United States Army Brigadier General. After early education in private schools in Charleston, South Carolina, he was appointed to the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York in 1880. Graduating in 1884, he was commissioned at a 2nd Lieutenant, and assigned to a cavalry regiment with duty in Wyoming, Kansas and Indian Territory, later admitted as Oklahoma. He returned to West Point in 1888 where he became an instructor and continued that duty until 1892 when he enrolled in law school. After two years of study he passed the bar in 1894 and returned to West Point where he became the Post Quartermaster. During the Spanish-American War he cleared the congestion at railroad terminals from Tampa, Florida to Columbia, South Carolina and moved the Fifth Corps from Tampa to Port Tampa for embarkation to Cuba and planned and executed the return of troops, due to fear of yellow fever from Cuba and Puerto Rico through the quarantine stations in Florida and Georgia in 1899. He served as Depot Quartermaster and General Superintendent of the Army transport Service at San Francisco, California from 1906 to 1909, and for the next two years was in charge of preparing plans, constructing buildings and water and sewerage systems, organizing and equipping shops and the railroad system and operating them for the building of Fort Mills on Corregidor Island in Manila, Philippines. Bellinger originated and executed the supplying of the Siberian American Expeditionary Force at Vladivostok, Russia in World War I as well as for them in the Orient and the sending of the troops home on army transports. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his services as Quartermaster, Philippine Department, a position of great responsibility he administered the services of transportation and of the supply of the troops serving in the Philippines and China in a markedly successful manner.