one or two literary friends, and the message came that he was not well and was going to the hospital instead. The malignant Brazilian fever, always lurking, ready to spring at his vitality, had shown itself in a peculiarly painful way, and an operation was considered necessary. As his own sons were far away, my son Monroe, who was soon to sail for France, was able to assist in taking him to Roosevelt Hospital, and there the operation was successfully performed; but within twenty-four hours, an unexpected danger connected with the ears had arisen, and for one terrible night the doctors feared for his life, as the trouble threatened the base of the brain. The rumor spread that he was dying, and on February 8th the New York Tribune printed at the head of its editorial page this short and touching sentence: “Theodore Roosevelt—listen! You must be up and well again; we cannot have it otherwise; we could not run this world without you.” At the time these words were printed, I was told by my sister-in-law and by the doctor that he wanted to speak to me (I had been in the hospital waiting anxiously near his room) and that they felt that it would trouble him if he did not have his wish; they cautioned me to put my ear close down to his lips, for even a slight movement of the head might bring about a fatal result. My readers must remember what was happening on the other side of the ocean as Theodore Roosevelt lay sick unto death in the city of his birth. The most critical period of the Great War was at hand. Very soon the terrible “March offensive” was to begin. Very soon we were to hear that solemn call from General Haig that his “back was against the wall.” We were all keyed up to the highest extent; all of my brother’s sons were at the front, my own son was about to sail, and at this most critical moment the man to whom the youth of America looked for leadership was stricken and laid low.