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WORLD WAR ONE – The war to end all wars.

WORLD WAR ONE – The war to end all wars. Researched & compiled by: Steven T. Jester (Carolyn Essex’ youngest son) July 5 th , 2011. Did you know that we do “NOT” have a WWI Memorial in Washington D.C? Not only is this an “injustice” but also a “disgrace!”.

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WORLD WAR ONE – The war to end all wars.

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  1. WORLD WAR ONE – The war to end all wars. Researched & compiled by: Steven T. Jester (Carolyn Essex’ youngest son) July 5th, 2011

  2. Did you know that we do “NOT” have a WWI Memorial in Washington D.C? Not only is this an “injustice” but also a “disgrace!” In 2014 the world will mark the centennial of World War I. Nearly 5 million Americans served during the war, and 116,516 Americans died in defense of democracy overseas. America’s support of its allies in World War I marked the first time in this nation’s history that American soldiers went abroad to defend foreign soil against aggression -- and it marked the true beginning of “the American century.” Yet while the later conflicts of the 20th century - World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War -- rightfully have national memorials on the National Mall, there is no such memorial to “the Great War,” even though more Americans gave their lives in World War I than in Korea or Vietnam. The D.C. memorial, which is already located adjacent to those other memorials, is the most fitting site for a national World War I memorial.Please help honor America’s veterans of World War I, by by donating generously to the World War I Memorial Foundation. and by asking your Congressman and Senators to support S. 2097, the Frank Buckles World War I Memorial Act. http://www.wwimemorial.org/

  3. PFC Herman Stonewall EssexService Dates: 28 April 1917 – 16 April 1919 Remember, it is as much your duty as a citizen as it is a soldier to ever have the welfare of your country at heart, to ever so conduct yourselves so as to be a credit to our forefathers who shed their blood that the principles of right and liberty “might not perish from the earth.” John H. KlineCaptain 134th Field Artillery, Commanding Battery “D.”

  4. “The war upset my whole life, as it did millions of others.“ Herman Stonewall Essex - 1943

  5. WWI involved all the world's great powers. • More than 70 million military personnel were mobilized in one of the largest wars in history. • More than 9 million combatants were killed. • It was the second deadliest conflict in Western history.

  6. PVT Herman Stonewall Essex Picture obtained from the Essex Family box

  7. More Camp Sheridan snap shots…Picture obtained from the Essex Family box

  8. Camp Sheridan, Montgomery Alabama Pictures were obtained from the Essex Family box.

  9. Herman at Camp Sheridan – photo from the Essex Family Box

  10. Battery D, 134th Field Artillery, 37th Division of WWI …Training continued for 10 months at Camp Sheridan. Then came word they were scheduled for overseas, and the young soldiers' spirits soared. It seemed a wonderful adventure to them. They left on May 20, 1918, on day coaches - no Pullmans this time - for New York, going by way of Baltimore, Philadelphia and Newark. All along the route admiring citizens gathered at every stop and handed in through the open windows gifts of candies, smokes, books and clothing; the soldiers felt like heroes. They stayed a week in Camp Upton on Long Island and then embarked on an English ship, SS HMS Nestor. The voyage took 12 days, and most of the men spent the first half of it leaning over the railing. They disembarked at Liverpool and marched to camp. "The bed sack was about 2 feet wide at one end, tapering to 1 foot in width at the other," wrote Carl Evans, "and not long enough to stretch out in. Someone in our tent awakened and finding it light, aroused the rest of us, thinking it was morning. But it was only 10:30 p.m. Next day we learned that it did not get dark there until after 11 p.m." Next day the battery went by train through Birmingham and Oxford to Winchester to another camp six miles out in the country. "Why camps are always built a great distance from the railroads," said Evans, "and always uphill, I never discovered." Although they were in camp there for two days, they were not allowed to leave to see any of the sights around Winchester. An hour's train ride took them to the channel where they boarded a small boat and disembarked at LeHavre. Traveling part of the time jammed into boxcars where they were so crowded nobody could lie down, and part of the time by long marches, they arrived at Camp De Sourge at the end of July. • http://www.daytonhistorybooks.com/batterydyoung.html

  11. 37th Infantry Division (BUCKEYE DIVISION) Order of Battle - American Forces - World War IThirty-Seventh Division (National Guard) Popularly known as the "Buckeye Division." Insignia, a red circle with a white border. Composed of National Guard of "Buckeye" State, Ohio. Organized at Camp Sheridan, Montgomery, Alabama, beginning in August, 1917, when the first units of the Ohio National Guard arrived, and completed in October when the last had reached camp. The F.A. Brig., Trench Mortar Battery, Sanitary Train, M.P., and 114th Vet Section, left Camp Sheridan, Ala, June 14th for Camp Upton, sailing from there June 27th via England. The artillery was sent to Camp de Souge for training and assigned to the 1st Army in the Argonne offensive, never serving with its own division. It served successively with the 4th American Corps, 2nd Armerican Army, 2nd French Colonial Army, and 17th French Corps. At one time the three regiments of the brigade served with three different divisions, the 28th, 33d, and 92d, and only joined the division just prior to its return to the United States. http://www.ranger95.com/divisions/order_battle_37th_div_ww1.html

