The Story From Howard’s Archive
Roy Howard’s 7 November 1918 cablegram from the French port of Brest carried supposedly official news of the signing of an armistice with Germany – news which Admiral H. B. Wilson, the Commander of American warships operating in French waters, had received from Paris. The cablegram was circulated by hundreds of newspaper-subscribers to the United Press (UP) news agency, its premature peace message spreading throughout North America, parts of Latin America, and to Australia and New Zealand, and bringing many hundreds of thousands of people onto the streets to celebrate victory for the Allies. It also brought vilification and, some maintained, lasting damage to the reputations of Howard and United Press. ENDNOTES III.1a,1c,1d
This article is based primarily on information drawn from Howard’s archived letters and telegrams sent and received during his four days in Brest from Thursday 7 to Sunday 10 November. As such, it presents Howard’s earliest story about his false armistice cablegram to the United States – the story before it became enlarged by the recollections of others and changed by Howard himself. It gives also an account of how the United Press offices in Paris and New York City reacted to the false armistice message, and of how Howard dealt with the crisis it created for his news agency – an integral part of the story of Howard’s eventful time in Brest that has generally been overlooked or ignored.
The Part Two article recounts a broader story resulting from the contributions of other key witnesses of those four days in Brest, and of changes Howard made to his earliest account of them. And reveals that Howard misreported aspects of what actually happened in Brest on 7 November to protect his and his agency’s reputation.
Some Contextual Details
Roy W. Howard
(Here and in subsequent sections of the article, text in this colour is used for excerpts from letters and telegrams Howard sent, replacing the use of indented text or inverted commas at the beginning and end of the excerpts.)
In November 1918, Roy Howard was thirty-five years old and President of the United Press news agency. Accompanied by his wife Peg (short for Margaret) he had travelled to France from Argentina a few weeks earlier, at the end of a business trip to South America. He explained to Ed. Keen in London (UP’s Vice President for Europe) that in Paris, he planned to have a look around a bit and meet the different fellows who are representing us at the different fronts. [Howard to Ed. L. Keen from Buenos Aires, September 4, 1918. Under Contents in Howard’s Papers.]
He left Paris (alone) for Brest on the evening of Wednesday 6 November and spent the next three full days there (7- 9 November). On Sunday 10th he set sail for the United States, as the man who had scooped – four days too soon – the eagerly awaited news that the Great War had finally ended.
Brest
On the tip of the Brittany peninsula, some 387 miles (623 kilometres) from Paris by train, Brest was the principal entry port for US troops shipping to France after April 1917. The Americans had two major military facilities there: an army base under the command of General George Harries; and the main base and headquarters of US naval forces in French waters under the command of Rear Admiral Henry B. Wilson.
The town had a telegraph transmitter and receiver, situated in its Post and Telegraph (P&T) building , for sending/receiving cablegrams across the Atlantic Ocean. The French Telegraph Cable Company (Compagnie Française du Télégraphe de Paris à New York) owned the undersea cable between Brest and New York City.
The local newspaper, La Dépêche de Brest, leased an overland telegraph wire to Paris (possibly also owned by the French Telegraph Cable Company) which provided it with a private line to the capital. Importantly, UP’s Paris office had an agreement with La Dépêche allowing it to use the line for news it sent from Paris to New York City via the Brest P&T cable transmitter and undersea cable. Alone among the American news agencies, this enabled UP to bypass the usually crowded public telegraph service from Paris to Brest, thereby enjoying a quick communication between its Paris office (Rue Rossini, Montmartre) and New York City office (third floor of the Pulitzer Building). III.2
The time in Brest, as in the rest of France and Britain (Allied Time), was five hours ahead of New York City Eastern Standard Time.
Howard’s Departure for Brest
As Howard recounted, he travelled from Paris to Brest to board a ship to the United States, where he intended to make arrangements to cover the peace conference that would follow the end of the war. And he was certain the war would be ending very soon. A few days earlier, Edward House (‘Colonel’ House) President Wilson’s Special Representative, had confided to Howard (at a luncheon laid on by the US Military Attaché, Major Warburton) that the Germans’ surrender was expected at any time, and that the Allies had already agreed upon the armistice terms to be imposed on them. By late evening on the 6th, when Howard caught the overnight train to Brest from Montparnasse Station, he also knew that a German delegation had left for the Western Front to conclude an armistice with the Allies. Peace, finally, seemed to be just a few hours away. [‘Premature Armistice’, pp77-80] I. Roy Howard. Also, III.3
Thursday 7 November 1918
In Howard’s archive, the earliest account of his days in Brest is in a typed letter to Phil Simms, UP’s Paris manager, dated Saturday 9 November, his third day there and the day before he set sail for the United States. There is also a typed statement of what occurred when Howard was given the armistice news by Admiral Wilson on 7 November, a statement Howard asked Major C. Fred Cook – who was present at the time – to write for him; it relates only to this event. The information in Howard’s letter is about what happened between 4:00 pm and about 4:20 pm on 7 November, and, in less detail, about the rest of that evening and the following morning. The telegrams Howard sent and received during 7–10 November throw light on each day’s events, and especially on how Howard and his offices in Paris, New York City, and Washington, DC, handled the crisis the false news caused for them.
Admiral Wilson’s armistice news, and Howard’s armistice cablegram
The false armistice news had arrived at Admiral Wilson’s headquarters shortly before 4:00 pm. Between 4:00 and 4:20 pm, Howard’s cablegram containing the news was put together and transmitted to New York City, arriving around midday EST – ahead of the early afternoon newspapers in that time zone, and of late morning ones farther west.
The sequence of events during those twenty minutes took place in two separate buildings: the US Navy Headquarters and the La Dépêche newspaper building. From different sides, each building overlooked President Wilson Square and its ornate central bandstand. III.4
1. In US Navy Headquarters
From Howard’s letter to Phil Simms, Saturday 9 November 1918
The letter’s account begins, in direct speech mode, with his and Major Fred Cook’s arrival at Admiral Wilson’s headquarters for an appointment arranged earlier in the day. From its content, the time was just before 4 o’clock in the afternoon.
[General] Harries had sent Cook to present me to the Admiral.
As Howard and Cook entered Admiral Wilson’s office, the Admiral’s aide, Ensign John Sellards, rather out of breath, also entered. The Admiral had just released the news that the Armistice had been signed at 11 o’clock that morning, hostilities had ceased at 2:00 pm, and the Americans had taken Sedan during the morning. Howard asked whether the news was official and Wilson assured him it was – “Absolutely, right from headquarters – right from Paris – I just got it a few minutes ago”. The Admiral whispered something to Cook about what Howard gathered to be the communication channel for the news, and then asked Sellards whether the La Dépêche newspaper had posted the bulletin. Sellards replied they had not and that he had returned with the news because the editor, Mr Coudurier, was not there. The Admiral told him to go back with the news and tell the person in charge to announce it.
Wilson allowed Howard to read the note Sellards was holding and Howard asked him again whether the news was official – whether there was any doubt about it – and was assured again that it was and had come “directly through our own private channels”. The Admiral gave him permission to use the news, and Howard hustled over to La Dépêche with Ensign Sellards, leaving Major Cook in the Admiral’s office. [Howard to Phil Simms, November 9, 1918; pp.1-2] (Listed under “Armistice”, 9 November 1918, in Howard’s Papers.)
From Major Cook’s statement for Howard, 15 November 1918
(Text in this colour is used for excerpts from Cook’s statement.)
Before the United States declared war, Cook was a news editor at the Washington Star; in November 1918 he was a member of General Harries’ staff at the US Army Base in Brest. When Howard met him he was liaison officer between the Army and Navy Bases, but became Harries’ Adjutant not long after Howard left Brest. At Howard’s request, he wrote a letter “certifying” that he was with Howard at Navy Headquarters when Admiral Wilson released the armistice news. The letter is dated 15 November, five days after Howard left Brest, and was addressed to him at United Press in New York City; because it went by ship as US military mail it is not certain when he received it. There is no record of Howard’s request for the statement in his archive, but there is his acknowledgement of it, dated 11 December, and assurance he would not use it in any way to embarrass Cook. (In a covering note with the statement, Cook had asked Howard not to publish it for obvious reasons . . . or use otherwise than as you stated to me.)
I would like to go on record as certifying that:
I accompanied you to the Navy Flag Office, in Brest, the afternoon of Thursday, November 7, 1918, to introduce you to Vice Admiral H. B. Wilson, U. S. Navy, commanding our Naval Forces in France. (No arrival time.)
After the introductions, Admiral Wilson hastened to inform them that Germany had signed an armistice.
Cook asked whether the news was official. The Admiral answered that it was and had come from the Embassy in Paris.
Howard asked for permission to make use of the information. Wilson consented and Howard then disappeared to the cable office inside the P&T. (No exit time.)
Cook remained with the Admiral, observed the sending of the Admiral’s personal aide (Ensign Sellards) to the Brest newspaper (no reason given) and overheard the Admiral order an immense American flag to be raised on the building. From the office balcony, he observed the public announcement of the news from the band stand in President Wilson Square, and an American navy band playing there then rendered the “Marseillaise” followed by “The Star-Spangled Banner”.
Cook believed the news was official and reported it later (no time) to General Harries at American Army Headquarters. [Fred Cook to Roy Howard. France, November 15, 1918. Howard Papers]
Cook’s statement and Howard’s account to Phil Simms of meeting Admiral Wilson match on only one important point – that Howard asked permission “to use”/”make use of” the armistice news. On the other points, Cook, not Howard, asked the Admiral whether the news was official; Howard left the building alone to go to the “cable office” with the news; Ensign Sellards left alone, a little later, to go to the La Dépêche building (reason not specified).
