Leonard Wood

Leonard Wood (b 1860) was a general in the United States army. Born in Winchester, New Hampshire, he attended Pierce Academy in Middleborough, Massachusetts, and Harvard Medical School, earning an M.D. degree in 1884 as an intern at Boston City Hospital.

Wood joined the US Army in 1885 and rose through the ranks to become Chief of the General Staff during the Great War. During that war he became the first US General in the highest position in the Army (formerly that position was General-in-Chief) to win a war under his command in a lifetime, though the bureacratic nature of the General Staff prevented him from impacting the war as heavily with his personal decisions as had been true of Generals-in-Chief like Winfield Scott, George McClellan, or William Rosecrans.

Wood remained on as Chief of Staff after the war ended. Intensely loyal to President Theodore Roosevelt, he was sacked by Upton Sinclair when the Socialist defeated Roosevelt in the 1920 election and took office the following year.