  12. Herman’s Bibliography, page 3… • “Born and raised in Ohio and Indiana. Completed high school and made plans to go to Denison University in Ohio when war was declared in 1918. • Volunteered at once for service with local battery made up largely of Denison men. • Unit sent to Montgomery, Ala. where I studied for and secured right to transfer to Aviation Signal Officers’ Reserve Corps. • However, our battery ordered to France and I passed up transfer to see actual service rather than train here for another year. • Sailed for Liverpool, then sent to Southampton, La Havre, Bordeaux, Nancy battle front and gradually north to Chateau Thierry and Metz sector at the end.”

  13. According to Herman’s Biography, when he left for the war he traveled to these cities…

  14. AEF Map showing Southhampton, La Havre, Bordeaux, Chateau Thierry and Metz.

  15. American troops pause for a rest…

  16. Map of Western Europe During World War OneThe Meuse-Argonne Offensive was the largest U.S. engagement. It began 26 September 1918 and ended 11 November 1918. In the three weeks fighting, the battle deaths of Americans numbered 18,000, a daily average of about 1,000.http://www.roangelo.net/angelo/battlemp.html

  17. “Meuse-Argonne” • The Meuse-Argonne Offensive, also called the Battle of the Argonne Forest, was a part of the final Allied offensive of World War I that stretched along the entire western front. • The whole offensive was planned by Marshal Ferdinand Foch to breach the Hindenburg line and ultimately force the opposing German forces to capitulate. The big September/October Allied breakthroughs across the length of the Hindenburg Line are now lumped together as part of the Grand Offensive (or Hundred Days Offensive) by the Allies on the Western front. • The French and British armies' ability to fight unbroken over the whole four years of the war in what amounted to a bloody stalemate is credited by some historians with breaking the spirit of the German Army on the Western Front. The Grand Offensive, including British, French and Belgian advances in the north along with the French-American advances around the Argonne forest, is in turn credited for leading directly to the Armistice on November 11. • The Meuse-Argonne offensive, shared by the U.S. forces with the French 4th Army was the biggest operation and victory of the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) in World War I. The bulk of the AEF had not gone into action until 1918. The Meuse-Argonne battle was the largest frontline commitment of troops by the U.S. Army in World War I, and also its deadliest. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meuse-Argonne_Offensive

  18. American Expeditionary Force at Meuse-Argonne On September 26, 1918 a massive series of offensives utilizing 92 British, Belgian, French and American divisions rippled urgently forward across the entire Western Front. Near the center of the offensive, 15 American and 22 French divisions attacked on a broad front from Rheims all the way to the Meuse River near Verdun. The offensive would eventually get the name Meuse-Argonne, in honor of the river on the right and the great forest on the left of the territory that was fought over. For the troops it was like being in a slaughterhouse. Of the 29 American divisions that would see combat by the end of the war, all 29 were in combat in mid-October, and they were holding approximately one quarter of the Western Front, which was just a little more than the British, though far less than the French. In all, approximately 1.2 million American soldiers fought in the Meuse-Argonne offensive. http://www.usaww1.com/American-Expeditionary-Force/American-Expeditionary-Force-Meuse-Argonne.php4 The 37th was the first American Division to be honored as one to start an offensive. They were given credit for being one of the main factors in the huge movement of troops which gave final victory to the Allies. In the forests of Meuse-Argonne, the 37th Division covered itself with glory.http://www.worldwar1.com/dbc/147thinf.htm

  19. “The Meuse-Argonne Offensive” This map of the Meuse-Argonne sector shows the US Infantry Divisions as well as the supporting air units. The air units are denoted by the large circles. IOG is I Corps Observation Group, 1OG is 1st Army Observation Group, 1PG is 1st Pursuit Group, 1BG is 1st Bomber Group, etc.http://www.usaww1.com/American-Expeditionary-Force/American-Expeditionary-Force-Meuse-Argonne.php4

  20. “Trenches near Verdun”

  21. THE WESTERN FRONT IN 1918 Over a four-month period in 1918, the German army launched five major assaults at different parts of the allied line. The new campaign was based on new tactics: squads of elite storm-troopers, armed with automatic rifles, light machine guns and flame-throwers, were supported with a creeping barrage of artillery fire. Initially the plan worked. The British Fifth Army collapsed. The allies gave ground. But for every allied trench captured, there was always another for the Germans to take. Within a week the advance had ground to a halt. Soon the elite German storm troopers were a spent force. The allies, having stemmed the German advance, now reversed it. The whole front was ablaze. The climatic battles of September 1918 saw the rupture of the Hindenburg Line, and on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, the armistice went into effect. http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/maps/maps_western.html