2. In the La Dépêche building
Major Cook’s claim that Howard headed for the cable office when he left Navy Headquarters is inaccurate: Howard went first to the La Dépêche building, as he repeated in other documents and as independent sources confirm; and most likely did not take his armistice news to the cable office himself.
Continuing his letter to Simms, in the La Dépêche building Howard looked up the operator of the leased wire . . . tried to find a typewriter and a cable blank but could not. The Ensign told . . . the operator of the leased wire who printed [Howard’s] message out on his tape printer, pasted it up on a P.Q. blank and sent it to the wire by the newspapers messenger. [Howard to Phil Simms, November 9, 1918; p.2] III.5
Thursday 7 November
4:20 pm to about 6:30 pm
Howard’s armistice cablegram was transmitted around 4:20 pm to Bill Hawkins, UP’s First Vice President and manager of the UP New York City office. Afterwards, Howard told Phil Simms that he made his way back to Navy Headquarters hoping to talk to Admiral Wilson again. In President Wilson square, the armistice news was on display outside La Dépêche, a huge American flag was hanging from Admiral Wilson’s office, the US navy band played the Star Spangled Banner and the Marcellaise (sic) and the stuff was off . . . . Everyone went bugs. As the Admiral was engaged, he went down to call on Major Cook whom he had left behind in the Admiral’s office (nothing further in the letter about Cook, and he did not say where Ensign Sellards was).
A little later he cabled another message – in the same way that [he] had filed the first story to New York City – about Brest being the first to celebrate the armistice news. (He did this around 6: 30pm). III.6 He also wired [John] deGandt at the Paris office fully as to what [he] had sent to New York. (He did this about two hours earlier.) He then went to dinner with a couple of Intelligence officers [he] had met. [Howard to Phil Simms, November 9, 1918; pp.2-3]
From information in Howard’s 7 November 1918 telegrams
Howard’s 7 November telegrams help to clarify what he told Simms he did between 4:20 pm and about 6:30 pm, the two hours or so after he sent his armistice cablegram. Information from these, and others sent and received before he left Brest, has not previously been published.
Almost immediately after his 4:20 pm armistice cablegram, and still in the La Dépêche building, he sent this to John de Gandt at the Paris office (as referred to above in his letter to Simms):
NOTE TRES URGENTE UNIPRESS . . . PRYE TELEPHONER ILLICO A M DEGANDT (Very urgent message for UNIPRESS . . . please telephone right away to Monsieur DeGandt)
DEGAND UNIPRESS PARIS
GETTING NEWS FROM ADMIRAL WILSON HERE I FILED THE FOLLOWING URGENT VIA PQ AT 4.18 QUOTE ARMISTICE ALLIES GERMANY SIGNED ELEVEN SMORNING HOSTILITIES CEASED TWO SAFTERNOON SEDAN TAKEN SMORNING BY AMERICANS HOWARD SIGNED SIMMS UNQUOTE WHAT TIME DID YOU FILE STOP SUGGEST INTERVIEW HOUSE DON’T HESITATE FULL RATE DESCRIPTION PARIS TONIGHT STOP AM AT HOTEL CONTINENTAL FOR FEW DAYS HOWARD “4.20 PM Thursday”, Howard’s pencil annotation on the sheet (hereafter, p.a.) [Howard to Degand (John de Gandt). TMG1: 2/34] I. Roy Howard Archive, Telegram Messages.
Not surprisingly, Howard had acted quickly to tell the Paris office about his armistice cablegram to the UP New York City office. Evidently assuming that the peace news was already known in Paris and the office had already published it, he recommended that they interview Edward House about the news, and bulletin how Paris was reacting to it.
Twenty-five minutes later (p.a.“4.45 PM”), Howard received de Gandt’s reply:
Howard’s telegram had surprised every body (sic) at the Paris office. The signature of an armistice with Germany was being persistently rumored, but it was impossible [to] get any confirmation. During a Senate meeting earlier in the afternoon, it was announced that Parliamentaries (German armistice delegates) were on their way towards the Front; but when de Gandt had telephoned the French Press Bureau and Foreign Office, they refused to say where the delegates were. He was about to go to the War Office, expecting an official announcement there, and would ask operators to keep the wire open that night between 8 and 10. (The La Dépêche wire presumably.)
Five minutes later, (“4.50 PM” p.a.) there was a follow-on from de Gandt – the War Office had no word yet about an armistice but were expecting news from GHQ any minute. He added that he was planning to stay on job until midnight. [De Gandt to Howard. TMG1: 3/34, 4/34, 5/34]
By 5:00 pm therefore – around forty minutes after his armistice cablegram – Howard was fully aware that Admiral Wilson’s news was not yet circulating in Paris. And he would still have been in the La Dépêche building. His whereabouts after 5:00 pm and before 6:30 pm, however, are uncertain.
Sometime later, there was another telegram from de Gandt with inauspicious tidings. He had now spoken by telephone to Phil Simms who told him that at 6:00 pm UP’s chief correspondent in Paris, Fred Ferguson, had talked to Gordon Auchincloss (Edward House’s son-in-law and personal assistant in Paris); that neither Auchincloss nor the American GHQ could confirm that the German delegation had crossed the front lines; and that House would endorse this. [De Gandt to Howard. TMG1: 6/34]
On this sheet there is a confusing “about 5 PM Thursday” p.a. (its presumed arrival time) which means either this or the “6:00 pm” in the message itself must be an error, as there was no time difference between Brest and Paris. Since Howard could not have received it or read it before 6:00 pm (the time Fred Ferguson reportedly spoke to Auchincloss), “about 5 PM” is probably an error and it actually arrived after 6:00 pm.
Around 6:30 pm Howard was back in the La Dépêche telegraph office preparing a cablegram about peace celebrations in Brest. This was his second to New York City that day; like his armistice cablegram earlier, it too had a Paris dateline. In ink, his handwritten draft reads:
Urgent Unipress New York BY HOWARD BREST 07183 [7 November, 18:30 hours (6:30 pm)] BREST PROBABLY FIRST CITY WORLD LEARD ARMISTICE NEWS REACHED ARMYERS NAVYERS SHORTLY AFTER FOUR COMMANDERS ADMIRAL WIL COMMANDERS COMMUNICATED NEWSPAPER DELA DEPECHE WHICH BULLETINED EXTRAED TOWN WILD YANKS KISSED CHEERED BOATS FACTORIES SIRENED HOWARD SIMMS [Howard Urgent Unipress New York (Bill Hawkins). TMG1: 7/34 & 8/34]
Again confusingly, there is a p.a. reading “about 6 PM Thursday” – half an hour before the 6:30 pm in the draft.
Confusing annotations aside, this 18:30 hours cablegram to New York City followed de Gandt’s news from Paris about Ferguson’s 6:00 pm talk with Auchincloss. Therefore, by 6:30 pm at the latest, Howard must have realised there was no German armistice. And although he had not yet been told Admiral Wilson’s armistice news was false, he was probably becoming increasingly concerned that it was and decided to send the ‘celebrations-in-Brest’ cablegram, which was in the New York City office “07144” – 7 November, 14:40 hours local time (2:40 pm; 7:40 pm French time).
They labelled it the “07183 confirmatory Brest bulletin”, which was how Howard intended it to be interpreted. Feeling anxious about the accuracy of Admiral Wilson’s armistice news, Howard would have realised that he and his agency might need to prove later that they had not fabricated the news or acted irresponsibly on mere rumours. That Brest also had the news and was wildly celebrating the end of the war would be a major factor in such a defence.
Thursday 7 November
6:30 pm to Midnight
Howard’s letter to Simms outlined that for the rest of the evening he had dinner with the Intelligence Officers he mentioned; and went back to the La Dépêche building afterwards, where he was told that the French authorities in Brest had received a report that the armistice was not “confirmed”.
You can imagine what a sweet night I had of it.
He immediately tried to find Admiral Wilson, hoping he could tell him what was happening, and eventually located him at the house of a French Admiral. Ensign Sellards, who was also there, informed him that the armistice news was unconfirmed. Howard was stunned; but he had a hunch that if it was not true, either the French censors in Brest would kill his armistice cablegram or the American censors in New York City would snag it. He then sent another story saying that Admiral Wilson who had given the first news out had now stated that the report was unconfirmed. By this time, Howard noted, it was 10:00 pm – nearly six hours after his armistice cablegram had cleared about 4:20 P.M. He stayed in the La Dépêche building – at the leased wire – until midnight and then turned in. [Howard to Phil Simms, 9 November 1918; p.3]
(For the dinner with the Intelligence Officers, which he had arranged earlier in the day, Howard went to the Brasserie de la Marine restaurant on Émile Zola Street and very close to President Wilson Square and the US Navy Headquarters. III.4 They were certainly there after 6:30 pm, that is, after Howard had filed a little item re Brest being the first city in France to get the news: his Brest-celebrating cablegram to the New York City office.)
Howard’s cancellation of his armistice news
After 10:00 pm, Howard drafted two messages in black ink, one to Unipress New York, with “10:50 PM Thursday” on it, the other to SIMMS Unipress PARIS, with “10:55 PM Thursday” on it.
In the “10:50 PM” one – his third to Bill Hawkins that day – he finally cancelled his armistice bulletin. Excluding some crossings-out, it reads:
Brest Admiral Wilson who ANNOUNCED to Brest newspaper 16:00 Armistice been signed later notified ANNOUNCEMENT unconfirmable meanwhile Brest riotously CELEBRATING HAWKINS DID MY ORIGINAL BULLETIN ANNOUNCING ARMISTICE REACH YOU HOWARD SIMMS [Howard (to Hawkins). TMG1: 9/34]
From its layout, Howard cabled it directly from Brest with Simms’ name again attached for the message to be paid for in New York. From its content, Howard was as yet (10:50 pm) unsure whether his armistice cablegram had reached the New York City office and, therefore, was still oblivious of the effects it was having across North America. But he was almost certainly hoping – against the odds – that something had stopped his false armistice news being delivered to Hawkins – hoping that the American censors had ‘snagged’ it, as he later remarked in his Phil Simms letter.
