Yankton College - Okihe Yearbook (Yankton, SD)

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, wffwm' 5 ,i , ,.,f.-Jw-f:fx.1i'ces21. in ' wrrpxai-,2, -+1 'r zw f9 ' 1' 3 ' 0:9 ? ' 4'59'7 . ' 56i'i si5?5' f-14 434' 'air 'E+ 'i7fQ'1'12,4s:.15'r' iff ' -x' f f W,--'f ,' 1 wif 'Q ' - f '?. 4f'.af.i--fi,scat-1:'.,-':--tm F. t : 14f H ffdifz , .1 :ff 'A ,351 fn' Y? 4 W s- Wy ,x -v t' 2 ,Q:5gg5?1'-gmagftwfa6E'if.tmgQ:fzik',a yy .aw qxa.. ' fa . '--:ri is-V M - 'I fm ' M ' 1 'JSF'-.sc.a'fe?+f40wr2,.--.cr-2152:-'MW' 1-W4 -1:11 1:1.fr-' Mar .cf mm f W ' -'W' KWH .-,Sim - '44?gEx, 'Zin 1 'ici' -:?A4'P ' 1 Hobart Tlfamilton warren, '15 Born, Portland, Michigan june 13, 1893 Died, Bordeaux, France, November, 25, 1916 For France and the Liberty of the World OBERT Warren, son of President l-1. K. Warren, after completing his junior year at Yankton College, sailed for England in October, l9l4, to , enter upon his coursehat Oxford University as Rhodes Scholar from South Dakota. 1-le was the third Yankton student, out of a total of five thus far from institutions in this state, to Win the Rhodes Scholarship. Two months beforehe crossed the ocean, the shock of the war had struck. His whole experience at Oxford was enveloped in a new wonderful atmosphere of moral excitement and idealism. Souls of Oxford men flamed into that passion of heroism that swept them by hun- dreds across the channel to die on the battle lields of France. lt was not yet Americas fight. At the close of the fall term, Robert, together with other Rhodes men, Went over into Belgium to take up work for the winter vacation under the Belgian Relief Commission. There he met with extraordinary success. 1-Ie was at one time arrested as a spy and came within an inch of losing his life. I-le became the obj ect of gratitude and praise such as were exceedingly embarrassing to his modest nature g for in all things he did merely what seemed to him his duty, without ever feeling like a hero. ' ,After spending the vacation of 1915 at home in America and resuming his work at Oxford in the fall, he again went over to the continent for the winter vacation, 1

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Page 17 text:

f - - . ,sp -:Wei-4-giff.. -q-,.i,-,-,,- :-1---y.1.',.,, , v Q, ,N - 3?-,r.gf v14.rr.',m2.:-'Q' 4:'m,Qff1?f': ' :ml 1 7 'ffffifuisii f 'X Wei, 11134 5234 , . ,f ,gf .fs t, iw ,p,.-:,,,,,.g,g , .f, ft., ,.,..., W., ,Aff ,, ' 1591? gas., Y? AEI! 5 ,hr -92.4.'o-Aka :5-:-xiifzir V,-1-1' V , -PQ -. -f' 1' ,izflefk-,T Wx 4--7 ,-f .' riiwv i-wa .wi 51 w0.ffws, - i -f-bf. .. Y A wi-fi--.1 ,. mt yi, . .Wi 5 , , 3 but this time in the service of the American Ambulance in France. The following july, at the close of his second year at Oxford, he went back to the Ambulance Service. l-lis work as an ambulance driver was Uconstantly loading and reloading terribly wounded and mutilated men. I-le became wonderfully expert in handling the mangled bodies of suffering men. Some can never learn to do such work well. Robert was to the manner born. I-le asked for the longest and hardest drives, I-le accepted none of the rest days allotted to him by the regulations. l-le was on the go through storm and night, eager to do his part and leave no man to suffer, if he could help it. ln this work Robert had no feeling that he was doing anything- great or excep- tional. l-le was doing only the natural and fitting thing, he thought, and doing it none too well. I-le was most impressed with the courage and sufferings of those whom he was serving, and with the heroism of those at the front, whether living or dead. Nor was he conscious that he was giving his life for the cause, overwork and exposure were exhausting him. l-le was driving his own motor too hard. It was on fire from its own over-strain, and before he was aware of it his life was spent, given to relieve the sufferings of others. Y Robert had received the year before from the Belgian Relief Commission a beautiful gold medal, and from Brand Whitlock, the American minister, a personal letter of appreciation. These he had never mentioned to anyoneg they were found in his trunk after he died. Shortly before his death the Republic of France con- ferred upon Robert Warren the gold medal of devotion, carrying with it 'ithe highest military honor bestowed on anyone not in the actual carnage of war. lt is a recognition of extraordinary devotion to duty, and of the highest degree of self- giving. I-le alone of the ambulance men had received it. Since then, at home, the alumni and former students of the College have contributed a fund for procuring a memorial portrait by a great American sculptor to be placed in the Library in honor of this first one of the sons of Yankton College to give his life in the great cause. Citizens of South Dakota, in a movement started by the D. A. R. of Yank- ton, have given to the American ambulance a standard ambulance automobile, completely equipped, in honor of Robert Warren and inscribed with his name. l-le was not only the first of the college but the first of the state to lay down his life. All the Yankton people and all students of his time will remember the events of Roberts sickness and death, the anxious days of waiting for news, the helplessness and the pity felt in every heart for the grief-stricken family. No one can forget the pathos of the mothers lonely voyage across the Atlantic in the hope of reaching his bedside before the end came, the arrival too late, and the return voyage with the body, President Warren meeting them at the dock in New York., Then fol- lowed the sad home-coming, on Christmas Day, and two days later the funeral at the church, Robert's body though not exposed to view, clothed in the uniform of a private soldier of France, the regular garb of ambulance men, and encased in a curious, foreign-looking, oaken coffin, and above it the crossed fiags of the United States and France. Robert did not live long. Neither did his Master. But he lived long enough to do something and to become something that will make his memory forever sweet and his influence everlasting. 'This is the compensation for a loss so heavy and a grief so poignant. Blessed are they that mourn, if in the mourning there are blended such strains of sacred memories - ' - C. l-i. DURAND