Researching my family history gives personal meaning to Memorial Day

“Time will not dim the glory of their deeds”

General of the Armies John J. Pershing

My father has this family photograph of his uncle. The photo is mounted on an old piece of cardboard with hand written captions above and below.  The handwriting is my great grandmother's; it is faded and very difficult to read.  I scanned it into Photoshop and zoomed in on the image to decipher it.

The top reads:

Prvt. Joseph Brady Collins II

Co. AA136MGBA

Camp Lee Virginia

April 28, 1918

Sailed on June 23

The bottom:

Gave His Life for His Country

October 28, 1918 (Gas Poison + Bronchitis

Pneumonia) at Toul, France

In Active Service

There is also a photocopy showing two of the pages from my great grandmother’s journal. Half of the words are indecipherable. Today is Memorial Day and I want to share this photograph, so I am driven to discover more. I know he is buried in France but I am not sure where.

First I googled “WWI servicemen buried in France” and one of the burial sites is Meuse Argonne which is something I recognize in the journal. But the journal context is about the offensive being from September 25th to October 1st 1918. From the journal I can also decipher “Flanders” and “Belgium” but those dates listed are early November and my great uncle passed away on October 28th. Flanders Field is an infamous burial site in Flanders. I wondered if his remains were transported to Belgium.

I was never a fan of the details on war history but now I have a personal interest. Searching the Meuse Argonne offensive I find a plethora of information. This offensive was the largest operation and victory of the American Expeditionary Forces in World War I. The American General John J. Pershing led the offense. This event is also known as the Battle of the Argonne Forest, the Grand Offensive and the 100 Days Offensive. According to Wikipedia “The objective was the capture of the railroad hub at Sedan which would break the rail net supporting the German Army in France and Flanders.” There were 26,277 American soldiers killed in the Meuse-Argonne offensive, which is the largest number of U.S. dead in a single battle. In spite of a great number of casualties by October 31st, they had advanced fifteen kilometers and finally cleared the Argonne Forest. This offensive proved to be the final straw, and German troops began to surrender in large numbers.  It was on November 11, 1918 that the Armistice was signed between the Allies and the Germans.

I tried searching “WWI Co. AA136MGBA” and found nothing. It’s rare that Google comes up empty but it did. I tried a few other things and finally searching “WWI Camp Lee 136th” led me to New River Notes.  This page contains a detailed itinerary of the 37th Buckeye Division and as I am reading it I find that the dates and places are lining up almost precisely with the journal. Handwritten words that were previously impossible to ascertain are suddenly clarified. I am certain that this was my great uncle's path. Understanding this I surmise that the journal entry appears to be an accounting that my great grandmother obtained of the division her son traveled with. I begin to plot the locations on Google maps; maybe I can determine which of the cemeteries for American soldiers is closest to their route.

Click here to see my map on Google

I look for additional family notes and find three letters written to my great grandmother in December of 1918 from the army chaplain. In the first he is returning a letter to her she had written to her son, he believes that she has already received from the government an official report of her son’s death. His letter is compassionate and he takes the time to offer her some details: “the pneumonia, though, was too severe to be successfully checked. It came as a result of the irritation of his lungs by gas at the front” Further on in the letter “ His body is buried at the new American Cemetery near this old city of Toul; and from it the view sweeps away across the fields….” “there it will rest in faithful keeping until the government determines what is to be done with the bodies of the soldiers that lie in France.” The second letter contains an apology “I am so sorry to see by the date of these letters to him (her son) that the government’s notification may have been very slow.” In the third letter it is apparent that she has received word of her son’s passing and he is answering her questions. Again burial is mentioned “The Government announced some months ago that the bodies of the men who fell in France would be carried back to America after the war.”

I know that his body was not returned to America, therefore it may still be in the American Cemetery closest to Toul France which is the St. Mihiel American Cemetery and Memorial at the western edge of Thiaucourt France.

I can check with my aunt to see if she has anymore family notes or journal pages that verify the cemetery. However, the time spent researching is invaluable; I now have a lucid understanding of WWI history, France’s geography, and a visual idea of how the French countryside appeared to my great uncle. I also have a reverence for my great uncle, my great grandmother, all service people and the mothers of those who served.