The “10:55 PM” draft was addressed initially to John de GANT, but his name was crossed out and replaced with SIMMS’:
Admiral Wilsons INFORMATION [CAME] FROM Captain Jackson American Naval Attache PARIS Suggest you phone Him. Unable SAY whether my FLASH REACHED HAWKINS HOWARD [Howard to Simms. TMG1: 10/34]
Just five minutes later, a delayed reply to Howard’s 4:20 pm notification of his armistice cablegram to New York City seems to have arrived from Fred Ferguson in Paris, for on the sheet is the p.a. “about 11 PM Thursday”.
HOWARD BREST SIMILAR REPORTS YOUR CABLE HERE BUT UNCONFIRMABLE STOP RUE UNIVERSITE FRIENDS SAY ADVISED [SECRETARY OF STATE] LANSING OTHERWISE SAFTERNOON RESPONSE [HIS] QUERY STOP NOTHING BEING PASSED STOP DO YOU KNOW WHETHER YOUR CABLE CLEARED FERGUSON [Ferguson to Howard. TMG1: 12/34]
(Secretary of State Lansing’s “query” was a request to Special Representative Edward House to ‘confirm or deny’ the armistice-signed news that had reached New York City.III.8 “RUE UNIVERSITE FRIENDS” indicates that Fred Ferguson had useful contacts in House’s entourage – House’s Paris residence and offices were at 78 Rue de l’Université. House’s early evening answer to Lansing’s query has 6:00 pm French time on it, which was around the time Ferguson spoke to Gordon Auchincloss, House’s son-in-law (according to de Gandt’s TMG1: 6/34 above). So, Ferguson must have wired it sometime after 6:00 pm and its delivery was held up for censorship reasons. Unless Howard actually read it before he sent his 10:50 pm and 10:55 pm messages, and mistakenly annotated it with “about 11 PM Thursday”, Howard’s Unable SAY whether my FLASH REACHED HAWKINS cannot therefore be taken as an answer to Ferguson’s DO YOU KNOW WHETHER YOUR CABLE CLEARED.
Howard’s last update from the Paris office on Thursday evening was from de Gandt. It was about the telegrams to Marshal Foch from German Supreme Headquarters in Spa concerning the German armistice delegates. De Gandt had flashed their information to New York – THE LAST [ONE] ANNOUNCING DELEGATION WOULD ONLY CROSS LINE BETWEEN 8 AND 10 PM. And closed by asking Howard whether he had ANYTHING ELSE TO SAY FOR TODAY. [De Gandt to Howard. TMG1: 11/34]
This sheet has “about 11 PM Thursday” on it as well. When de Gandt sent it is not shown; but it was late evening because the Spa-Senlis telegrams news was not available in Paris before 9:00 pm on 7 November. (A cablegram about them for President Wilson left Edward House’s offices at 11 pm; French newspapers discussed them and the German delegation’s arrival on Friday. III.1a;1c
Between Howard’s 6:30 pm second armistice cablegram – the “confirmatory Brest bulletin” – and de Gandt’s “about 11:00 pm” Spa-Senlis information, some four and a half hours therefore elapsed, during which Howard’s dinner, search for Admiral Wilson, and return to La Dépêche to cancel his first cablegram’s armistice news had occurred.
At the UP New York City office
Meanwhile, by midnight on 7 November in New York City (5 am on Friday 8 November in France) Bill Hawkins had only received Howard’s first two armistice cablegrams, each of which carried a Paris dateline. Believing that the news had come from the Paris office, had been sent by Howard and Simms and passed by the French censors, Hawkins refused to retract it even after the State Department denied during the afternoon that there was an armistice with Germany. During early evening he announced that “a cable message had been received telling of a celebration of the signing of the armistice at Brest” (Howard’s second one) which he regarded as proof of “the accuracy of the [first] message from Mr. Howard and Mr. Simms”. Therefore, Hawkins declared, until the news was proved beyond doubt to be wrong, he would not withdraw it: “it is inconceivable that they could be misled in a matter so important as this”. United Press was “standing pat” on all its armistice reports. And in response to a midnight telephone call to the office questioning the accuracy of the armistice news, he made this bold statement:
“We stand absolutely on that dispatch [from Howard]. It is authoritative. We haven’t the slightest doubt of its accuracy. It was passed by the French censor and the American censor. It was signed by Mr. Howard and Mr. Simms, two responsible newspaper men. It was transmitted in perfectly plain English and there is no doubt about what it said. The event will show that it is correct.” III.9
In Brest, Howard was completely unaware of the stand Hawkins had taken, or of the condemnation being heaped on him and United Press over his armistice cablegram and its effects across North America. Their rivals, mostly but not exclusively the Associated Press, were vilifying him and his agency, accusing them, above all, of egregious unprofessionalism in concocting what some labelled “fake” news and others characterised as “the greatest hoax of recent years”. III.10 It was not until Friday afternoon, French time, that Howard began to appreciate what huge repercussions his cablegram was having in America.
To summarise: after his armistice cablegram, Howard had sent two more to Bill Hawkins in New York City before Thursday ended: a second one at 6:30 pm about peace celebrations in Brest; and a third at 10:50 pm stating that, having announced the armistice news in Brest, Admiral Wilson had since learnt that it was “unconfirmable”, and asking Hawkins whether his armistice cablegram had arrived – “DID MY ORIGINAL BULLETIN ANNOUNCING ARMISTICE REACH YOU”. The American Navy censors delayed the delivery of this third one until Friday morning. From New York City on Thursday 7, Bill Hawkins had sent three cablegrams to the Paris office for Howard, but they did not arrive there until Friday. Consequently, for most of Thursday afternoon and evening Hawkins was unaware of what was happening in France, and Howard was oblivious to what was happening at the New York City office and elsewhere in America. Howard had told the Paris office about his armistice cablegram to the New York City office almost as soon as he sent it, and communicated with them during the rest of the day hoping, in vain, to hear that the armistice news had been officially confirmed. However, the next morning, Friday 8 November, news of disquieting developments in both Paris and the United States reached Howard.
Friday 8 November
Morning
Alarming news from Paris and, via Paris, from New York City
In a somewhat ambiguous morning telegram from Paris, Fred Ferguson alerted Howard YOUR CABLE REACHED HAWKINS[.] CENSOR CALLED SMORNING INQUIRING UPON RECEIPT MESSAGE EXHAWKINS ANNOUNCING ARRIVAL. And urged him as a matter of OBVIOUS IMPORTANTEST GET QUICKEST EXPLANATION SOME SORT NEWYORK ALSO TO CENSORS. Warning that SERIOUS EMBARRASSMENTS POSSIBLE HERE (Paris) he signed off with APPRECIATE ANY SUGGESTION. [Ferguson to Howard. TMG1: 13/34.] (Written in pencil on the sheet is “Friday Nov 8 10 AM” – the time Howard received or read it.)
So, not knowing that Howard was in Brest, Hawkins had addressed his reply to Howard’s 10:50 pm Thursday evening question to the Paris office. This was Howard’s cablegram cancelling his armistice news and asking “DID MY ORIGINAL BULLETIN ANNOUNCING ARMISTICE REACH YOU”, and Ferguson was now relaying it to Brest, together with news of other developments. But beforehand, the censors in the Bourse (Stock Exchange building in Paris) had seen it and had asked the Paris office to explain how Howard’s false armistice cablegram (with its Paris dateline) had been transmitted to New York. Hence, an “explanation [of] some sort” from Howard was urgently needed to help Hawkins and Ferguson deal with these worrying developments for United Press in both New York City and Paris.
Howard replied with just the bare details of where his armistice news had come from, and an ambiguous reference to its transmission:
MY MESSAGE TO NEW YORK FILED FROM [BREST] MESSAGE SUPPOSEDLY OFFICIAL RECEIVED HERE BY AMERICAN ADMIRAL WILSON AND COMMUNICATED TO LOCAL NEWSPAPER AND TO ME. He suggested that the Paris censor should have his LOCAL REPRESENTATIVE SEE ADMIRAL WILSON HERE HE IS NOT EXCITED AND IS READY TO EXPLAIN TO ANYONE INQUIRING HE SENT HIS AID WITH ME YESTERDAY TO FILE MY BULLETIN. And asked Ferguson to clarify whether the censor referred to had visited the Paris or the New York City office, and whether Hawkins had actually published the armistice news which he now knew had reached New York – DO YOU MEAN CENSOR CALLED IN PARIS OR NEW YORK ? DID HAWKINS PUBLISH ? – [Howard to Ferguson. TMG3: 7/17]
The message contains the first of Howard’s recorded comments about receiving some assistance with the armistice cablegram from Admiral Wilson and his aide Ensign Sellards – namely that Sellards went with him “to file” it. But there is very little about what had taken place in Brest the previous day which the New York City office could use, or which might satisfy the censors. There is no transmission time from Brest for it, but as it clearly relates to Ferguson’s “Friday Nov 8 10 AM”, Howard must have filed it sometime after 10:00 am, and, it seems, before the following reached him at 11:00 am.
