JEWS AS SOLDIERS.
LORD ROBERTS attended on Sunday last the special military service held at the Central Synagogue in Great Portland Street for Jewish members of the Regular and Auxiliary Forces. The gathering took place, not inappro- ?riately, in connection with the yearly religious ceremony commemorating the warlike exploits of the Maccabees and the struggle which terminated in the overthrow of the Syrian dominance in Palestine by the Asmoneans and their followers. It is the first time in the annals of this country that the acting Commander-in-Chief of the British Army has been present in his official capacity at a military function of this kind limited exclusively to soldiers and Volunteers who are members of the Judaic community. Onthe Continent, where the number of Jews serving with the colours or passed into the Reserves runs into thousands, such parades honoured by the attend- ance of the higher officers have been far from uncommon. On more than one occasion—as with the German forces in- vesting Paris, and the Russians around Plevna—the Sons of the Synagogue have met to observe their solemn anniversaries amid the tumult and stress of actual warfare. Here, in England, the soldier element has not, until within the past few years, been strong enough to admit of such a parade as bat of Sunday. The last two decades have, however, seen a change in the temperament of the younger generation of Jews in the United Kingdom. The rise of a wider, broader imperNliem which has marked this period, and the spread of a martial spirit among the people which has accompanied it, have quickened the dormant fighting instincts of the race. The result is seen in the larger number of Jews now found in the Army and Reserve Forces. In the operations recently terminated in South Africa it is estimated that over twelve hundred officers and men belonging to the Hebrew community took active part. This would be a very goodly proportion having regard to their total in the three kingdoms. The deaths among the Jewish soldiers have been, it is said, in excess of their due quota. In any event, the bulk of the native-born Jews here have come well to the fore in the recent struggle, and it is understood that the presence of Lord Roberts at Sunday's Synagogue parade is intended to mark in some measure the Commander-in-Chief's satisfaction with the conduct of the Jewish troops during the South African War.
The Jew ought to make a good soldier. After all, he comes of a fighting stock, and the fighting instinct must be latent in him. King Solomon, according to Biblical accounts, made husbandmen and mechanics of the Syrian tribesmen, but his
own people he expressly reserved for warfare. The struggle for independence under the Maccabees showed the Jew to be bold in attack, even at heavy odds, and the contest against Rome that preceded the taking of Bither was prolonged beyond anything in the early annals of military operations. The anomalous position of the Jew during the Middle Ages, the absence of all incentive or motive for any form of active patriotic life, was fatal to those sympathies and aspirations in which military ardour has its spring and origin. The mass of the Jewish people were cowed into a timidity fatal to all true manliness, and altogether incompatible with any- thing like a soldierly spirit. But the instinct was only repressed, for where the Jew was permitted to take part in the stirring events of the time, he played a bold and courageous part. In the turbulent movements characterising Italy from the twelfth to the sixteenth century more than one Jew came into prominence as a valiant and skilful soldier. In our East Indian possessions Jews have from time to time shown conspicuous gallantry as combatants and rendered important services in the field. It is not generally known, but the Indian native army regiments have always had a proportion- ately larger number of recruits from the Jews than from any other of the tribal units of Hindostan which contribute to the Indian Army. These Jews belong to the so-called "Beni Yisrael" of Bombay, natives who have been settled there from time immemorial. They are, singularly enough, the only people in the country whose occupation is put down in the official returns as " soldiering." At the taking of Seringapatam in 1799 the boldest of the stormers was the Jew, Samuel Ezekiel Kharceldar, of the 12th Native Infantry, who re- ceived a special bronze medal for his distinguished gallantry.
For his gallantry at Kirki and Poona, and for bravery in the field for twenty-seven years from 1799 to 1826, the Jewish Subadar-Major, Ellojee Davorjee Israel, of the 7th Native Infantry, received a special silver medal and clasp.
In 1830 the Honourable East India Company conferred on the Jew, Subadar Dameljee Israel, of the 16th Native Infantry Regiment, a special gold medal in recognition of his services and gallantry. A like acknowledgment was awarded to the Subadar Ezekiel Bapurjee, of the 12th Native Infantry, in 1862. And as recently as 1882 the Jew, Subadar-Major Moses Bapurjee Malakar, also of the 12th Native Infantry, received the Gold Star of the First Class of the Order of British India for his bravery and distinguished services. These Indian Jews, the Beni Yisrael, are essentially fighting men, and their education and intelligence specially qualify them for the position of native officers to which they almost invariably
attain. Unfortunately, the numbers of this branch of the Hebrew tribes are small, otherwise a good deal more would be
heard of them, for they show as much ability and skill in the economic management of their small properties and in business as they do in military matters. There is, it may be pointed out, a good deal of Jewish fighting material running to seed among certain of the less known Hebraic clans in the remoter districts of North-Western Africa. Few, probably, are cognisant of the fact that a large number of the so-styled " Riff Pirates," the last and worst, perhaps, of the old Corsair-men of the Barbary coast, are really Jews, in whom the old fighting lust of the Hebrews has taken this unusual mode of manifesting itself. That the Jew is not deficient in mere animal courage and pluck the prize ring here sufficiently showed in the last century, when "The Star of the East," Barney Aarons, with his coreligionists, Dutch Sam and David Belasco and Daniel Mendoza, stood in the very front rank of noted pugilists. Disciplined and properly trained, these men had the qualifications that go to the making of a first-rate soldier. And there is plenty of the spirit of these Jewish boxers among the Hebraic brotherhood in these days.
