Harry Hill Bandholtz Harry Hill Bandholtz ( 1864 – May 11 , 1925 ) was a United States Army Major General during World War I , and the US representative of the Inter - Allied Military Mission in Hungary in 1919 . He is famous for preventing Romanian soldiers from removing Transylvanian treasures from the National Museum of Hungary in Budapest during the Romanian occupation of the city in 1919 . Life . Bandholtz was born in Constantine , Michigan and a graduate of the United States Military Academy . In 1902 he served as Provincial Governor in Tayabas Province in the Philippines . As an Army captain assigned in the Philippines , he became an early patron of Manuel Quezon . He was promoted to Brigadier General and served as Chief of the Philippines Constabulary between 1907 - 1913 supporting America ' s colonial government during a period where violent rebellion to American rule still smoldered in the Philippines . After his Philippines service ended in 1913 , he returned to serve in the infantry as a Major . He served in NY as Chief of Staff in the NY National Guard and went with it to the border in Mexico . In 1917 he became commander of the 58th Brigade of the 29th Division . He went with his unit to France in June of that year and served with it for three months . On September 27 he was named United States Army Provost Marshal General to General John J . Pershing ' s American Expeditionary Force in France serving through the end of hostilities and beyond . General Bandholtz reorganized the Military Police Corps , established a Military Police school in Autun , France , and advocated a permanent Military Police Corps following the war . Major General Bandholtz is widely considered to be the " father " of the United States Army ' s Military Police Corps . Between August 1919 and February 9 , 1920 , he was the US representative to the Inter - Allied Supreme Command ' s Military Mission in Hungary . The Military Mission was charged with disarming the Hungarian military and supervising the withdrawal of the Serbian and Romanian armies who were occupying the territory of Hungary . According to his own accounts , he is said to have prevented the arresting of Hungarian PM István Friedrich by the Romanians . He is also remembered for preventing Romanian soldiers from looting the Hungarian National Museum on 5 October 1919 . In 1920 , when a rebellion among miners broke out in Mingo County , West Virginia after two mineworkers were assassinated on the McDowell County courthouse steps , President Warren G . Harding sent Gen . Bandholtz and Gen . Billy Mitchell ( * ) to control the situation . Bandholtz threatened marching mineworkers that they would be tried for treason . Mineworkers offered the compromise that they would stop fighting if federal troops would come and enforce the law evenhandedly but this was initially refused by Bandholtz . Eventually federal troops did deploy and mine workers quickly ceased fighting . Several treason trials eventually were held , at private expense , but they failed to procure convictions and scandalized US society . Memorial in Budapest . In his honor a statue was placed in front of the US embassy in Budapest , Szabadság tér ( Liberty Square ) in 1936 , with the following inscription in Bandholtz ' s own words : The statue made by prominent Hungarian sculptor Miklós Ligeti depicts Bandholtz with his famous riding - whip in his hand . According to the popular legend he bundled off the robbing soldiers with this whip although Bandholtz didn ' t mention this detail in his autobiography . Today the whip is on display in the Hungarian National Museum . The memorial caused diplomatic troubles in the Hungarian - Romanian relationship . Romania asked the US ambassador in Budapest not to be present on the inauguration ceremony but American diplomats in lesser rank were there . After World War II , the statue was repaired but in 1949 it was removed by the new Communist government . In 1985 , at the request of Ambassador Nicolas Salgo , it was moved from a statue boneyard to the garden of the US Ambassador ' s residence . It was placed back on its original place before the US embassy on 6 July 1989 , one day before the historic visit of President George H . W . Bush in Budapest . The inscription with the humble sentence was only restored in 1993 .