Ferguson responded THINK EXTREMELY IMPORTANT YOU FILE FORMAL STATEMENT URGENT TO NEW YORK USING ADMIRAL WILSONS NAME IF POSSIBLE STOP STORY PUBLISHED AMERICA FROM NOON ON CELEBRATIONS COUNTRYWIDE STOP HAVE SEEN CENSORS HERE AND BELIEVE CIRCUMSTANCES WILL SAVE SITUATION (in Paris) STOP OBVIOUS OUR POSITION CRITICALEST AT HOME (USA) STOP STATE DEPARTMENT HAS CABLED ASKED EXPLANATION AND CENSOR IS CALLING WILSON AT BREST STOP III.1e
Meanwhile, FAILING GET IN TOUCH YOU AND FEELING SOMETHING ABSOLUTELY IMPERATIVE SIMMS AND I CABLED HAWKINS FOLLOWING QUOTE HAWKINS FOR YOUR INFORMATION HOWARDS MESSAGE FILED EXBREST WHERE AWAITING HOMEBOUND STEAMER FLASH BASED WHAT CONSIDERED UNIMPEACHABLE AUTHORITY BUT WHOSE INFORMATION PROVED PREMATURE UNQUOTE.
They had done this, Ferguson explained, not only for whatever use Hawkins might make of the information, but also TO REASSURE CENSORS HERE (who would read it before clearing it for transmission). The censors suspected that UP had used CODE to sneak the armistice news to New York, and their suspicions were ENDANGERING [UP’s] ENTIRE STANDING, so more about what had occurred in Brest was urgently needed – BELIEVE QUICK STATEMENT THROUGH BOURSE (location of the Paris censors’ office) TO US IMPORTANT [IN] ADDITION [TO] STATEMENT NEWYORK. “11 AM Friday Nov 8” p.a. indicating its arrival time in Brest. [Ferguson to Howard. TMG1: 14/34 & 17/34. Although separated in the archive, these two sheets carry parts of the same message and are in sequence as p.a. “76” and “77”.]
Five minutes later, at “11 05 AM Friday” p.a., a short note came from Paris that Phil Simms BELIEVES [A] STATEMENT EXADMIRAL CLEARING US RUSHED TO NEWYORK FOR PUBLICATION WILL DO MOREN ANYTHING ELSE SQUARE US WITH PUBLISHERS STOP . . . ANT (incomplete, WANT?) FERGUSON EXPLAIN MATTER COLONEL HOUSE. [To Howard from (it seems) “TAYLOR” p.a., a UP reporter just returned from the Front). TMG1: 18/34]
As a result, just before midday Howard sent an “urgent” cablegram directly to the New York City office. On an American Army Signal Corps form, it reads:
ARMISTICE BULLETIN BASED LOCAL ANNOUNCEMENT ADMIRAL WILSON ADMIRAL SUPPOSING OFFICIAL WAS FILED WITH ADMIRALS APPROVAL LOCAL NEWSPAPER BULLETINED BREST CELEBRATED NIGHTLONG DID UNIPRESS PUBLISH [Howard to Unipress, New York (Hawkins). 8 November 1918. TMG2.]
On Howard’s copy of it there are annotations that it was filed at “11:55 AM” and “cleared” the local censors at “1:30 PM” French time, 8:30 am New York time “Via P.Q.” (via the Brest Post and Telegraph Atlantic cable office). (New York had it by 11:30 am, local time – three hours later.) It provided Hawkins with little more than he had received above from Ferguson and Simms in Paris. And it appears that Howard still wanted to know whether Ferguson had published his armistice news, although Howard may be alluding to his second Thursday cablegram – the 6:30 pm one – about celebrations in Brest sparked by Admiral Wilson’s armistice news from Paris.
However, two and a half hours later, Howard was able to provide New York City and Paris with precisely what Phil Simms said was needed to “square” UP with editors who had printed the armistice news – a “STATEMENT EXADMIRAL CLEARING US”.
Friday 8 November
Afternoon
Admiral Wilson’s acceptance of blame for the false armistice news
Howard told Phil Simms in his letter the following day that on Friday, after learning in the morning that the stuff had gotten through [to New York City] and been printed, he decided there was nothing to do except put it up to Wilson who signed a statement of fact accepting responsibility for giving him the armistice news: he came all the way through to do everything within his power to undo the damage. [Howard to Phil Simms, 9 November 1918; p.3]
Howard saw Admiral Wilson at Navy Headquarters. It is not certain when their meeting started, not known how long it lasted, or therefore what time Howard left Navy Headquarters. But for Howard it was entirely worthwhile. The signed statement he obtained completely exonerated him and UP from any blame for the false armistice news; it was an affirmation of Howard’s and UP’s innocence and an official rebuttal of the potentially hugely damaging accusations being levelled against them in the United States.
The statement, as typed and ready for separate transmission to Hawkins in New York City and Ferguson in Paris, reads:
Admiral Wilson today made following statement for information of United Press editors quote The statement of United Press relative to signing of Armistice was made public from my office on basis of what appeared to be official and authoritative information. Am in position to know that United Press and its representative acted in perfect good faith and that premature announcement was result of an error for which agency was in no wise responsible unquote. [Howard to Unipress New York, 8 November 1918. Urgent Rate. TMG2: 8 November 1918]
On it is the p.a. “3.20 PM Nov 8 18”, assumed to indicate its dispatch time. However, on one copy of the actual telegram to Ferguson in Paris, no time is indicated – NOTE: FERGUSON UNIPRESS PARIS. TMG3: 9/17. But on another such copy – NOTE: FERGUSON UNIPRESS PARIS, TMG1: 19/34 (below), there is the p.a. “Friday Nov 8, 1918 2 30 PM”, which is assumed to be a more accurate dispatch time because of the times shown on associated subsequent communications.
Gratitude to Admiral Wilson
Howard was deeply grateful for the statement. To Fred Ferguson and (via him) Bill Hawkins, he declared that Wilson QUOTE HAS BEEN ABSOLUTELY SQUARE UNWELCHING SLIGHTEST THOUGH WE BEEN HELPLESS HAD HE WANTED SACRIFICE US SAVE HIMSELF STOP DON’T FORCE ADMIRAL INTO MIXUP UNNECESSARILY DON’T KEEP DISCUSSION ALIVE APPRECIATE SERIOUSNESS TIME HEAL UNQUOTE. [NOTE: FERGUSON UNIPRESS PARIS (“2 30 PM” p.a.) TMG1: 19/34 & 20/34.]
Just five minutes later, he sent a follow-on to Ferguson: SHOW ADMIRAL WILSONS STATEMENT OF WHICH I HAVE SIGNED ORIGINAL TO COL HOUSE TELL HIM THAT I WORST SUFFERER ADMIRALS MISINFORMATION REALIZE ADMIRAL ALSON VICTIM [FERGUSON UNIPRESS PARIS (Friday Nov 8 1918 2:35 PM p.a.) TMG1: 21/34.]
In his letter the following day to Phil Simms in Paris, his admiration for the Admiral is obvious:
Howard recounted that, at their Friday meeting, Admiral Wilson told him Secretary of State Robert Lansing had contacted him about the false armistice cable, and that he knew full well . . . he was in for some grief too; indeed, he thought that when Wilson signed he did it knowing that he might be writing his own resignation, but he never showed the slightest hesitancy or the slightest suggestion of intention to welch. Continuing, he wanted Bill Hawkins to leave the Admiral out of the picture as much as possible because I am sure that he was sure that the information he was giving me was official. I am sure that he was bunked and that he is going to have his troubles too. Of course, he has no idea of what the thing means to us, but he could see that it was a bad mess and he came all the way through to do everything within his power to undo the damage. [Roy Howard to Phil Simms, November 9, 1918; p.3]
(Ironically, that same day the UP Paris office alleged that the Admiral had acted (improperly, if true) to make sure the censors in Brest accepted Howard’s armistice cablegram; allegations which derived most likely from remarks Howard had made to them about the Admiral. III.8)
The UP Paris office crisis under control
It is not clear how long after 2:30 pm Ferguson read the Admiral’s statement, or whether he made use of it when dealing with the Paris cable censors and Edward House’s team who were investigating the armistice news. For by 3:15 pm, he had resolved the worries he outlined to Howard during the morning and the crisis for the Paris office had receded: the censors had been placated, and the agency’s standing with the State Department in Washington, DC, had been safeguarded by reports to Robert Lansing from Edward House and the American Ambassador in Paris, William Sharp. III.8
And blame for “reckless news work” deflected
Ferguson’s “friends” in Edward House’s team, and the American Embassy’s involvement in spreading the armistice news the previous day, must have made matters easier for him. He summarised discussions he had had with Edward House and Gordon Auchincloss (House’s son-in-law) in two telegrams:
In the first (“Friday, Nov 8, 1918 3:15” p.a.), Ferguson reported that House knew the false news was not Howard’s FAULT before he spoke to him about it because IDENTICAL STUFF to that in Howard’s 7 November cablegram ANNOUNCED ON AUTHORITY [AMERICAN] EMBASSY. THEY had tried unsuccessfully to make House believe the news; EMBASSY IN VERY BAD WILL WRITE DETAILS . . . . AM KEEPING CLEAR AWAY FROM EMBASSY.
Regarding the censors, he assured Howard EVERYTHING ALRIGHT WITH CENSORSHIP NOW NOBODY IN AUTHORITY BLAMING US. But it was still urgently necessary to SET WASHINGTON STRAIGHT. He had impressed upon Auchincloss IMPERATIVE BLAME BE PUT WHERE BELONGS and Auchincloss promised he would send a STATEMENT POLK (to Frank Polk, a State Department counsellor) TONIGHT IN WHICH [HE] ASSURED ME ABSOLUTE JUSTICE BE DONE. [TO: HOWARD – BREST. “Friday, Nov 8, 1918 3:15” p.a. TMG1: 22/34.]
