My great grandfather's brother, a soldier in the American Expeditionary Force, was killed in the Second Battle of the Marne, the Battle of Château-Thierry specifically. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Ch%C3%A2teau-Thierry_%281918%29. He has a monument at the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Belleau, France. http://www.abmc.gov/images/am5.jpg
http://img372.imageshack.us/img372/2946/harrybostonof3.jpg
My grandfather and his siblings were just kids during the war and my great-grandfather worked in Alaska to make supply routes for the military bases. They didn't send him overseas. Some of my family in Belgium were part of the underground though and hid an American flyer who was shot down.
shareI had both grandfathers in it. One was a supply sargeant and the other was in the artillery. That one had sever hearing loss from the war. He told his grandkids a little about what it was like. He said there were times when the cannons didn't stop firing for days and nights on end. One battle, lasted 6 days and nights and there were times when the barrels were so hot they were melting. At times like that were some of the only times they could take a break. A truly terrifying and unnecessary war, but the egos of a few caused untold misery in tens of millions. Every memorial day they are in my heart along with the others who have perished in WWII and those idiotic wars since. It seems to be the fate of mankind to fight in ever more meaningless conflagrations.
Let it be unsaid: insignificance is the locus of true increpation.
I don't know the specifics, but my Irish grandfather (a fairly new immigrant to the US) served in the US army infantry. He came home in one piece thankfully, but his wife, my grandmother (also an Irish immigrant) lost her two brothers one week apart (October 30th and November 7th, 1918) and one week before the signing of the Armistice. Truly heartbreaking. I've been told that it's typical of the time that they used immigrants as cannon fodder.
My Dad (WWII). He survived and lived to be a ripe old age. He hardly discussed the war. He once said he didn't want to talk about it.
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Half of both my parent's families were killed in WWI.
A whole generation of women were forced to grow up single.
What were the causalty stats, on all sides?
The Brits lost 1 million and the French lost 1.7 million.
How many Germans died? I am guessing 2.5 million.
All for, what?
My Grandfather was wounded at the Battle of Arras in 1917. I believe that when his platoon went 'over the top' the first time, he couldn't go as he had hurt a wrist and was unable to fire his gun. His entire platoon was wiped out, and he survived.
When he did eventually go over the top, a shell exploded in front of him, killing those around him but leaving him badly wounded, with over a hundred shrapnel wounds on his body and face. Small pieces of shrapnel could be seen in his face even when I, as a small boy in the 1960s, used to visit him at his house. It used to work its way out of its own accord, apparently!
My Great-Uncle fought in WWI. He lived with my Grandparents because he couldn't support himself due to poor physical and mental health as a result of the war, so the family took care of him.
He died when I was about seven, but I always remembered Uncle James as a very gaunt, frail, quiet man who moved slowly, said little, and never smiled or laughed. He wasn't mean, he just seemed disinterested in the world in general.
When I was older, I asked my Mom and Grandmother about him, and that's when they told me why he had lived with them. His back had been broken and his skull fractured when he fell into an abandoned trench during an attack. The trench was contaminated with mustard gas residue from an earlier gas attack, and he ended up badly burned and his lungs were damaged as well. He had been unconscious, lying in the trench for over a day before he was found. The prolonged exposure to the chemical residue is what caused the damage. The man was in constant pain the rest of his life, and ended up riddled with cancer.
What I didn't know at the time he died was that he actually committed suicide. He had already had one lung removed, and when the VA told him he had inoperable cancer, he took out a pistol he owned, went out to the garage and blew his brains out. He left a note apologizing for having been such a burden to everyone for so long, and asked forgiveness for not having the courage to kill himself 50 years earlier.
My grandfather served in the Canadian navy on the Allied side after being rejected by the U.S. Navy in 1917 as he was just 16. My other Grandfather answered a draft call at age 27 in Chicago in 1917, but was not drafted as he had a job, wife, and baby.
A friend from Lousiana lost two great Uncles in that conflict, one to the Spanish Influenza Epidemic, one killed in action in France.
My great-grandfather served in the Austro-Hungarian army, first on the Eastern Front, then in the Italian Campaign. I've read his war diary. He didn't engage in direct combat, he mostly served in patrols, and diseases caused him more suffering than the enemy. He doesn't write much about how he felt about the war (though he certainly didn't enjoy service), but it seems to me that it didn't affect him all that much. He died peacefully at home at age 81.
shareI'm of 100% German ancestry on my Mother's side. My maternal grandparents were born in the US in 1891, but there were still relatives in Germany. My grandmother had a cousin who served in the Kaiser's navy on a submarine in WWI. He later moved to the US and served with the American army in WWII. I'm guessing as a translator in the US, but I don't really know.
shareYes, my great-grandfather, as in my maternal grandmother's father. He died from a heart attack the day my grandmother graduated from high school, so even my mom never knew him.
I don't know a whole lot, but I do know that he served in an African-American Army unit (during segregation, obviously) and that he's buried at the Chalmette cemetary where the Battle of New Orleans took place. My mom still has the flag that was draped over his coffin at his funeral.
A great great uncle who died at age 20 in Northern Italy. I've seen a photograph of him and he was very beautiful.
I have cried readingl your stories of other beautiful young men who died so very long ago. What a great tragedy.
My Mothers father went ans served in WW1. He changed his middle name Reinhold to Reynolds so as to avoid any connection to being German. His father had been one of the Kaiser's gardeners before emigrating to the US.
shareMy great uncle (paternal side) is buried at the St. Sever Cemetery Extension in Rouen, France. He died on October 31, 1916 at the age of 26 during the Battle of the Somme. He emigrated from Ireland to Canada and died as a private in the Canadian army. He had been in the army for only seven months.
I have a painting of him done on linen, with his insignia and awards embroidered on it. It's an amazing piece and I'm glad to have this part of my family's history in my home.