Carlton Jackson - Kentucky Maverick: The Life and Adventures of Colonel George M. Chinn

Kentucky Maverick

The Life and Adventures of
Colonel George M. Chinn

CARLTON JACKSON

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Copyright 2015 by The University Press of Kentucky

Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth, serving Bellarmine University, Berea College, Centre College of Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky University, The Filson Historical Society, Georgetown College, Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky State University, Morehead State University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University, Transylvania University, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, and Western Kentucky University.

All rights reserved.

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Photos are from the authors collection.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Jackson, Carlton, 1933-2014.

Kentucky maverick : the life and adventures of Colonel George M. Chinn / Carlton Jackson.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-8131-6105-1 (hardcover : acid-free paper)

ISBN 978-0-8131-6107-5 (pdf) ISBN 978-0-8131-6106-8 (ePub)

1. Chinn, George Morgan. 2. KentuckyBiography. 3. MarinesUnited StatesBiography. 4. United States. Marine CorpsOfficersBiography. 5. Military art and scienceTechnological innovationsUnited StatesHistory20th century. 6. HistoriansKentuckyBiography. 7. Kentucky Historical SocietyBiography. 8. BusinessmenKentuckyBiography. 9. BodyguardsKentuckyBiography. I. Title.

F456.C487J33 2015

976.9'043092dc23

[B]

2015017763

This book is printed on acid-free paper meeting the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence in Paper for Printed Library Materials.

Manufactured in the United States of America.

This book
is dedicated to the GIs
who fought our wars for us.

Thank you.

When Colonel George Morgan Chinn took his final separation papers from the U.S. Marine Corps, he wore ribbons and medals earned in four conflicts: World War I, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. Just how did he manage to take part in all these wars, especially World War I? His birthday was January 15, 1902, which would have made him just fifteen when the United States began to send troops over to France.

The answer has to do with his upbringing and schooling. His earliest intellectual memory was of his mother reading the Deer Foot series to him. This series was about pioneer life around Harrodsburg, Kentucky, including the areas of Danville, Lexington, and Nicholasville. Theres more real history in this area, whats called the Big Settlement area, than any place in the United States, he asserted. Always included in the stories were guns, and even as a child, he made the connection between Kentucky history and firearms. Moreover, he was familiar with guns and ammunition early in life; his father, George P. Chinn, was, for some time, the sheriff of Mercer County, a position that put young George in the presence of weaponry.

Later, when his father was warden of the Kentucky penitentiary in Frankfort, George Morgan Chinn frequently accompanied him. Just up the street from the prison was the state arsenal, with Major C. W. Longmire in charge. As it happened, there was

George Morgan grew up at Mundys Landing, on the Kentucky River, never losing his love or fascination for this area. He and his dog, Tauser, were often seen fishing on the river after Touser had dug him a can of worms or caught a bucket of minnows. From Mundys Landing in Mercer Countys Brooklyn community, one could see another place of treasure: the palisades, massive rock formations above the Kentucky River. These palisades had future consequences for George Morgan Chinn.

George Sr. made up his mind early on that his son was going to be a military man, becauseas the son jokedfamily members thought hed look nice in a uniform. In preparation, his father sent George Morgan to a one-room schoolhouse in the Harrodsburg area called Braxton Hall. Many of the military cohorts he came across later introduced themselves pompously as Major So-and-So, Cal Tech, or Captain Somebody, MIT. Invariably, Chinn would introduce himself as Major Chinn, Braxton Tech. He later remarked, I havent had anybody yet ask me where in the pluperfect so-and-so is Braxton Tech. No one ever questioned it [the title] and they always gave a knowing glance like they knew it well.

The students at Braxton Tech faced a battery of questionable teaching techniques. One old maid teacher put them through numerous classroom spelling bees. If a student missed just one word, he or she (girls were on one side of the one-room school and boys on the other) would have to go to the end of the class as it lined up to show off its spelling abilities. If, heaven forbid, a student missed two words in a row, he or she not only had to go to the end of the line but recite, in correct order, the name of every president from George Washington to Woodrow Wilson. George became so efficient here that it took him only a few seconds to declaim, Washington, Adams, Jefferson... Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson! One gets an insight into his behavior when he admits that he could go backward from Wilson to Washington in short order as well.

He did, however, learn one substantial thing in school about engineering: the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. He argued that engineers, particularly those with college degrees, complicated things by lessening obstructions, whereas Chinn wanted to add things. To add parts of a machine gun to make it work is, he said, simplicity rather than complexity. Simplicity is the highest form of art, he liked to say.

His tenure at Braxton Tech helped to forego regular high school and got him into the Millersburg Military Institute, a few miles up the road from Lexington. He did not particularly like this early military experience. He called the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) the Saturday Afternoon Tea Club.

He left the campus unauthorized on numerous occasions, for which he received whippings administered by Colonel C. M. Best, superintendent of the school. Chinn described himself as a hard-headed boyafter Superintendent Bests sixth beating, he exclaimed that he would not yield to any more assaults on his body. In the past, any lip from a student, any insubordination, as that word was defined by higher-ups, brought on severe discipline and ten-hour shifts of guard duties, during which there was little or no rest. Nevertheless, at Millersburg Chinn learned