But he was just a scrawny stray puppy when Private John Conroy picked him up on the campus of Yale University in 1917. The lonely young private was at Yale for training before being sent to the European front. Soon he and the pup were inseparable. When deployment orders came, Conroy managed to smuggle the patchy pup aboard the troop ship bound for France. Once aboard, Stubby quickly won the hearts of all the men of the 102nd. They even taught him to perform his trademark salute by raising his right paw to his face. When finally discovered by Conroy’s commander, the little stray was so beloved by the troops, he was allowed to stay to keep up morale.

But once in Europe, Stubby had to grow up fast. Within weeks of their arrival in the
European theatre, the 102nd was under fire on the front lines in France.
And it was there that the young pit bull began to really prove his mettle.

 Stubby reached the trenches of the front line in February 1918 in the midst of a
horrific battle. Although the dog was never trained to cope with such nightmarish
conditions, he calmly endured a mounting barrage of shelling for the first 30 days.
 In fact, Stubby’s caretakers were amazed by his cool under fire, and absolutely stunned when he voluntarily ventured out into the battle zone to seekout and comfort wounded soldiers caught in the crossfire. News of the little dog’s heroism and fidelity reached the French village of Domremy, and after the fighting subsided, the women of the town presented him with a hand-sewn chamois coat decorated with Allied flags and his name stitched in gold thread.(1)

 During the next 18 months Stubby carried messages under fire, stood sentry duty, and helped paramedics find the wounded in “no man’s land”. He gave early warning of deadly gas attacks and was credited many times with saving his entire regiment. When Stubby found and helped capture a German spy who was mapping a layout of the Allied trenches, he was awarded the
honorary rank of Sergeant. When seriously wounded by shrapnel, he was sent to the Red Cross hospital for surgery just like any other soldier. Once recovered, the gutsy pit bull returned to his regiment and continued to serve until November 11, 1918, the day the war ended.

Upon his return to the U.S. after the Armistice, Stubby was greeted by a wildly cheering American public. Recognition of his valor came from all directions. Named a life member of the Red Cross and the American Legion, he was awarded many medals including one by General
 John J. Pershing. Called to the White House several times to meet Presidents Harding and Coolidge, he led more regimental parades than any other dog in history. Stubby spent his final years with John Conroy the beloved soldier who had rescued him so many years ago. He died of old age in 1926.

                   Civil War Dogs
 But Stubby was not the first American pit bull terrier to help America’s fighting men.
 During the Civil War, Sallie—intrepid pit bull mascot and comrade in battle of the 11th Regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteers—had already made her mark.

Sallie was a lady; she was a soldier too—
She marched beside the colors, our own red white and blue.
It was in the days of our civil war that she lived her life so true(2)

During the fiercest fighting of the war—Cedar Mountain, Pope’s Retreat, Bull Run,
 hantilly—the little brindle dog stood bravely under fire. Her refusal to leave
the wounded of her regiment during the three-day stand at Gettysburg became a legend among the battle-hardened veterans. When Sallie was killed by a bullet to the brain on the front line at Hatcher’s Run, her “boys” risked their lives under fierce enemy fire to bury her where she fell. Today Sallie lies, immortalized in bronze, at the foot of the 11th
Regiment’s Monument at Gettysburg National Military Park.

The 102nd Pennsylvania Infantry, a unit of volunteer firemen, claimed that their beloved Civil War mascot—a brown-and-white pit bull named Jack—understood bugle calls and obeyed only the men of his regiment. Jack participated in nearly all of the regiment’s battles in Virginia and Maryland, fearlessly seeking out the dead and wounded. Once severely wounded
in battle, he recovered only to be captured by the South on two separate occasions.
The second time he was exchanged for a Confederate soldier at Belle Isle.