Background
Anthony Clement "Nuts" McAuliffe was born on July 2, 1898 in Washington, D. C. , and was the son of John Joseph McAuliffe, a government employee, and Alice Katharine Gannon.
Anthony Clement "Nuts" McAuliffe was born on July 2, 1898 in Washington, D. C. , and was the son of John Joseph McAuliffe, a government employee, and Alice Katharine Gannon.
After attending public schools in Washington, McAuliffe went to West Virginia University in 1916 and was appointed to the United States Military Academy at West Point, entering in June 1917. He graduated twice: first on November 1, 1918, after completing the War Emergency Course; having been recalled to West Point as an officer cadet after the end of World War I, he graduated again on June 11, 1919. He was 29th out of 284 in the class of 1919.
After graduating from the Field Artillery School, Camp Zachary Taylor, Ky. , McAuliffe served in the field artillery at Fort Lewis, Wash. , from 1920 to 1921. He was stationed at the Presidio in San Francisco (1921 - 1922) and at the Presidio in Monterey, Calif. (1922 - 1923). McAuliffe became first lieutenant in 1923 and was stationed at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. In 1926 he went to Fort Riley, Kans. , and in 1927, Fort Hoyle, Md. He served in Hawaii from 1932 to 1936 as a general's aide and was promoted to captain in 1935. McAuliffe said, "I always had the idea that it was a mistake to specialize. My ambition was to command troops in battle. " Long after attending the Command and General Staff School, Fort Leavenworth, Kans. , in the 1936-1937 academic year, McAuliffe called it "one of the most valuable years that I ever put in" and spoke appreciatively of "the principles that were so thoroughly beaten into me. " From 1937 to 1939 he was an instructor in the Artillery School, Fort Sill, Okla. At the Army War College in Carlisle Barracks, Pa. , McAuliffe did a study of race relations, advocating integration in 1940. Promoted to major, he served on the general staff, becoming lieutenant colonel in 1941 and colonel in 1942. Amid World War II, the 1016t Airborne Division was formed in the summer of 1942, with Brigadier General McAuliffe as artillery commander.
He parachuted into Normandy in June 1944 and also took part in Operation Market-Garden, the airborne assault on the Netherlands in September 1944. In December he was in temporary command of the division when the German counteroffensive struck the Ardennes, thus beginning the Battle of the Bulge. The 1016t rushed by truck to the road center of Bastogne, Belgium. Non-airborne units also played a crucial role: the 705th Tank Destroyer Battalion; Combat Command B of the Tenth Armored Division and Combat Command R, Ninth Armored Division, together had about forty tanks; the 969th and 755th Field Artillery Battalions, manned by black troops, had 155-mm howitzers. Bastogne was surrounded by the Wehrmacht's XLVII Panzer Corps on December 20, 1944. Two days later, a demand for surrender arrived. The day after the ultimatum, December 23, 1944, the skies cleared from England to the Ardennes: cargo planes dropped supplies for the 101st, and fighter-bombers attacked the German ring around Bastogne. The siege of Bastogne was broken on December 26, 1944, when a relief column led by Lieutenant Colonel Creighton Abrams of the Fourth Armored Division, of George S. Patton's Third Army, fought through the German defenses.
In January 1945 McAuliffe became commander of the 103d Infantry Division, which broke the Siegfried Line and captured Innsbruck and the Brenner Pass. After the war McAuliffe briefly commanded the Seventy-ninth Infantry Division. In 1945 and 1946 he commanded the airborne center at Camp Mackall, N. C. , and later Fort Bragg, N. C. He was army ground forces adviser for Operation Crossroads, the atomic bomb tests, at Bikini in July 1946. He served as army secretary of the Joint Research and Development Board from August 1946 to December 1947 and as deputy director for research and development, logistics division, army general staff, in the following two years. McAuliffe went to Japan in March 1949 as commander of the Twenty-fourth Infantry Division. He became chief of the chemical corps and permanent major general in October 1949. In 1951 McAuliffe became assistant chief of staff for personnel and lieutenant general. He integrated combat units in Korea, knowing they would not be resegregated when they returned to the United States. In 1953 McAuliffe became deputy chief of staff for operations and later that year commander of the Seventh Army in Germany.
In 1956 McAuliffe retired from the army to become a senior executive at the chemical firm American Cyanamid Company in New York City, from which he retired in 1963. He was chairman of the New York State Civil Defense Commission from 1959 to 1963, after which he moved to Chevy Chase, Md. McAuliffe grew tired of the continued interest in his "Nuts!" remark, which the New York Times called "so typically American that it baffled the Germans and French. " He was, however, proud of his work in integrating the army, work that was to have an influence on American civilian life. McAuliffe died in Washington, D. C. , and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
McAuliffe is known as the World War II United States Army General. He commanded the division of the 101st Airborne that defended the town of Bastogne during World War II. He received a fourth star in 1955 and became commander in chief of the United States Army in Europe. The central square of Bastogne, Belgium, is named Place Général McAuliffe. A Sherman tank, pierced by a German 88 mm shell, stands in one corner. A southern extension of Route 33 in eastern Northampton County, Pennsylvania, completed in 2002, was named the Gen. Anthony Clement McAuliffe 101st Airborne Memorial Highway. The new headquarters building for the 101st Airborne Division, which opened in 2009 at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, is named McAuliffe Hall. A room at the Thayer Hotel at West Point has been dedicated to General McAuliffe.
McAuliffe believed that until world peace was established the United States should stockpile atomic weapons.
In a speech to the American Chemical Society on April 17, 1950, McAuliffe discussed the potential of chemical and biological weapons and the need for preparedness.
McAuliffe had demonstrated superb battlefield leadership, keeping his troops informed and maintaining morale while making the best use of what he had. His casual defiance contributed to the mystique of the 101st Airborne, and he said his "Screaming Eagles had no superiors on the battlefield. "
After Operation Desert Storm of 1991, some journalists praised the army as the most integrated meritocracy in the country, noting that officer clubs were more integrated than faculty clubs.
McAuliffe married Helen Willet Whitman on August 23, 1920; they had two children.