In the second telegram, just over three hours later, there was good news that Auchincloss (in his promised dispatch to Polk in Washington, DC), COMPLETELY EXONERATES US . . . SAYS IN EFFECT WE WARRANTED SENDING NEWS ON BASIS INFORMATION . . . TAKES VIEW WE SHOULD COME OUT SCRAMBLE STRONGERN BEFORE. Ferguson added that he was CABLING HAWKINS WATCH FOR POLK CABLE. As for the American Embassy, it was now free of FIRST SUSPICIONS but, Ferguson remarked, YOU KNOW WHO [ADMIRAL] WILSON GOT [ARMISTICE] MESSAGE FROM. [TO: HOWARD – BREST. “Friday, Nov 8, 1918 6 30 PM” p.a. TMG1: 23/34.] I. Archives, House and Auchincloss Papers
Presumably before he had received this second telegram, Howard congratulated Ferguson on his work – THANKS THINK YOU HAVE HANDLED THINGS WELL – wanted him to MAIL TONIGHT COPIES ALL HAWKINS WIRES ALSON MEMO RE HOUSES ATTITUDE and to ASK HOUSE IF HE WOULD PREFER I RETURN TO PARIS BEFORE SAILING. [NOTE: FERGUSON UNIPRESS PARIS. TMG3: 17/17.] No date or transmission time, only an annotation on the sheet in French reading ”Recu à 18.25” (“received at 6:25 pm”) – perhaps the sheet the printer tape was pasted on at the Paris-end of the La Dépêche wire.
Friday 8 November
Evening
Yet more alarming news from New York City
Perhaps it was not long after Howard read Fred Ferguson’s 6:30 pm, “[AUCHINCLOSS] COMPLETELY EXONERATES US”, when fresh news arrived from Paris concerning a continuing critical situation for Bill Hawkins at the UP office in New York City.
As noted above, Howard had cabled Admiral Wilson’s statement to Hawkins “Urgent Rate” that afternoon at 2:30 pm French time, 9:30 am New York time. Hawkins confirmed later that he received it 08131 – that is, Friday 8 at 13:10 – 1:10 pm local time, 6:10 pm in France, three hours and forty minutes later. But at 08123 (below), 12:30 pm local time, 5:30 pm French time, some forty minutes before Wilson’s statement reached him, and still believing Howard was at the Paris office, Hawkins cabled him a stark account of the Thursday armistice cablegram’s impact, of the problems it had created in the United States, and the serious consequences threatening United Press.
Fred Ferguson forwarded most of its information from Paris in a telegram of his own to Howard: FOLLOWING FROM HAWKINS RECEIVED SMORNING IN ORDER
08123 HOWARD YOUR ORIGINAL PARIS FLASH RECEIVED (07120 PUBLISHED EVERYWHERE EXACTLY AS SENT YOUR 07183) CONFIRMATORY BREST BULLETIN RECEIVED 07144 NOTHING MORE UNTIL 08113 WHEN RECEIVED FIRST REFERENCE ADMIRAL WILSON OR UNCONFIRMABLE SIMULTANEOUSLY RECEIVED YOUR BREST MESSAGE STATING ADMIRAL WILSON APPROVED FILING STOP
(The information in parenthesis is in Hawkins’ cablegram to Paris but not in Ferguson’s telegram to Howard about it.)
So, Hawkins in New York City at 12:30 pm local time, 5:30 pm French time, on Friday afternoon cabled that Howard’s armistice message had been received Thursday at midday (5:00 pm in France) and was published everywhere. Howard’s Thursday bulletin about Brest celebrating the armistice news, sent 6:30 pm from France, 1:30 pm in New York City, had arrived at 2:40 pm in New York City, 7:40 pm in France. Other messages about Admiral Wilson, apparently causing some confusion, arrived from France at 11:30 am on Friday morning, 4:30 pm in France. Among them, it seems, were Howard’s “10:50 PM” Thursday night one cancelling his armistice message, the last one Howard sent to Hawkins on Thursday. If it was not received until 11:30 am local time on Friday, it had been in transit for more than seventeen hours. The ‘simultaneous’ one was probably Howard’s Friday morning “11.55 AM” (6:55 am in New York) cablegram, on the Army Signal Corps sheet, stating that his armistice cablegram had followed Wilson’s release of the news in Brest, was filed with the Admiral’s approval, and that Brest had celebrated throughout the night.
After STOP, Ferguson continued his relay of Hawkins’ information with:
FULL EXPLANATION QUOTING YOUR MESSAGES ANNOUNCEMENT YESTERDAY CAUSED GREATEST DEMONSTRATION AMERICAN HISTORY DAYLONG NIGHTLONG OPPOSITION SERVICES PAPERS ATTACKING UNIPRESS VICIOUSLY ADVISE YOU RUSH FULLEST POSSIBLE STATEMENT FOR PUBLICATION FACT THAT UNCABLES RECEIVED EXPARIS (why your cables were sent from Paris) . . . WE STOOD PAT [ON THE ARMISTICE NEWS] UNTIL OFFICIAL COMMUNIQUES [THIS MORNING] SHOWED FIGHTING CONTINUING IMPOSSIBLE OVERESTIMATE SERIOUSNESS INCIDENT WHICH UNPARALLELLED ALL NEWSPAPER HISTORY IN TREMENDOUS EFFECT PUBLIC. [Fergusons’ telegram is HOWARD BREST. TMG1: 24/34 & 25/34. No date or time shown. Hawkins’ cablegram to Howard, sent to Paris, is NEW YORK 115/111. TMG3: 2/17 & 3/17]
Hawkins then followed this 12:30 pm EST cable forty minutes later with information that he had received Admiral Wilson’s STATEMENT TO UNIPRESS at 08131 – 1:10 pm EST, 6:10 pm French time – and had BROADCASTED it; and that ALL AGENCIES CARRIED it. There is no transmission time on the first follow-on; but 08150 – 3:00 pm local time, 8:00 pm French time, is on the second one. In his telegram relaying these details, Ferguson added his own comment: HEARTILY SECOND HAWKINS SUGGESTION [YOU SHOULD MAKE] CLEAR EVERYTHING FILED FROM BREST UNFORTUNATE WAS DATED PARIS BUT WELL HAVE ACCEPT THIS MISTAKE EXPLAINING THIS DUE CABLES BEING SIGNED SIMMS OWING HIM HAVING FILING PRIVILEGES. [Hawkins’ follow-ons: NEW YORK 690 to Howard TMG3: 5/17, and NEW YORK 705 to Howard. TMG3: 6/17. Ferguson’s relay, no time or date, TMG1: 26/34.]
Fred Ferguson must have sent Hawkins’ information to Howard during Friday evening, but when Howard received it that evening is not known. And he would not have known, when he did read it, whether the Admiral’s statement had helped relieve the pressure on Hawkins in New York City. But for the rest of Friday and perhaps into the early hours of Saturday, Howard prepared a response to Hawkins’ information, and to the comments Ferguson added when he relayed it, which he sent off the next day, Saturday 9 November, his last full day in France.
(The Hawkins cablegrams Howard asked Ferguson to mail to him carry a ‘PARIS BOURSE’ censors’ date stamp for Saturday 9 November 1918. How Ferguson actually had them delivered to Brest, and whether Howard received them on Saturday is not certain.)
Saturday 9 November
In the United States, many Friday afternoon and evening papers featured the Admiral’s statement together with Howard’s earlier message that Wilson gave the armistice news to the local newspaper in Brest and had allowed him to file it. III.11 On Saturday 9th, United Press paid for a whole-page print-out of the statement in the Fourth Estate (which marketed itself as “A Newspaper for the Makers of Newspapers and Investors in Advertising”). III.12
However, far from silencing press criticisms of Howard’s armistice news, the statement added fuel to them. Some of UP’s rivals chose to interpret it and Howard’s account of how he obtained the armistice news as attempts to shift the blame onto the Admiral for what had happened, and therefore as more evidence of UP’s dishonest handling of the news. The New York Times, for instance, charged the agency with placing “full responsibility for the circulation of the false news . . . on Vice Admiral Henry B. Wilson . . . one of the most distinguished officers of the American Navy”. More bluntly, the Oklahoma Daily Ardmoreite accused it of “Making Admiral Wilson the [Scape] Goat”. III.13
Warning UP’s Competitors
(With one exception, there are no times indicating when during Saturday the following communications travelled between Brest, New York City and Paris.)
Howard’s responses for Bill Hawkins and Fred Ferguson
Howard’s reply to Bill Hawkins is in three telegrams sent to Phil Simms at the Paris office with instructions to forward them “urgent rate” to New York City.
The first is a press statement covering what took place in Brest on Thursday afternoon.
