Headquarters Nights: A Record of Conversations and Experiences at the Headquarters of the German Army in France and Belgium

Vernon Kellogg. 2011. [1917].  Headquarters Nights: A Record of Conversations and Experiences at the Headquarters of the German Army in France and Belgium  (Boston: The Atlantic Monthly Press), 116+ 3 pages advertisements. (Euston Grove Press facsimile edition). ISBN 9781906267322 In 1915, Kellogg was a pacifist and humanitarian working with relief organisations in war-torn Europe. By 1917, he wanted war with Germany, pursued to total victory.  Headquarters Nights   is the story of his conversion.   "And always we talked, and tried to understand one another; to get the other man's point of view, his  Weltanshauung ." The Prussians told Kellogg how Darwinism justified war, how nations competed in the struggle for existence, and how war - the ultimate survival of the fittest - was the only means for ensuring civilisation’s progress. Kellogg was shocked. An evolutionary biologist and expert on Darwinism, he knew this reading of Darwin was a corruption. It perverted Darwinism into a doctrine of  ‘might makes right’. After many long nights arguing with his Prussian hosts, Kellogg concluded there was no reasoning with them. This perversion had too strong a foothold. It created an evil militarism. The expansion of their views had to be resisted with all available force. Headquarters Nights  follows Kellogg’s conversion. This was no easy journey. Kellogg’s struggles offer an intimate study of one man’s transformation from an opponent of all wars into an advocate of one. His conversion will offer insight for modern thinkers about world events today.