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Description: General Whipple Page 8
Date: January 2 1908Newspaper published in: Washington, D. C., USA
Washington Times January 2, 1908 General Whipple Page 8
Succeeds Brigadier General Sniffen, Who Goes on Retired List.
Vol. Charles H. WHIPPLE, of the pay department, United States Army, today assumed the duties of paymaster general of the army, with rank of brigadier general. He succeeds Brig. Gen. C. C. SNIFFEN, who is placed upon the retired list.
General WHIPPLE is the son of Bishop WHIPPLE, of the Episcopal diocese of Minnesota, who was known generally as “the apostle of the Indians,” and to the Indians themselves as “Old Straight Tongue.”
General WHIPPLE was born in New York in 1849 and entered the army as a major and paymaster in 1881. Many important duties have devolved upon him since that time, including service as chief paymaster of the Philippines, Porto Rico, and Cuba. He will serve as paymaster of the army until 1913, when he will be placed upon the retired list on account of age.
He had a long ond [sp.] arduous service on the frontier in a district where long, tedious overland trips had to be made, being often exposed to the intense cold and the death-dealing blizzards. For many years while stationed at Fort Keogh he paid the troops at Fort Buford, seventy-six miles from the railroad, and at Poplar river, seventy miles to the Northwest. On several of these trips his party was caught in blizzard of the utmost severity, and only by the greatest perseverance and good judgment did they escape death.
“While on one of his trips in May, 1884, from Glendive, the point of departure from the railroad for Fort Buford, and when about midway, his party, consisting of himself, his clerk, Sergeant COONROD, Seventh Cavalry, and the driver of the ambulance, followed by three enlisted men in an escort wagon, was attacked by seven road agents concealed in the brush on the side of a steep canton, which the road ascended. General WHIPPLE had with him $30,000 for the payment of troops. Thinking that the funds were in the escort wagon, the robbers allowed the ambulance to pass, and opened with a volley on the escort wagon a few yards in the rear. Immediately the occupants of the ambulance opened fire on the robbers, while they were making a rush for the escort wagon, thereby drawing the fire of the robbers upon them, resulting in mortally wounding Sergeant COONROD, wounding the driver, and knocking him off his seat, riddling the ambulance with shot, and wounding one of the mules. Fortunately, the funds were under the seat of the ambulance. Alone with the dying sergeant, his clerk having jumped from the ambulance, WHIPPLE gathered up the reins and urging the team to its greatest speed managed to escape and reach Scott’s ranch, seven miles away, thus saving the Government funds. he robbers, having left their horses concealed in the timber some distance from the scene of the attack, were unable to overtake the ambulance, and after having searched the escort wagon and relieved the escort of their teams.