Posts Tagged With: Irish Doughboys

Recent years have seen a dramatic upsurge in interest in Irish participation in the Great War, particularly with respect to service in the British military. Thousands of Irish men and women also served in the armed forces of other Allied nations, particularly those of the United States. However, little work has been carried out on their experiences, largely because it is extremely difficult to uncover details regarding the nativity of those who went into the conflict wearing the uniform of Uncle Sam. This is principally due to the catastrophic 1973 fire at the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, Missouri, which destroyed vast numbers of 20th century American military personnel records. As part of our U.S. Military in Ireland Centenary Project, we decided to take a look at one surviving record source, the New York State Abstracts of World War I Military Service, in an effort to determine how many had been identified as being from Cork. That search revealed the names of almost 450 men and women. A portion of the database we compiled is presented below, providing information on the name, place of birth, rank, age at enlistment, unit, overseas service and fate of these hundreds of Cork emigrants.

Doughboys of the 77th Division on the front line, 1918. The 77th had large numbers of Irishmen in the ranks (History of the Seventy Seventh Division)

The database on which this listing was based was prepared by Paul Higgins, who carried out the work while on placement in our Rubicon Heritage offices. Our full database contains additional information which space constraints prevent us from including here, such as the actions some of the men were recorded as serving in, whether they were disabled as a result of their service, and whether they had received a gallantry award. Paul also sought to uncover additional detail on the individuals listed where possible. Readers should note that the detail should be taken as a guide only– during our work we have identified that the card details are not always 100% accurate. The cards themselves were transcribed in 1920 as abstracts of the military service records. The database provides only a small snapshot of Irish service in the American military during the Great War; even with respect to Corkonians and New York, there were undoubtedly many more who went into American service not recorded here. The creation of the database has brought to light numerous interesting stories, which we intend to return to in future posts. As an introduction to what the material can reveal, we take the opportunity to here to briefly explore one aspect– those men from Cork who were killed in action.

Doughboys of the 77th Division waiting for the jump off, France, 1918 (History of the Seventy Seventh Division)

Killed in Action

A total of twenty of the men in the database were recorded as having being killed in action (see Table 1 below). Undoubtedly the most famous of these is Daniel Buckley from Ballydesmond. He lost his life while serving with the 165th Infantry on 17th October 1918. Daniel has a particular claim to fame in that he survived the sinking of RMS Titanic in 1912. His service in the 165th Infantry is no surprise, given that this was the designation of the 69th New York National Guard, the famed Irish unit. As the full database shows, it was a regiment filled with Irishmen during World War One.

Daniel Buckley, survivor of the sinking of the Titanic, who was killed in action as an American Doughboy in World War One (Image via Wikipedia)

The 69th or 165th went to war as part of the 42nd “Rainbow” Division. Another of the Cork men to fall in its ranks was Sergeant William O’Neill, from Bantry. During fighting in Champagne in July 1918 he continued on the line despite being wounded, “till death claimed him in the heat of the fray”(Duffy 1919:138). His death has added poignancy given the fact that two of his brothers, Eugene and Jerome, were also serving with the regiment. The regiment’s chaplain, Father Francis Duffy (who is remembered with a monument in Time Square) recalled that ‘”The three O’Neills and Bernard Finnerty as also Sergeant Spillane of Machine Gun Company came from the town of Bantry. “Rebel Cork” added new leaves to its laurel wreath of valor in this battle on the plains of Champagne”‘ (Ibid.).

During the war the 1st Battalion of the 165th (69th New York) was led by William “Wild Bill” Donovan. A proud Irish-American with family origins in Skibbereen, he earned the Medal of Honor and later became the first head of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War Two, the forerunner of the CIA. He is often referred to as the “Father of American Intelligence.” (United States Army)

Perhaps the greatest number of Irishmen served with the 77th Division, which was drawn from New York and was often called the “Liberty Division.” They are also a reminder that although those Irish who served from Ireland in the war were all regulars or volunteers, many of the Irish who went to the front as doughboys were conscripted. There were three main types of American divisions during the war– the Regular Army Divisions, made up of professional soldiers, the National Guard Divisions (such as the 42nd Division of which the 69th New York was a part) and the National Army Divisions, which was made up of men inducted into the military by draft boards. The 77th Division was one of the latter, and was the first National Army Division to go to Europe (77th Division Association 1919: 7). So many Irish served in the 77th Division that the regimental history carried a cartoon of the Irishmen’s reactions upon seeing the coast of Ireland while the troops traveled to Europe– and war– in 1917.

