When Joe Jenkins, backup catcher for the Chicago White Sox, enlisted in the army shortly after the 1917 World Series, it didn’t cause much concern for the team’s prospects. The Chicago Daily News said:
“With Ray Schalk behind the plate, the Sox could give away a dozen Jenkinses and not miss them.”
Joe Jenkins
Malcolm MacLean of The Chicago Evening Post said regardless of Jenkins’ value to the White Sox, the catcher was committed to the war effort. He recounted a conversation with the usually “happy-go-lucky” Jenkins during Chicago’s spring trip to Marlin Springs, Texas before the 1917 season:
“(I) spied Jenkins sitting alone in the smoking compartment of the special car. There was no smile on his face. He invited us to have a seat.
“’”I’m thinking about this war,’ he said. ‘It’s up to us young, unmarried fellows to get busy, and I’m going to be one of them within a few months.’”
Jenkins went to officer’s training school at Camp Gordon, Georgia, and then to France as a second lieutenant with the 132nd Infantry Regiment, composed primarily of soldiers from Chicago’s South Side.
Jenkins at Camp Gordon
Shortly after the armistice was signed in November of 1918, MacLean was a given a letter Jenkins had written to a friend in Chicago several weeks earlier. MacLean said Jenkins had been “promoted, while under fire from second to first lieutenant.”
According to MacLean, “At one stage of the game, all the other officers of his company being disabled, Jenkins commanded his company in an advance,” and as a result received the promotion. MacLean said Johnny Evers mentioned in a letter that he had met Jenkins in France shortly after the latter was promoted.
Jenkins also wrote two letters to White Sox President Charles Comiskey—as with the letter MacLean was given, both letters to Comiskey were written before the armistice, but received weeks after—and were printed in Chicago newspapers.
In the first, Jenkins wrote:
“My Dear Mr. Comiskey…I have been in the front line for four days, having gone up to look over the situation with the major.
“Believe me, I am a brave man, but I did not bargain to eat any of these high explosives. One of the shells just missed me about ten feet. It hit on top of the trench and had it hit in the trench I would not be writing to you today.
“To be honest with you, this is some league that I am in and it is a lot faster than the old American, for you know that when you boot one in this league you are through and can’t come back.”
Jenkins wrote to Comiskey again, approximately three weeks later:
“Well I thought you had forgotten me, but today I got your letter, and you may be sure that I was delighted to hear from you. We have been scrapping for the past ten days on the Meuse, North of Verdun, and believe me, the fighting has been hot and sharp. We have just been moved to a more quiet sector, the purpose for which is rest, and believe me we can use it nicely. It is becoming apparent that Germany is through, and in the last offensive I was in their spirit and morale was at a very low ebb.”
Jenkins also assured Comiskey that the Chicago Southsiders in the 132nd “can go some.”
The catcher told Comiskey he planned on joining the Sox at Mineral Wells in the spring of 1919 and promised:
“I will bring something back in the line of a trophy for your office with me as shipping it would be risky. This trophy that I refer to was taken where the fighting was thickest.”
There is no record of what the “trophy” was or whether Jenkins brought it to Comiskey.
Jenkins said in closing:
“Give my regards to all the boys and tell them that in this league over here the pitchers all have plenty on everything that they throw.”
Jenkins made it back to the US on April 15, 1919—on the same ship as Sergeant Grover Cleveland Alexander—The Chicago Tribune said:
“Jenkins fought in Flanders, the Argonne, and St. Mihiel. He escaped unwounded and looks ready to play baseball at a moment’s notice.”
Sergeant Grover Cleveland Alexander
He didn’t make it to Mineral Wells but joined the Sox for their opener in St. Louis. The Daily News said he told manager Kid Gleason he was available to pinch hit:
“’You know I’m a valuable man in a pinch, Kid. When I came up to hit in a pinch over there the Kaiser lit out for Holland and he’s been there ever since.”
1919 White Sox, Jenkins is bottom left
Ready to play or not, Jenkins appeared in just 11 games for the pennant-winning White Sox—four behind the plate—and had three hits in 19 at bats.
He remained with the Sox through the 1919 World Series—a member of two World Series teams, he did not appear in a game in either series—and was released that winter.
His big league career over, Jenkins played 11 more seasons in the minors, retiring in 1930.
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