The Five Yanks

During the early years of World War II—before the United States entered the conflict—a group of five young Americans volunteered to fight for Britain against Nazi Germany. Nicknamed the "Five Yanks" by the British press, these men were Robert Cox, Charles G. "Chuck" Bolté, John F. "Jack" Brister, William "Bill" Durkee, and Heyward Cutting. All five were Ivy League students (three from Dartmouth College and two from Harvard University) who were dismayed by the U.S. government's reluctance to confront fascism in Europe. In May–June 1941, more than six months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, they took the extraordinary step of enlisting in the British Army, effectively becoming the first American ground troops to fight the Nazi army in World War II. They received officers' training in England and were commissioned as second lieutenants in the King's Royal Rifle Corps. This unusual arrangement was made possible by British officials (including Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden and KRRC Colonel Sir Hereward Wake) with the support of U.S. Ambassador John G. Winant, who saw propaganda value in Americans fighting "shoulder to shoulder" with British troops. After Alamein, the five were separated by circumstance. Lieutenant Bolté's right leg had to be amputated near the hip due to his wounds, removing him from active combat. Lieutenants Durkee and Cutting also required long recoveries in military hospitals in Egypt. Only Brister and Cox were fit enough to remain on the front lines by early 1943, just as the final phase of the North African campaign was underway. Both Cox and Brister fought through battles like the Mareth Line offensive in Tunisia. However, neither would live to see the Allied victory in North Africa. Lt. Robert Cox was killed by a sniper on April 19, 1943, during operations near Djebel Zaghouan in Tunisia. Just eight days later, on April 27, 1943, Lt. Jack Brister was struck by a stray artillery shell and killed near Medjez-el-Bab. Brister"s death came only about two hours before official papers arrived approving his transfer to the U.S. Army, a move he had requested so he could rejoin his countrymen once American forces were in the field. Both Brister and Cox were buried in Commonwealth war cemeteries in Tunisia, and their sacrifice as Americans in British service was noted with honor by comrades and the press. == Members ==

Robert H. Cox (1919–1943) Robert Hill Cox was a recent Harvard graduate from New Jersey when he volunteered for the British Army in 1941. Born into a prominent American family (he was a descendant of founding father Roger Sherman and U.S. Secretary of State William M. Evarts), Cox grew up with a strong sense of patriotic duty. In college he supported U.S. intervention against Hitler, and his draft lottery number was near the top of the list in 1941. Unwilling to "sit mediocre" while war raged, Cox decided to act: "I love America, and I could not sit [by] while America was being attacked...America is a faith and...must be dynamic or perish," he wrote in a letter to his mother to be opened in the event of his death. In May 1941, during a visit to Dartmouth College, Cox helped persuade several friends to join him in volunteering for the British forces. After training in England, Lt. Cox was deployed to North Africa in mid-1942, where he commanded an infantry platoon in the 7th Armoured Division during the Second Battle of El Alamein. There he was shot in the back and wounded, one of several injuries that temporarily took him out of action. He recovered and rejoined his unit for the Tunisia campaign in early 1943. His brother Archibald Cox later served as Solicitor General of the United States. This impassioned plea, printed on the front page of the Dartmouth student newspaper, was reprinted in papers across the country and even read into the Congressional Record by U.S. Senator William H. Smathers. Bolté's outspoken interventionism reflected his conviction that America could not stand aside. A shell blast mangled his right leg; after an agonizing month of treatment, doctors amputated the leg near the hip to save his life. Bolté was invalided back to the United States in June 1943, walking with an artificial leg. As the AVC's national chairman and spokesman in the late 1940s, he campaigned for veterans' benefits, civil rights, and world peace, arguing that the ideals for which the war was fought should shape the post-war world. Bolté also worked in publishing (including as an editor at Viking Press) and later at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He authored several books; his first, The New Veteran (1945), was dedicated to "John Frederick Brister and Robert Hill Cox – brave men who died fighting and were their own memorial." Bolté lived a long life despite his wartime injuries. He remained a writer and public intellectual into the 1950s and 1960s, and even named one of his sons John Cox Bolté to honor his fallen comrades. Charles G. Bolté died in 1994. Brister's graduation editorial in June 1941 captured his moral resolve: after initially penning a satire on war, he concluded that although he "conscientiously object[ed] to war" on principle, "America must fight Hitler... We're ready. Ready to fight. Ready to destroy. Ready, if necessary, to be destroyed." After Alamein, Brister continued to fight through the North African campaign. By early 1943, he was the last uninjured American officer in his KRRC battalion – the others had all been killed or sent to hospitals by then. Feeling it was time to serve directly under the U.S. flag, Brister applied for a transfer to the United States Army once American ground forces began arriving in North Africa. His British commanders, who valued him, had assured the five volunteers that such a transfer would be allowed when the time came. On April 14, 1943, Brister wrote to his commandant, "For twenty-three years I have been pledging allegiance to the United States of America. The time has come to turn those words of allegiance into action." Permission was granted, but on April 27, 1943, who shared his classmates' resolve to stop Nazi Germany's aggression. Less inclined to literary pursuits than Brister or Bolté, Durkee excelled in economics and politics and had a clear-eyed grasp of the geopolitical stakes – he believed that a Nazi victory would be catastrophic for civilization. When his friends decided to volunteer for the British Army, Durkee quickly agreed, driven by the conviction that Hitler had to be confronted as soon as possible. Commissioned into the KRRC, Lt. Durkee led a motor platoon side by side with Brister's unit at El Alamein in October 1942. He married and settled in Massachusetts, raising a family. In his professional life, Cutting worked as a vice-president of an engineering firm (Geometrics, Inc.) and was involved in community affairs in Concord, MA. Heyward Cutting died on March 18, 2012, at the age of 90. At the time of his death, he was the last surviving member of the Five Yanks. == Significance and legacy ==

The story of the "Five Yanks" holds a unique place in World War II history, illustrating the courage of private American citizens who took action against tyranny even before their nation was officially at war. Their decision to volunteer for the British Army in 1941 had both symbolic and practical impacts. Symbolically, they represented the conscience of a segment of American youth who felt a moral imperative to stop fascism—a fact that Allied propaganda eagerly highlighted. British media covered the five Ivy League volunteers extensively, portraying them as proof of American commitment to the Allied cause and predicting that the United States would eventually join the fight. Their presence served to strengthen transatlantic camaraderie at a critical time. The group's letters and diaries – preserved by families and later compiled by Rachel Cox, niece of Robert Cox – offer richly detailed first-hand perspectives on both the battlefield (especially North Africa) and the personal moral choices involved in going to war. These primary sources have provided material for scholars and writers interested in the American role in the early war. == In popular culture ==

The story of the Five Yanks has been documented in modern literature and media. Journalist Rachel S. Cox, a niece of Robert H. Cox, authored the non-fiction book Into Dust and Fire: Five Young Americans Who Went First to Fight the Nazi Army (published 2012), which chronicles the full story of these men. == References ==