REPONSE PLEASE SAY TO TIMES (New York Times) THAT SIGNED STATEMENT GIVEN UNIPRESS BY ADMIRAL WILSON . . . TELLS WHOLE STORY ADMIRAL GAVE TO ME PERSONNALLY AND TO BREST PAPER WITH PERMISSION TO BOTH OF US TO PRINT A BULLETIN STATING THAT ARMISTICE BEEN SIGNED AT 11 AM HOSTILITIES HAD CEASED AT TWO PM AND THAT AMERICAN HAD TAKEN SEDAN UPON THE ADMIRALS ASSURANCE THAT THE INFORMATION WAS OFFICIAL AND FULLY AUTHENTICATED I FILED A VERBATUM COPY OF HIS BULLETIN THIS WAS FILED IN THE REGULAR MANNER IN PLAIN ENGLISH AT THE BREST POST OFFICE TO BE PASSED ON BY THE FRENCH CENSORS HERE
I WAS TOLD YESTERDAY (8th) THAT IN THE EXCITEMENT IN THE BREST POST OFFICE DUE TO THE LOCAL NEWS PAPERS BULLETIN ANNOUNCING THE ARMISTICE MY MESSAGE DID NOT REACH THE CENSORS UNTIL MORE THAN TWO HOURS AFTER THE MESSAGE HAD BEEN CABLED TO NEWYORK
I AM PERSONALLY CONVINCED THAT ADMIRAL WILSON WAS ASSURED THAT THE BULLETIN HE MADE PUBLIC WAS OFFICIAL AND THAT HE ACTED IN ABSOLUTE GOOD T[F]AITH I HAVE NO WAY OF KNOWING WHO WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE ADMIRALS MISINFORMATION MY OWN PART WAS MERELY THAT OF A NEWSPAPERMAN AT THE END OF A CABLE RECIVING FROM A BASE COMMANDER WHAT I WAS ASSURED AND HAD EVERY REASON TO BELIEVE WAS AN OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT OF AN ARMISTICE I MADE USE OF THE SUPPOSEDLY OFFICIAL INFORMATION ONLY AFTER REQUESTING AND RECEIVING SPECIAL PERMISSION TO DO SO UNQUOTE HOWARD [Howard to Simms and Hawkins. TMG3: 11/17 & 12/17]
In the second, soon afterwards, Howard asked Simms PLEASE CONDENSE SLIGHTLY AND URGENT RATEHAWKINS STATEMENT WHICH JUST SENT YOU FOR TIMES ADDING FOLLOWING UNDER QUOTATIONS UNIPRESS DISPATCH WAS CABLED FROM BREST DIRECTLY NEW YORKWARD MESSAGE CONTAINED BOTH MY OWN SIMMS SIGNATURE LATTER BECAUSE COLLECT CABLE PRIVILEGE REPOSES SIMMS NAME STOP UNDERSTAND DOUBLE SIGNATURE CAUSED CONFUSION NEWYORK CREATING ERRONEOUS IMPRESSION MATTER FILED PARIS STOP SIMMS PARIS OFFICE UNINVOLVED STOP
(This second message was in reply to the suggestion from Ferguson, the previous day, as to what Howard should say on this particular point: SHOULD BE MADE CLEAR EVERYTHING FILED FROM BREST UNFORTUNATE WAS DATED PARIS BUT WELL HAVE ACCEPT THIS MISTAKE EXPLAINING THIS DUE CABLES BEING SIGNED SIMMS OWING HIM HAVING FILING PRIVILEGES. In TMG1: 26/34)
Howard continued with an uncompromising, combative, clear warning to UP’s competitors – his personal response to Hawkins’ information about vicious attacks in American papers over the false armistice news:
CABLES RECEIVED (from Hawkins) INDICATE INCLINATION INTERSTED PARTIES CAPITALIZ FOR PERSONAL ENDS INCIDENT WHEREOF UNIPRESS UNFORTUNATELY VICTIM STOP SERVE NOTICE EVERY ACTION UNIPRESS MATTER OFFICIAL RECORD OUR HANDS CLEAN (amended to ABSOLUTELY CLEAN) ALL OFFICIALS DIRECTLY CONCERNED ABSOLUTELY ABSOLVED UNIPRESS RESPONSIBILITY WILL TAKE ANY STEPS NECESSARY PROTECT REPUTATION AT HOME UNQUOTE HOWARD [Howard to Simms and Hawkins. TMG3: 13/17]
In the third telegram, Hawkins was to be told also that WHILE BREST DEMONSTRATION HEIGHT LEARNED FRENCH ARMY OFFICERS BREST QUESTIONED ACCURACY REPORT IMMEDIATELY SOUGHT WILSON FOUND HE HAD RECEIVED WORD HIS ORIGINAL BULLETIN ? [Howard to Simms and Hawkins. TMG3: 15/17]
To summarise, in the first of his replies Howard expanded upon Admiral Wilson’s Friday exoneration of him and UP, adding some words of support for Wilson and his predicament. There is nothing about Wilson’s aide helping him file his cablegram, about its composition in the La Dépêche building, or about its overall appearance of having come, already vetted, from Paris, only that the censors in Brest did not see it until two hours after it had gone through.
In the second, he maintained that the New York City censors believed the cablegram had arrived from Paris because it had his and Simms’ name on it (which did not make clear why it had left Brest with a Paris dateline); and inserted the defiant warning directed at his and UP’s detractors.
And in the third, he added that he attempted to find Admiral Wilson on 7 November to verify that, according to the French, the armistice news was doubtful.
Phil Simms presumably edited these three Saturday communications from Howard before he forwarded them to Bill Hawkins from Paris. And Bill Hawkins added an initialled warning of his own to hostile newspapers in the United States as a preamble to the version of Howard’s text circulated for publication.
ALL EDITORS —- FOLLOWING IS SENT FOR YOUR INFORMATION AND PUBLICATION IF DESIRED. WE SEE NO REASON TO CONTINUE THE CONTROVERSY WHICH WAS CLOSED BY ADMIRAL WILSON’S OWN STATEMENT YESTERDAY (8th) AND SECRETARY DANIELS’ STATEMENT TODAY. W.W.H.
New York, Nov. 9 —- The following cablegram was received today from Roy Howard, president of The United Press, filed from Brest, France:
“Admiral Wilson’s statement tells the whole story. The Admiral gave me personally, and a Brest paper, a bulletin stating that the armistice had been signed etc. Upon the Admiral’s assurance that the information was official and fully authenticated, I filed a verbatim copy of his bulletin in the regular manner at the Brest Postoffice (French postoffices are also the telegraph offices) for the French censorship. I learned yesterday that in the excitement due to the newspaper announcing the armistice, my message did not reach the censors until after the text had been cabled to New York.
“I am personally convinced that Admiral Wilson was assured that his bulletin was official and that he acted in absolute good faith. I do not know who was responsible for the Admiral’s misinformation. My own part was merely that of a newspaperman, at the end of a cable, receiving from the Base Commander what I was assured, and had every reason to believe, was an official announcement of the armistice. I made use of supposedly official information only after requesting and receiving special permission.
“While the demonstrations were at their height, I learned that French officers at Brest questioned [its] accuracy. I immediately sought Admiral Wilson and found that he had received word that his original bulletin was unofficial and unconfirmable. I immediately sent an urgent cablegram of correction to New York, which should have reached there in time for the Thursday afternoon papers, but unfortunately this cablegram was delayed for hours.
(The last sentence here was most likely inserted by Bill Hawkins, and without Howard’s knowledge initially, because Howard did not mention a “cablegram of correction” in any of his three replies for the press release.)
“The United Press dispatch was cabled from Brest directly to New York. The message contained both Simms’ signature and mine, the former because our collect privilege reposes in Simms’ name. I understand the double signature caused confusion in New York, creating the erroneous impression that the matter had been filed in Paris. Neither Simms nor the Paris office participated. III.7 and III.6
“I have received cablegrams indicating that interested parties are endeavoring to capitalize the incident whereof The United Press was a victim.
“Serve notice that every action of The United Press is a matter of official record. Our hands are absolutely clean. All officials directly concerned have completely absolved The United Press of responsibility.
“I will take any steps necessary to protect our reputation at home.”
This note at the end was added by Phil Simms, derived from Howard’s remark in his first REPONSE about EXCITEMENT IN THE BREST POST OFFICE:
“Howard’s reference to the confusion in the Brest postoffice probably explains the fact that the original cablegram as received by The United Press in New York was dated ‘PARIS’ and bore no other dateline whatever. It contained no mention of Brest either in the text or in the dateline and clearly showed Paris as the office of origin. 1:05PM”
(“1:05PM” – is taken to be the time Hawkins issued the statement from the New York City office on Saturday 9 November.) III.14
Newspapers printed it, without comment, that afternoon and evening, and over the next few days – the signing of the Real Armistice on Monday 11 November evidently did not diminish the False Armistice’s newsworthiness. III.15
And it had the desired effect. From New York City, via Phil Simms in Paris, Hawkins announced jubilantly: YOUR FINE SATURDAY STATEMENT EFFECTUALLY ENDS ARGUMENT TRADE JOURNALS FEATURE ADMIRALS STATEMENT OUR ENEMIES . . . NOW REALISE THEY SQUAWKED OVERQUICKLY WE ALL SET FOR BIG IMPENDING NEWS ADVISE YOU PROCEED MONDAY WITH PERFECT ASSURANCE INCIDENT ONLY SERVE CEMENT REAL FRIENDS CLOSER REVEAL HYPOCRITES ALTOGETHER RESULT HEALTHY CLARIFYCATION ATMOSPHERE MORALE WHOLE ORGANISATION HIGHEST NEVER WAVERED ASIDE BUSINESS JOYOUSLY ANTICIPATE SEEING YOU MARGARET AGAIN [Hawkins to Howard. TMG1: 15/34. No date or times, Saturday 9 or Sunday 10 November.]
Criticisms in the newspapers certainly ceased, but privately doubts about Howard’s story endured. Associated Press, for instance, which had earlier credited “United Press with [the] greatest hoax of recent years” continued to be suspicious of the armistice cablegram even after Howard’s 9 November press warning and the 8 November Admiral Wilson announcements. Moreover, they decided to initiate enquiries to find out whether Wilson’s headquarters had indeed been influencing the local censorship, and whether Howard’s arrival in Brest on 7 November was anything other than entirely “accidental”. III.16
Howard’s Other Saturday 9 November Messages
The previous day (Friday 8), Bill Hawkins had urged Howard to “RUSH FULLEST POSSIBLE STATEMENT FOR PUBLICATION” clarifying why his armistice news was not from Paris; Fred Ferguson “heartily” agreed with the suggestion, telling Howard it was necessary to explain this to the Paris censor as well. [Above, the (081230) New York Hawkins to Howard, TMG3: 2/17 & 3/17, relayed in Ferguson to Howard, TMG1: 24/34 & 25/34. And (08150) Ferguson to Howard, TMG1: 26/34 ]
Consequently, in addition to his warnings to UP’s detractors, Howard dealt with these prompts in a separate telegram to Fred Ferguson and in one to Captain D. L. Stone, the American Military Censor at the Paris Bourse.