In other lands Jews have, in modern times, shown them- selves skilful and proven adepts in the art of war. During the War of Independence in the United States Washington's right-hand man and counsellor was a Jew, Colonel Isaac Franks, who acted as private secretary and aide-de-camp to the American Commander-in-Chief. He was still alive in 1822. More curious still is it to note that one of the first Commodores of the newly constituted American Navy after the finish of the struggle with Great Britain was a Jew, Mordecai Manuel Noah. He was probably the only com- mander of a war vessel the Jewish race ever produced, and
the instance is interesting as indicating, perhaps, a survival of the old instinct of the sons of Dan who preferred the sea to their habitation on land, and elected to dwell in their ships with the neighbouring Phoenicians. The French Army has always had a goodly percentage of officers of Jewish blood in its ranks : at the present day there are among them at least three of the rank of Brigadier-General, and one General of Division. In Italy the present Minister of War, General Ottolenghi, is a Hebrew, and an orthodox one to boot; and he was raised to his present position after holding command of the most important army corps in the kingdom. In Germany—with the exception of Bavaria—no Jew can ever become an officer. The same is true of Russia. In this country no followers of the Synagogue have ever at- tained high rank in the Army. The Major-General Goldsmid who had two horses shot under him at Waterloo was born a Jew.—he was a son of the financier, Abraham Goldsmid, who helped to found the Jews' Hospital now at Lower Norwood— but he had abandoned the faith of his ancestors early in life. At the present time there are not, probably, more than three Jewish officers of field rank on the lists of the British Army, —Colonel Montefiore, a nephew of the late Sir Moses Monte- fibre, who served in the Artillery; Colonel Leverson ; and Colonel Goldsmid, a collateral descendant of the Goldsmid referred to before. On the whole, the number of officers is small considering the large number of young men in the Hebraic community who have ample means, plenty of brain, and no serious calling or occupation to which to devote themselves.
If military service is not popular among the great bulk of the poorer class of Jews in Russia and Eastern Europe, it is easily accounted for without going into any question of racial inclination or predisposition. The IColonist system, as it was termed, formerly in vogue, is sufficient to explain the Russian Jew's hatred of the Army and all connected with it. Under this abominable system, Jewish children destined for the Army were taken, often from the mother's arms, when three or even two years old, placed in special barracks, and brought up there as Kolonists for the Army. There they served twenty-six years. It can hardly be deemed matter of surprise that human nature rebelled at such treatment, and that the Jew looked upon military service as something akin to a life-long punishment. Even now the lot of the Hebrew in the Russian Army is exceptionally hard. His life is made bitter to him by every species of insult, often by ill-treatment of the grossest kind. And when he shows anything like bravery or courage, how is it rewarded ? Here is an instance from the War Gazette which transpired within the past six weeks. A Jewish drummer of the Fanagoraki Grenadier Regiment named Teitelbaum was going home during the time of the recent riots in and about Moscow. He saw a policeman suddenly attacked by a mob, and severely hurt. Without staying a moment to consider, be rushed into the fray to rescue the constable, and was at once set upon by a score of the peasants, receiving a severe wound in the head. In spite of this, he drew his weapon, and beat about right and left, until he drove the mob of rowdies off and rescued the policeman from certain death. So pleased was the Colonel of the regiment with the man's bravery that he specially reported it to the Czar. The Czar endorsed the report " a stout and brave man," and ordered him to receive as a reward—five roubles ! Five roubles would be about lls. 6d., and this magnificent sum was duly handed to the Jewish soldier by the commander of the regiment. There are fifty thousand Jews in the Russian Army, that is, two full army corps of twenty-five thousand each. Teitel- baum's reward for bravery isnot exactly calculated to stimulate others to the like course in similar emergencies.
In Galicia the ancient prejudice against military service is rapidly disappearing even among the more orthodox followers of the Synagogue. Formerly the Service was so dreaded that when a boy was born he was compelled to wear a pair of narrow stays, which were laced in tighter and tighter as the child grew older so as gradually to narrow his chest, and thus bring the measurement and girth below what were required for the Army recruits. The abominable practice brought with it its own punishment in the shape of chest diseases and con- sumption, which are still the scourges of the Austro-Polish Jewries. The reduction of the term of training with the colours and the spread of schools have done much to reconcile Jewish parents to the conditions of service in the Dual Empire. The effect, too, of military training upon the younger genera- tion has been beneficial to an incredible extent. Galicia furnishes the larger proportion of infantry required for the Austro-Hungarian Army, while the Jews form nearly one-half of the Galician contingent. And a smarter, neater-looking set of men than the Jewish foot-soldiers, in their shapely dark uniform, as they may be seen by hundreds any day in the street; of Lemberg or Cracow, it would be hard to find. They have lost in Jewishness—if the phrase be allowable—but gained it. manliness. And they, as well as the State, are the better for this. The same may be said of the martial spirit which, from the nation at large here, has spread in recent years to the members of the Synagogue in this country, and is leading them in increasing numbers to take their stand in Vat defensive ranks of the Empire. It cannot but broaden their mental ideals, stimulate their patriotism, raise their standard of manliness and manly duty, and bring them in closer touch with the general population of which they form an increasingly important element.
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