lad. When the first batch finished their work in 1907 and returned to their homes, Wylie began the practice of sending all former Rhodes Scholars cards and letters on their birthdays. This soon amounted to hundreds per year. He continued this practice long after he retired, until his death in 1952. He never lost touch with “his men.”
The fact that most Rhodes Scholars enjoyed their Oxford experience was demonstrated clearly when most of Europe became engulfed in war in the summer of 1914. With the exception of the German scholars, the Americans and all the others rallied to the cause of Britain and its allies.
Like the Americans, the German scholars had never distinguished themselves academically in Oxford. What made the Germans unique was their selection process. They were chosen directly by the Kaiser, and nearly all of them came from the nobility or the political elite. Their aristocratic background shone through when the first five arrived in Oxford in the fall of 1903. Francis Wylie described how he first met some of them:
I turned, to find myself facing three immaculate young Germans, complete with top hats, frock coats and patent-leather boots. They clicked their heels as one man, and bowed…And there was I, straight from golf on the old links…muddy and bedraggled…I carried them off and gave them tea; and that was the last I saw of the top hats.26
Due to the requirements of universal military service in their country, most of the Germans were permitted to remain in Oxford for only two years. This meant that few of them could take degrees. Despite this handicap, they appear to have got along well socially.27
When war was declared most of the Germans in Oxford returned home. Several of them, along with Germans from earlier years, served with distinction in their country's army. It was perhaps a small mark of the success of Cecil Rhodes' plan that friendships with German scholars enabled Americans and others to avoid some of the excesses of wartime propaganda. Germany may have become the enemy, but Rhodes Scholars knew that Germans were not cannibalistic Huns. After obtaining parliamentary authorization to amend the will, the trustees abolished the German scholarships in 1916 and in their place allotted more awards for students from the British Empire.28
By early 1915 the student population of Oxford had dwindled from about 3,500 to 600. Besides the Rhodes Scholars, about the only men left were those unfit for military service. With the naive, gung-ho spirit that filled many bright young men in 1914, the Americans in Oxford were enthusiastic about this war to end all wars. Virtually every American there devoted his vacations to working for the Red Cross, the YMCA and other groups that provided ambulances, cared for the wounded, and distributed food. Some obtained leaves of absence from Oxford so that they could remain in France or Belgium. A handful of current and past Rhodes Scholars, impatient with their government's neutrality, joined the British Army. One of these, William Fleet, was killed in action in May 1918 while serving in the Grenadier Guards. Dozens more volunteered for the U.S. Army after the United States entered the war. Twelve American Rhodes Scholars died in the war, while doing relief work or serving in uniform. Nearly three hundred either joined the armed forces or held war-related jobs in Washington. In addition to the dozen Americans, fifty-eight Rhodes Scholars from elsewhere also died in the fighting.29
If the Americans, on the whole, valued their Oxford experience, the reaction of Oxford was decidedly more mixed. At one extreme there was an article that appeared in the Oxford Magazine late in 1904. It admitted that the Rhodes Scholars had not brought the revolutionary changes that many had feared. The article also expressed the hope that the Americans' impression of Oxford was as favorable as Oxford's view of them.30
Others in Oxford, however, shared the opinions of Max Beerbohm. His farcical 1911 novel Zuleika Dobson is an Oxford classic. It concerns the lovely Zuleika, who comes to Oxford to live with her grandfather, the head of the fictional Judas College. She is a femme fatale in the most literal sense. She breaks the hearts of so many young men that finally every male student in Oxford drowns himself in the Isis. At the end of the story she sets off to conquer Cambridge too. One of the secondary characters is an American Rhodes Scholar, one Abimelech V. Oover. He is so obtuse and earnest that he grates on everyone's nerves. When the snuff is passed around after dinner he enthusiastically outperforms all Englishmen in its use. One of his “friends” among the British students avers that “Americans have a perfect right to exist. But he did often find himself wishing Mr. Rhodes had not enabled them to exercise that right in Oxford.”31
It would be most accurate, however, to state that a majority of dons and students showed little feeling about the newcomers one way or the other. To have showered attention on the Americans would have been a most un-Oxonian thing to do. For centuries the university had received visitors and students from among the most illustrious families in the world. The Rhodes Scholars were novelties, but, except for an occasional problem here or there, they were nothing to cause excitement.
Even if many in Oxford might wish to deny it, however, the Rhodes Scholars were already forcing the venerable institution to make adjustments. The university slowly realized that laboratories and faculty in the sciences and in law would have to be improved, because of the heavy demand in these areas by Americans. In addition, the desire by some Rhodes Scholars to obtain advanced degrees forced the university to give more structure and substance to its B.Litt. and B.Sc. programs. Additional changes would come in the years ahead.
NOTES
1. Frank Aydelotte, The Oxford Stamp (Freeport, NY, 1967; orig. ed. 1917), 22-40; Aydelotte, American Rhodes Scholarships, 73-74; Blanshard, Aydelotte, 130; Alumni Magazine, 3 (January 1910): 13-16; TAO, 2 (1915): 14; Ashby, “American Rhodes's Scholar,” 183-84.
2. Robert Hale, “Oxford Again – A Rhodes Scholar Goes Back,” The Outlook, 11 July 1923, 378; Aydelotte, American Rhodes Scholarships, 60; Alumni Magazine, 1 (December 1907): 15.
3. NYT, 2 October 1910, 12, and 16 October 1910, sec. 5, 9.
4. TAO, 1 (1914): 33, 21 (1934): 130.
5. TAO, 65 (1978): 112.
6. TAO, 1 (1914): 20-35.
7. TAO, 1 (1914): 25. Also see 81 (1994): 10.
8. TAO, 3 (1918): 107; 65 (1978): 113; Register of Rhodes Scholars, 4-12.
9. Aydelotte, American Rhodes Scholarships, 55.
10. Alumni Magazine, 1 (December 1907): 4.
11. TAO, 1 (1914): 11.
12. NYT, 12 March 1911, sec. 5, 5.
13. Parkin, Rhodes Scholarships, 228.
14. Aydelotte, American Rhodes Scholarships, 62; Parkin, Rhodes Scholarships, 159. One who did successfully combine reading and travel was John Crowe Ransom. See Young and Core, Selected Letters, 58.
15. NYT, 5 July 1907, 7; TAO, 57 (1970): 578.
16. Elton, First Fifty Years, 105-6.
17. Alumni Magazine, 1 (December 1907): 14-15.
18. Thomas Daniel Young, Gentleman in a Dustcoat: A Biography of John Crowe Ransom (Baton Rouge, 1976), 41.
19. TAO, 34 (1947): 214.
20.