Howard’s explanation to Fred Ferguson of his 7 November armistice cablegrams
WILL WIRE STONE IN FEW MINUTES YES [I] FILED THREE BULLETINS FROM HERE THE ARMISTICE FLASH THE FACT BREST PROBABLY FIRST CITY IN WORLD TO CELEBRATE AND THE CORRECTION AFTER WILSON LEARNED THAT HE HAD BEEN MISINFORMED I SUPPOSED BREST DATE WOULD SHOW ON CABLE IN NEW YORK I DID NOT PUT BREST DATE ON FIRST FLASH BUT DID MENTION BREST IN OTHER TWO CABLES WHICH PROBABLY ACCOUNTS FOR HAWKINS REFERENCE TO PARIS FLASH [NOTE FERGUSON UNIPRESS PARIS. TMG3: 10/17 and TMG1: 27/34.]
(There are two copies of this NOTE. The first, TMG3: 10/17, carries a barely legible annotation in ink “Recu ȧ 18.1″ (“Received at 18.10” – 6:10 pm) and an illegible signature. This copy may be the sheet the printer tape was pasted on at the Paris-end of the La Dépêche wire; the other, TMG1: 27/34, may be Howard’s from the Brest-end.)
Howard did not send the note to Bill Hawkins who had also asked for the clarification, probably because he had already included a few explanatory details in the REPONSE telegrams Phil Simms edited and forwarded to Hawkins.
Howard’s explanation to Captain D. L. Stone at the Paris Bourse
For his explanation to the American censor, Howard used the Army Signal Corps service. He began with Admiral Wilson’s Friday 8 November admission of responsibility for the armistice news in Brest, which took up one Signal Corps form; he filled a second form with the following, which, unfortunately, is incomplete:
I FILED THREE MESSAGES FROM BREST FIRST A VERBATUM COPY OF ADMIRAL WILSONS BULLETIN STOP I DID NOT DATE THIS BREST AS I SUPPOSED CABLE WOULD CARRY BREST DATELINE WHEN DELIVERED SECOND DESCRIBED STREET SCENES IN BREST FOLLOWING PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT HERE THIRD WAS A CORRECTION STATING ADMIRAL BEEN INFORMED HIS NOTIFICATION WAS NOT OFFICIAL AND NOT CONFIRMED STOP UNIPRESS PARIS OFFICE FILED NOTHING STOP IF NEWYORK STORY CARRIED PARIS DATE LINE WAS DUE FACT CABLE COMPANY UNDATED MY MESSAGE BREST OR TO CONFUSION RESULTING FROM MY NECESSARILY SIGNING SIMMS NAME IN ADDITION (The text ends here.) [Howard to Captain Stone. American Censor. Bourse. Paris. November 9 ‘18. TMG2. At: 9 November 1918, under “Armistice”.]
The abrupt ending, without Howard’s name to sign it off, suggests there was a third sheet which is missing from the archive. On it, Howard probably pointed out why Simms’ name was “in addition” to his – “BECAUSE COLLECT CABLE PRIVILEGE REPOSES SIMMS NAME” – as he had elsewhere.
Here, Howard makes perfectly clear the sequence in which he filed his three armistice cablegrams on 7 November: first, the one with Admiral Wilson’s armistice news from Paris; second, the one describing peace celebrations in Brest; and third, the one carrying the ”correction” – that is, his cancellation of the first cablegram – after learning that the armistice news was not official and not confirmed.
Perhaps Howard found the time to type out his long 9 November letter to Phil Simms towards the end of Saturday, in which, reflecting on what had happened since Thursday, he revealed something of the torment he experienced over his armistice cablegram.
Personally I’m still a bit groggy from this jolt I received here, [and] fully conscious of what it has done to us in America. He reckoned that thing had caused United Press at least a quarter of a million dollars worth (sic) of damage.
But in spite of everything, he confessed that if the same thing [happened] again today, he would do exactly as he had done on 7 November – there would be nothing for me or any other newspaper man to do except just what I did.
Right at the end, in a postscript relating to the local French censors and his cablegram, he noted that he became aware on Friday morning that the people in the P.Q. office here were so excited by [the] La Depeche bulletin that they did not send my message to the French censor here until two hours after it had cleared for New York – the entirely plausible reason for its transmission given in his press statement earlier in the day for Hawkins in New York City to use. [Howard to Phil Simms, November 9, 1918, p3.]
Sunday 10 November
Departure
Howard left for home aboard the USS Great Northern, the fast troop-transport between Brest and the Port of New York. Fred Ferguson wished Howard ‘bon voyage’ and assured him that although it had BEEN SOME BATTLE HERE [UNITED PRESS] WIN BY AMILE; and that HOUSE WRITING LETTER APPRECIATION ADMIRAL WILSON. [Ferguson to Howard. TMG1: 16/34. No date or time, probably Saturday 9 November.]
On Monday, the ship’s radio picked up the official broadcast to “All Allied Men of War” announcing an armistice with Germany and that hostilities should be “forthwith suspended”. Howard kept a duplicate of it in his papers. (Under: 11 November 1918.) He was back in America by 18 November.
In spite of Howard’s efforts to vindicate himself and silence detractors, his armistice cablegram remained “a huge embarrassment to UP and left a bitter taste in the mouths of those who had worked so hard to compete with, and often beat, A[ssociated] P[ress] during the war”. III.17 According to some, it cast a shadow over Howard’s subsequent career and damaged the agency’s reputation for many years to come. The authors of a history of United Press, for example, writing early in the present century, considered that adverse effects on UP persisted for “the rest of the twentieth century”. It was “never allowed to forget the goof” and “many newspaper editors, some who were not even born when Howard ended the war prematurely, would not print a United Press ‘beat’ but would wait for AP to confirm it”. III.18 Even as late as November 1951, Howard was named as being “responsible for” the 7 November 1918 armistice news – on this occasion by President Harry S. Truman, no less. III.19 But as for its business operations, UP “amazingly lost only one client” (the Vermont Burlington News) because of the armistice cablegram, making Howard’s gloomy $250,000 “conservative” estimate of the probable False Armistice damage to the agency overpessimistic in the event. III.17
© James Smith (August 2019) (Additional material, reviews and re-arrangements: May 2020 – November 2025.)
ENDNOTES
I. Archive Sources
Roy Howard
Roy Howard Papers (1892-1964). MSA 1, The Media School Archive, Indiana University Libraries, Bloomington, Indiana. Available online.
Telegram Messages (TM) from and to Howard while he was in Brest:
TMG1: Sheets 1-34. A group of 34 in the Papers’ CONTENTS under 7 November 1918: Armistice documentation.
TMG2: Three separate items, wrongly listed as ‘letters’, two at 8 November 1918; and one at 9 November 1918 in the Papers’ CONTENTS.
TMG3: Sheets 1-17. A group of 17 in the Papers’ CONTENTS under 25 April 1957: To: Naoma Lowensohn. From: Marshall Coles. Armistice.
Most of the TMs went via the La Dépêche leased telegraph link with Paris, having been printed on ticker tape before being pasted on plain sheets of paper. Some others are on telegram forms which have been cropped in parts. Many have no date or times of transmission or receipt on them, details which cannot always be established from their content or relation to other telegrams.
Roy Howard’s Diaries are not in the Media School Archive, and so have not been consulted. They are with other family papers still held privately.
Another archive of Howard’s Papers is in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division. In the ‘Finding Aid’ to it, under Miscellany, 1918-1966, is listed ‘Box 340, World War 1 “Armistice” incident’. The box contains mostly newspaper clippings of reviews of Premature Armistice.
‘Premature Armistice – Roy W. Howard Speaking’.
This is Howard’s memoir of 7 November 1918, presented as Chapter IV in Webb Miller’s, I Found No Peace. The Journal of a Foreign Correspondent. (Page numbers given in this article are for The Book Club Special Edition, Camelot Press, London, 1937, but seem to be accurate for most editions.)
Howard kept a print of his chapter from the 1936 Simon and Shuster first edition of Miller’s book. This is in images 1-21 at 6 January 1936 in his archive. There are, though, no letters or other documents relating to it.
There was a German edition of Miller’s book: Ich fand keinen Frieden. (Rowohlt Berlin. 1938)
Edward Mandell House
Edward Mandell House Papers. Call Number MS 466. Yale University Library, Newhaven, Connecticut.
House ignored the False Armistice in his Diary entries for November 1918. He made two entries about the talks with the German Armistice Delegation: the first, on 9 November, that during a discussion at the War Office with Georges Clemenceau (French Premier and War Minister) “a courier came from Marshal Foch to tell of the negotiations with the German Plenipotentiaries”; the other, on 10 November, that “last night” there was more from Clemenceau and Stephen Pichon (French Foreign Minister) on “the progress of the discussions of the Armistice”.
[Edward Mandell House Papers. MS 466. Series 2. Diaries, 1858-1926. Box 297. Folder 4, p32.]
The Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, the University of Texas at Austin, also has a collection of House’s Papers. But the Index of Personal Names, Subjects, Places, and Document Types, suggests there is nothing relevant to the False Armistice of 7 November 1918.
Gordon Auchincloss
Gordon Auchincloss Papers. Call Number MS 580. Yale University Library, Newhaven, Connecticut.