‘When the Irish Sighted Ireland’ (History of the Seventy Seventh Division)

The 77th Division consisted of the 305th, 306th, 307th and 308th Regiments along with the 305th and 306th Machine Gun Battalions, the 304th, 305th and 306th Field Artillery Regiments and the 302nd Trench Mortar Battery. Readers will come across these units frequently in the database below, and a number of the Cork men who died served in its ranks. Some of them fell in actions that have become part of American military legend. One such engagement was that of the “Lost Battalion”. In October 1918, nine companies of the 77th were cut off for days in the Argonne Forest– an incident that inflicted not only severe hardship but horrendous casualties on the men engaged. One of those to fall early in the fighting was James Lynch of the 308th Infantry. A native of Youghal, he was mortally wounded while trying to carry news to the rear early in the advance. The divisional history records the moment he went down:

The forest at this point was infested with German machine gun nests and snipers, the enemy having brought up strong reinforcements, which made rapid advance extremely difficult and precarious. Private James Lynch, one of the runners of the Company, was sent from here with a message to the rear by the Company Commander. When gone only a short distance he was mortally wounded by machine gun fire, later dying in the advanced First Aid Station. His death was an extreme loss to the Company, since he was an able and fearless dispatch carrier. (Hussey & Flynn 1919:48)

The area where the ‘Lost Battalion’ were engaged in 1918 (History of Company E, 308th Infantry)

Another Cork man in the 77th Division was Patrick Shea from Adrigole on the Beara Peninsula. The young man was in his mid-twenties at the time of the war, and was a majorly popular figure in his regiment, the 305th Infantry. When the unit history was written in 1919, he featured prominently. One of the stories told about him related to the time when the men were still in training. With the approach of Yom Kippur, it was announced that any man of the Jewish faith would be permitted passes to go to New York. As the history told it ‘a knock was heard at a certain orderly room door. In the gloomy hallway stood a big, strapping fellow who made known his desire for a pass. “You want to to go in for Yom Kippur?” “Yiss, sorr.” “What’s your name?” “Patrick Shea”‘ (Tiebout 1919: 18). Patrick was killed in action in the final days of the war. His comrades never forgot him:

Good old Pat; one of the best fighting Irishmen that ever struggled through the Argonne with his back-breaking burden, a Hotchkiss machine gun. Nearly everybody in the Regiment knew Pat Shea, of the Machine Gun Company, and felt mightily bitter when he lost his life at the Meuse, in the last few minutes of the war. (Ibid.)

Cartoon accompanying the story of Pat Shea in the History of the 305th Infantry (History of the 305th Infantry)

Another Cork man to serve in the 305th was Sergeant Michael Kelleher. Like Pat he would not survive the war. He received a posthumous divisional citation for his actions on the Western Front:

G.O. 36, May 8, 1919.

Kelleher, Sgt. Michael (deceased), 1692867, Co. K, 305th Inf.– On Sept. 26-27, 1918, with his platoon performed the duties of a combat liaison group in the Argonne Forest between the 77th Division and the 28th Division on our right. At one time the artillery fire to which he was periodically subjected became particularly severe, 16 men of his unit being wounded. Despite this fact, Sgt. Kelleher, with cheerful disregard for his own safety, personally dressed and aided his wounded men and successfully maintained the morale of his unit, held his position and continued efficiently to carry out his mission without interruption. He was later killed in the Bois de la Naza, Oct. 5th, while gallantly leading his platoon in action.

Next of kin– Mrs. M. Donnell, aunt, 178 Devoe Street, Brooklyn (Ibid., 282).

Doughboys of the 307th Infantry Regiment, 77th Infantry Division on the march in France, June 1918 (Imperial War Museum via Wikipedia)

The details of the twenty Cork men we identified as being killed in action while serving with New York units during the First World War are outlined in Table 1 below.

Table 1. Those in the database recorded as killed in action. 

77th Division Dressing Station in a Church in La Chalade, October 1918 (History of the Seventy Seventh Division)

Future posts will explore different aspects of the database, such as those who were cited for bravery, and an examination of the Cork nurses who served in the American forces from New York. You can explore the full database, listing all of the Cork natives we have identified, below.

COMPLETE DATABASE

Men of the 77th Division pause during the advance, September 1918 (History of the Seventy Seventh Division)

References & Acknowledgements

*This database was compiled by Paul Higgins under the direction of Damian Shiels for the Midleton Archaeology & Heritage Project. Paul’s dedication to uncovering these men and women’s stories and his efforts at locating additional detail on their service added greatly to the project. Thanks are also due to Pat Sullivan, a Cork New Yorker whose own family served in the 77th Division, for drawing my attention to the fantastic cartoon depicting the reaction of Irish troops in the division to sighting the coast of Ireland while on their way to Europe. 

New York State Archives. New York State Abstracts of World War I Military Service, 1917–1919.

77th Division Association 1919. History of the Seventy Seventh Division August 25th 1917–November 11th 1918. 

Duffy, Francis P. 1919. Father Duffy’s Story: A Tale of Humor and Heroism, of Life and Death with the Fighting Sixty-Ninth. 

Hussey, Alexander & Flynn, Raymond. 1919. The History of Company E, 308th Infantry (1917-1919).

Tiebout, Frank B. 1919. A History of the 305th Infantry.