Background
Glassford was born on August 8, 1883, in Las Vegas, New Mexico, the son of William Alexander Glassford, an army officer, and of Allie Davis.
Glassford was born on August 8, 1883, in Las Vegas, New Mexico, the son of William Alexander Glassford, an army officer, and of Allie Davis.
Raised mainly in Denver, Colorado, Glassford was graduated from West Point in 1904, ranking eighteenth in a class of 124.
A field artillery officer who served three years as an instructor at West Point, Glassford was a captain by the time the United States entered World War I. Sent to France in one of the first contingents of the American Expeditionary Force (AEF), he was on the staff of several artillery schools until July 1918, when he assumed command of the 103rd Field Artillery. On October 1, 1918, he became commanding general of the 516t Field Artillery Brigade, the youngest general officer in the entire AEF. A participant in the Marne defensive and the St. -Mihiel salient, he was slightly wounded by enemy shellfire. The war over, Glassford reverted to his permanent rank of major and received a series of staff appointments: he served at the General Service Schools, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas; attended and taught at the Army War College, Washington, D. C. ; and commanded the 16t Field Artillery for a little over a year. He returned to Washington in October 1928. From then until his voluntary retirement in July 1931, Glassford held staff positions culminating in a tour as chief of Mobilization Branch, G-3, War Department General Staff. In November 1931, Glassford was appointed police chief of Washington, D. C. Although the appointment of an outsider was resented by senior police officials and liberals were troubled by his military background, Glassford quickly captured the imagination of press and public by appearing almost everywhere on an oversized blue motorcycle. However, he soon faced serious problems. In December 1931, as the Great Depression deepened, a Communist party-organized hunger march, several thousand strong, came to the capital for the opening of Congress. Although similar demonstrations elsewhere were treated brutally by police, Glassford insisted publicly, to the delight of liberals, that since the Communist party was legal and on the ballot, its lawful activities should not be interfered with. At the end of May 1932, thousands of veterans of World War I began to descend on Washington as a "petition in boots" to pressure Congress to approve advance payment of a "bonus" that had been voted in 1924 but was not payable until 1945. These "bonus marchers" insisted that they would stay in the nation's capital until the bonus was paid, and began what became a two-month sit-in. The only official in the District of Columbia who was willing and able to deal with them was Glassford. He tried to discourage them, yet insisted that they had a right to stay. He urged them to go home, but organized public donations for their succor. He hoped, eventually, that all but a few diehards would leave. Although Glassford's Fabian tactics seemed to be working - by the last week of July, the number of bonus marchers had shrunk to less than half of June's 20, 000 peak - the administration of Herbert Hoover was determined to force the veterans out of the nation's capital and off the front pages, where they were a distinct embarrassment in an election year. Glassford reluctantly complied with orders to evict the veterans from selected national property in the Federal Triangle area of downtown Washington. Despite his desire to avoid bloodshed and his personal supervision, violence erupted and a policeman shot and killed two veterans. The federal administration, against Glassford's advice, then called on the army. Under the personal direction of Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur, infantry, cavalry, and tanks dispersed the marchers and their families, and expelled them without serious casualties. Almost three months later, on October 20, the district commissioners asked for and received Glassford's resignation. He then attacked Hoover in a preelection series of articles in the Hearst newspapers and in political addresses. Glassford was an unsuccessful federal conciliator in an agricultural labor dispute in the Imperial Valley of California in 1934; and in 1936 he served briefly as police chief of Phoenix, Arizona, where he demoted his predecessor to patrolman and advocated legalized prostitution. That same year he ran unsuccessfully for Congress from Arizona as an "anti-New Deal Democrat. " In February 1942 he was recalled to active duty and served as director of the internal security division, office of the provost marshal general, until December 25, 1943, when he retired. Glassford spent the rest of his life in Laguna Beach, California, where he painted, became the unsalaried president of the Chamber of Commerce, and participated in the United World Federalist movement. In 1948 he organized a MacArthur for President club. Glassford died there on August 9, 1959.
In 1908, Glassford married Cora Carleton (1887-1958), the daughter of US Army General Guy Carleton (1857-1946). They were the parents of four children. The Glassfords divorced in 1932. In 1934, Pelham Glassford married Lucille Painter (1906-1957).
He was a United States Naval officer with the rank of Vice Admiral, who is most noted for his service during World War II.