In his 1918 Diary, Auchincloss mentioned the false armistice news and some of his father-in-law’s cables to the State Department about it. But not Roy Howard’s armistice cablegram, Fred Ferguson or anyone else from the UP office in Paris.
Two of his last entries for Thursday 7 November concern the armistice news. One is House’s reply to Secretary of State Lansing’s request to verify or reject Military Attaché Warburton’s morning cablegram announcing the German armistice: the “Armistice has not yet been signed . . . . We will notify you promptly.”
The second was his summing-up of the matter: “A rumor was started early in the morning that the armistice had been signed and most of official Paris and all unofficial Paris implicitly believed that this was a fact. The truth is that the German delegates did not cross the lines to meet Foch until after ten o’clock at night and were not even shown the terms of the armistice at that time.” [pp59-60]
During Friday 8 November morning, after reading Secretary of State Lansing’s “Number 16. November 7, 4 p.m. requesting an enquiry into the false armistice news from UP to New York City, he “investigated the question and . . . ascertained that the [rumor] was first started by the French”, that Naval Attaché Jackson was the source of Admiral Wilson’s news, that Wilson gave it to Roy Howard, and an aide accompanied Howard to the “cable censor’s office in order to permit Howard to send [it] through to the United States”. [pp61-62] During the afternoon, he used this text in an official reply to Lansing, carrying House’s name, and stating that the armistice news had been widely believed in Paris; that UP was not to blame for it – if anyone was to blame it was Naval Attaché Jackson “or the French official that started the rumor”; and that the American Embassy’s findings were broadly the same as House’s. [pp63-64]
[Gordon Auchincloss Papers. MS 580. Series 1. Diary, 1914-1920. Box 2, Folder 26. 1918 Oct 18-Nov 14.]
Associated Press Corporate Archives
Associated Press Corporate Archives, New York, NY. AP02A.03A, Subject Files, Box 27, Folder 6.
II. Biographical Information
For some background about Roy W. Howard, C. Fred Cook, Admiral Henry B. Wilson, and John Sellards, see Biographical Details on this website.
III. Other Sources. And Explanatory Comments.
1.For context, see the articles on this website about:
a)the Spa-Senlis messages; b)the American Army G-2 (SOS) false armistice findings; c) the False Armistice in France; d) the False Armistice in Britain; e) for the spread of the news in the United States, see Stanley Weintraub’s A Stillness Heard Round The World (1985).
2.For more about UP’s leased wire, see ADDENDUM in ‘Roy W. Howard in Brest, Part 2.
3.Accompanied by Peg and Fred Ferguson from the Paris office, Howard made it to Montparnasse station just in time for the 9:00 pm train and a twelve-hour journey to the westernmost region of France. He did not mention his wife or Ferguson again and clearly intimated that he travelled alone to Brest (“with the hastiest of farewells I … was off … to Brest”, p77.) Cablegrams from and to Howard while in Brest indicate that both his wife and Ferguson remained in Paris. (It would seem that Howard was planning to return to Paris in the very near future.) When Peg went back to the United States is not known here. But as Howard appears not to have returned to Paris for the Versailles Peace Conference, it may well be that she travelled alone to New York City sometime after 11 November 1918. (See ‘Roy Howard’s Search For Information About the False Armistice’ on this website.)
Emmet Crozier wrote that Peg travelled to Brest with her husband: American Reporters on the Western Front, 1914-1918. Chapter XXIII, ‘Too Soon the Good News’, pp259, 260. (New York. 1959.)
Patricia Beard has it that Fred Ferguson travelled with Howard to Brest, arriving there at 10:00 am on 7 November, but not that Peg was in Paris with her husband: Patricia Beard, Newsmaker Roy W. Howard. The Mastermind Behind the Scripps-Howard News Empire. Chapter 10, ‘The Worst Day: “The False Armistice,” November 7, 1918’, pp70, 71, 72. (Lyons Press. Connecticut. 2016.)
4.Before July 1918, President Wilson Square was called Place du Champ de Bataille (Battlefield Square). It is defined by four streets (rues): Émile Zola, Jean Macé, d’Aiguillon, and Château (Castle). On opposite sides of the square: Émile Zola and Castle Streets; and Jean Macé and d’Aiguillon Streets. In November 1918, US Navy Headquarters occupied the Crédit Lyonnais Bank premises, 35-37 Émile Zola Street. The La Dépêche buildings, with their dome and clock, were at 25 Jean Macé Street. The Post and Telegraph building (originally the Lamarque Hotel), at 32 Castle Street, was on the lower side of the square close to the corner where Castle Street met d’Aiguillon Street. The Brasserie de la Marine restaurant was at the corner of d’Aiguillon Street and Émile Zola Street.
The Continental Hotel, where Howard stayed in Brest, like the US Navy Headquarters, was on Émile Zola Street but farther along the street to the north-east, where it overlooked La Tour d’Auvergne Square.
For maps/drawings of President Wilson Square, and of the bandstand, go to: http://www.wiki-brest.net/index.php/Kiosque-à-musique-Brest
For postcards/images of:
* the La Dépêche buildings overlooking the bandstand in the square, go to ‘Diverses cartes postales sur Brest’ at brest – cartes postales anciennes – bretagneweb.com
* the US Navy Headquarters/Crédit Lyonnais Building, search for ‘NH 121623 Street Scene in France’
* La Brasserie de la Marine (prior to demolition after WW2 damage), go to ‘Archives municipales de Brest – Brest métropole’, click ‘recherche par mots clés’ (middle icon), type ‘brasserie de la marine’ in ‘les notices contenant’ and click ‘lancer’.
For postcards/images of the Continental Hotel and Place de la Tour d’Auvergne, go to 1 – Brest – Cartes postales anciennes diverses.
5.“P.Q.” denoted “all French companies operating trans-Atlantic cables”. They were the initials of Augustin Pouyer-Quertier, founder of the Compagnie Française du Télégraphe de Paris à New York. See: René Salvador, Underwater Cables in the Brest Harbor. A Short History of French Trans-Atlantic Telegraph Cables from the French Viewpoint; and ‘French Telegraph Cable of 1898’ in Engineering and Technology History Wiki. (Online) A P.Q. blank was a sheet or form specifically for messages that were to be sent by underwater Atlantic cables (cablegrams).
6.‘To file’ is a journalistic term meaning “to send a story to the office usually by wire or telephone”. The Wall Street Journal. ‘Glossary of Terms: Journalism’. Available online.
7.‘Collect privilege’: the right to file toll-collect (to send telegrams which are paid by the receiver rather than the sender).
8.See ‘False Armistice Cablegrams from France’, and ADDENDUM, in ‘Roy W. Howard in Brest. Part Two’ on this website.
9.The statement prompted by the telephone call is from the Evening Star (Washington D.C.), 8 November 1918, under ‘”War Over Story” Precedes Events’, front page. The excerpts for his refusal to retract Howard’s armistice news are from the New York Times, November 8, 1918, p.3. (Access by subscription.) And from the Greeneville Daily Sun, November 8, 1918, p.2. Available online through Library of Congress, Chronicling America, Historic American Newspapers portal.
10.For reactions in the American press, see Dale E. Zacher, The Scripps Newspapers Go To War, 1914-18, Chapter 7, under ‘Such an Almighty Fluke’, pp.206-208. (USA. 2008)
11.For instance, the Evening Public Ledger(Night Extra), Philadelphia, Friday, November 8, 1918, front page. The Evening World (Final Edition), New York, Friday, November 8, 1918, front page. The Washington Times, (Final Edition), Washington, Friday Evening, November 8, 1918, front page. Available online through Library of Congress, Chronicling America, Historic American Newspapers portal.
12.TheFourth Estate, November 9, 1918, p.7. Available online through the Hathi Trust Digital Library.
13.The New York Times, Saturday, November 9, 1918, under ‘United Press Admits Peace Report Is False’. Available through subscription. And the Ardmore (Oklahoma) Daily Ardmoreite, 22 November 1918, p3 under ‘United Press is Making Admiral Wilson the Goat’. Available online through Library of Congress, Chronicling America, Historic American Newspapers portal.
14.Howard Cable (four pages); and Hawkins’ 8 November press statement (two pages) in: I.Associated Press Archive
15.As in the (Kansas) Topeka Daily State Journal, Saturday Evening, 9 November 1918, p.7, under ‘EXPLAINS IN FULL’; the (Oregon) Daily Capital Journal, Saturday, November 9, 1918, p.7, under ‘PRESIDENT OF UNITED PRESS TELLS HOW THE NEWS WAS RECEIVED’; and the (Tennessee) Columbia Herald, Friday, November 15, 1918, p3, under ‘ROY W. HOWARD EXPLAINS REPORT OF ARMISTICE’. Available online through Library of Congress, Chronicling America, Historic American Newspapers portal.
16.For the Associated Press enquiries, see ‘Admiral Wilson and Roy Howard’s Armistice Cablegram’ under Associated Press Suspicions About Admiral Wilson. Its “greatest hoax of recent years” allegation is from the (UP subscriber) Lancaster News (South Carolina), Friday November 8, 1918, front page, under “PEACE REPORT WAS HOAX”. Available online through Library of Congress, Chronicling America, Historic American Newspapers portal.
17.Dale E. Zacher, The Scripps Newspapers Go To War, 1914-18. Chapter 7, under ‘The False Armistice’, p208. (USA. 2008)
18.Richard M. Harnett and Billy G. Ferguson, UNIPRESS. United Press International. Covering the 20th Century, Chapter 7, ‘World War Sells News’, p58. (USA. 2003)
19.Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Harry S. Truman, January 1 to December 31, 1951,‘The President’s News Conference at Key West, November 29, 1951’, p637. (US Government Printing Office, Washington, 1965.)
The False Armistice, 7 November 1918 