Quentin Roosevelt
Quentin Roosevelt was born on November 19, 1897 and was the youngest child of Theodore and Edith Roosevelt. He was best known for his humor and charming personality.
Quentin was four years old when his father was sworn in as president and he took every advantage of living in the White House. Quentin and friends such as Charlie Taft (son of the Secretary of State and future President and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court William Howard Taft) and Roswell Pinckney (son of the White House Steward, Henry Pinckney) comprised the group of rambunctious youths that would be known as the “White House Gang.” Together they carved a baseball diamond on the White House lawn without permission, defaced official presidential portraits in the White House with spitballs, and threw snowballs from the White House roof at unsuspecting Secret Service guards. One of his most memorable antics was to sneak his pony, Algonquin, up the White House elevator up to cheer up his sick brother, Archie.
Due to his playful actions, his father to nicknamed him "Quinikins” while his mother, Edith, labeled him a "fine bad little boy.” Quentin began his education at Force Elementary School in Washington, D.C. and then at the Groton School in Massachusetts. Quentin was an excellent student and was admitted to Harvard University in 1915. At age 19, while attending Harvard, Quentin met Flora Whitney and soon after the United States entered World War I, they became engaged but never married.
At the onset of World War I, inspired by the models of his father and older brothers, Quentin dropped out of Harvard and joined the United States Army Air Service where he eventually became a pursuit pilot. Quentin was killed in aerial combat over France on Bastille Day, July 14, 1918. As an honor to his father, Quentin was originally buried by German soldiers where his plane fell in Coulonges-Cohan, France. A few days later, American soldiers replaced the cross with their own and the French enclosed the area. In 1955, he was exhumed and later reburied with his oldest brother Theodore Roosevelt Jr., in Normandy, France.
As of 2020, he is the only child of a United States President to die in combat. In addition to be awarded the Purple Heart posthumously, Quentin was also granted a degree from Harvard in 1919, the year he would have graduated with his class.
Quentin is buried at the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial in France.
Military Service - 95th Aero Squadron
Before entering World War I Quentin was admitted to Harvard in 1915. He fell in love with Flora Whitney and after turning 19 the two became engaged, however the outbreak of the war prevented their marriage.
Quentin dropped out of Harvard in May 1917 a month after Wilson declared war. All of Roosevelt’s sons were enlisting to go “Over There” to do their part and fight in the Great War. TR helped Quentin get into the United States Army Air Service and he began training in Mineola at Hazelhurst Field.
He had bad eyesight and a bad back. Out in Arizona with his father in 1913 a pack mule rolled over his back leaving him with chronic pain. After shipping off to France he spent his first three months on supply duty and then in-flight training before becoming a pilot in the 95th Aero Squadron, the famous Kicking Mules. They were part of the 1st Pursuit Group based in Saint-Cloud, France.
It was June 1918, nearly a year after he had arrived when Quentin received his combat orders. On June 25th, less than three weeks before his death he wrote the family, “I’m on the front – cheers, oh cheers – and I’m very happy.”
Roosevelt wrote Quentin, “All of you children have by your deeds justified my words.” TR loved reading Quentin’s letters about his risk-taking, about his acrobatics by moonlight. Quentin said it was now our job to “practice what father preached.”
Despite suffering from periods of air sickness, poor eyesight and a bad back resulting from the pack mule accident when he was 16, Quentin undertook the riskiest assignment in the war. Newly trained combat pilots called themselves the "20-Minute Club" because the life expectancy of a new pilot in combat was about 20 minutes. The British reported the average life expectancy for their new pilots was 11 days.
In his unit it was believed Quentin suffered from what they called, “a malady of the soul.” He seemed to be battling demons, and it was believed there were hints of a death wish.
Quentin only flew two full combat missions. On July 5th, 1918, he took off for the first time and had to return due to engine failure. He went up a second time, but after two shots his machine gun jammed. On July 9th it’s believed he got his first kill. He had flown into a cloud and gotten separated from his squadron. Thinking he was rejoining their formation he discovered he was following three German planes back across enemy lines into Germany. He had gone unnoticed and was lucky enough to pick off a Fokker D7 before managing to escape. Five days later on July 14th Bastille Day, Quentin was caught out of formation. A German Ace got so close to him he could plant two machine gun bullets to the back of his head. He was dead before he hit the ground.
The Nieuport 27 he was flying didn’t catch fire. German troops pulled his body from the wreckage and laid it next to the fuselage. Within a half hour a photographer appeared to take photographs. One became a postcard that made its way to Sagamore Hill. The German’s buried Quentin where he crashed in Coulonges-Cohan, France. 37 years later in 1955 he was moved to Normandy where he now rests next to his eldest brother Theodore Roosevelt Jr. He is currently the only child of a U.S. President to die in combat. He was awarded the Purple Heart and the French Croix de Guerre. In 1919, the year Quentin would have graduated from Harvard, the school posthumously granted him his degree.
TR didn't get the final word of Quentin's death until three days later on Wednesday morning July 17th. Phil Thompson, an AP reporter and friend of Roosevelt’s arrived at the front door to Sagamore Hill.
TR anticipated he was going to receive information on Quentin. The last report said he hadn’t returned from his combat mission of the 14th. The two entered the library and TR closed the pocket door behind them. Tears were in Thompson’s eyes as he told Roosevelt his son Quentin had died in aerial combat.
TR was standing beneath the portrait of his father when he received the news.
The two would pace the piazza for about a half hour before Thompson left TR alone to tell Edith they had lost their youngest son.
Together TR and Edith publicly held firm to their belief it was better that Quentin went to war, to do his part, rather than to have stayed home and worked in an office behind the safety of a desk. Edith told the press she had raised her children to become eagles, not sparrows. Roosevelt bragged that Quentin had smashed his plane “beautifully” in a solo battle surrounded by multiple German fighters.
It was a different story privately. Those who worked at Sagamore Hill saw TR weeping during his solitary walks around the property. There were times he could be found in the stable with his arms draped around the neck of Quentin’s horse murmuring under his breath, “Quinikins, poor Quinikins.”
Roosevelt wrote, “To feel that one has inspired a boy to conduct that has resulted in his death has a very serious side for a father.”
TR never fully recovered. It was not only his sons that he was encouraging, but the sons of an entire nation to go to war knowing full well America was ill-prepared. It was as if his entire world was caving in. He aged quickly. This wasn’t the gallant charge up the San Juan Heights, this was mechanized murder. 176 days after Quentin’s death in combat over France, Theodore Roosevelt died in his sleep at Sagamore Hill.
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