  22. 134TH FA Record Of Events(Source: Cease Firing, A History of 134TH Battery D, Field Artillery), 1921, by Kenneth W. Walsh)

  23. This article appeared in the Dayton Daily News on January 12, 1991HEROES ALL MEN OF BATTERY D MARCH TO BATTLE TO DEFEAT THE GERMANS by Roz Young …They spent the rest of the war moving to new positions, firing barrages, sleeping in the mud and moving on to new positions. They fought defensively in the Marbache and Pannes sectors and offensively at Bois-de-Bonseil and Meuse-Argonne. All the men came through the battles unscathed. Battery D went out to fire on the morning of Nov. 11 when they heard rumors of an armistice. Between 10 and 11 a.m. they wiped out a German ammunition train of 18 trucks. At 10:59 the command "Cease firing," sounded. The men cheered and immediately began to think of home. They did not, however, go home for some months. They stayed for weeks in a camp the men called "Mud Flats" - always wet and always hungry. Finally they took a boxcar train to a chateau called Le Lion de Angiers, where they were billeted for 30 days in barns and outbuildings. At last they arrived in boxcars at Brest, where they boarded the US President Grant for Newport News. They arrived in port April 2 and were greeted by crowd of Daytonians who had come to welcome Battery D home. The men hoped to have a parade in Dayton, but they had to be content with one in Columbus on April 11. Back to Camp Sheridan they went for the necessary paper work and were mustered out April 16, 1919. They came home heroes with the loss of only three men and disappeared, as one of the men said, into the ranks of civilians in society. http://www.daytonhistorybooks.com/batterydyoung.html

  24. Herman’s approved application for the Victory Medal

  25. “WWI Victory Medal” (with Meuse-Argonne and Defensive Sector Battle Clasps) Instituted: 1919Qualifying Dates: 4/1917 -11/1918Criteria: Awarded to all members of the armed forces who served at least 1 day active federal service. Instituted for service between April 6, 1917 and November 11, 1918. http://www.medalsofamerica.com/Item--i-World_War_II_Victory_Medal

  26. Battery D, 134TH Field Artillery Signal Detail, France – 5 Mar 1919Picture obtained from the Essex Family box

  27. Flanders Fields is the generic name of the World War I battlefields in the medieval County of Flanders. At the time of World War I, the county no longer existed but corresponded approximately to the Belgian provinces East Flanders and West Flanders and the French Nord-Pas-de-Calais region. The name is particularly associated with the battles of Ypres, Passchendaele, and the Somme. For most of the war, the front line ran continuously from south of Zeebrugge, Belgium, to the Swiss border with France (Alsace and Vosges regions). Canadian Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae wrote a poem, In Flanders Fields, inspired by his service during the 2nd Battle of Ypres. ..

  28. Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,Sleep sweet - to rise anew!We caught the torch you threwAnd holding high, we keep the FaithWith All who died. We cherish, too, the poppy redThat grows on fields where valor led;It seems to signal to the skiesThat blood of heroes never dies,But lends a lustre to the redOf the flower that blooms above the deadIn Flanders Fields. And now the Torch and Poppy RedWe wear in honor of our dead.Fear not that ye have died for naught;We'll teach the lesson that ye wroughtIn Flanders Fields.In Flanders Fields we fought We Shall Keep The Faith "We Shall Keep the Faith" is a poem penned by Moina Michael in November 1918. She received inspiration for this poem from In Flanders Fields. Wreaths of artificial poppies used as a symbol of remembrance

  29. “Herman & Susan”Picture obtained from the Essex Family box

  30. “OUR AMERICAN FLAG” –From the book “Sincere Thoughts About Everyday Living” – Herman S. Essex The red’s for courage and perseverance of man, That makes him fight on the very best he can, Regardless of the odds and surrounding gloom, For the life of a coward is man’s lowest doom. The white is for tolerance and justice for all, The ideals of ethics and of morals that call, That men live uprightly, conscience the guide, With faith that good shall all evil out stride. The blue, like the sky that covers the earth, Reminds that whatever the land of our birth, We are all equally part of an all -supreme plan Of a mighty force that keeps things in hand. The stars, grouped together in the field of blue, Proclaim that old truth that is always so new, We must all work together, as a united band, And fight for man’s happiness in every land.

  31. Herman Stonewall Essex 29 Nov 1895 - 13 Oct 1964 “Time will not dim the glory of their deeds” - General of the Armies, John J. Pershing

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