Category Archives: World War 1

Private Luther Irl Snapp, 1892-1918

LutherSnapp

During the centennial of World War 1, this page periodically remembers American servicemen who gave their lives in that war.

Private Luther Irl Snapp was born on September 15, 1892, near Marshall Minnesota. He was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Snapp. He graduated from the Marshall public schools and worked as a carpenter until 1915, when he moved to Baker, Montana. He enlisted in the Montana National Guard Infantry and served on the Mexican border. He was mustered into service in April 1917 and served with the 41st (Sunset) Division, 163rd Infantry, and sailed to France in the fall of 1917.

He was transferred to Company H of the 167th (Alabama) Infantry, 42nd (Rainbow) Division.  He was killed in action in  Chateau-Thierry on July 28, 1918, during the capture of the village of Sergy in the Second Battle of the Marne.

He was buried in the American cemetery near Sergy. His body was later disinterred and returned to the United States. He was buried at Marshall, Minnesota.

An American Legion Post in Marshall was named after Private Snapp in 1919. That Post does not appear to be in existence today.

The photo above is from Soldiers of the Great War, Volume 2, page 104.

References

Fallon County Times, October 24, 1918 and October 1921.

White Earth (Minn.) Tomahawk, Sept. 4, 1919.


Herbert Hoover and the Belgian Humanitarian Crisis

Today marks the 100th Anniversary of Herbert Hoover’s great humanitarian work in the First World War. His great granddaughter, Margaret Hoover, shared this poster today on her facebook page.

Starting a hundred years ago, President Hoover spent the last half century of his life serving his country, as Commerce Secretary, President, and Humanitarian. Fifty years ago today, the State of Iowa was preparing for the late President’s State Funeral. You can read more at the Cedar Rapids Gazette. You can also read more posts about President Hoover on my blog.

References

Herbert Hoover at Wikipedia 

Herbert Hoover National Historic Site

Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum

Hoover Institution at Stanford University

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Chateau de Mondement, 1914

Mondement1914

This illustration appeared in the New York Sun a hundred years ago today, on October 18, 1914.  It depicts the chateau at Mondement. During the last day of the First Battle of the Marne, September 12, 1914, the chateau changed hands four times before the final German retreat. The sketch was made by British war artist Frederic Villiers, who noted that “every shell hole and bullet mark has been faithfully portrayed.” The final drawing was the work of Dutch artist H.W. Koekkoek, also known as Hermanus Kokkoek the younger.

References

Association Mondement 1914 (French)

Monument national de la Victoire de la Marne at French Wikipedia

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U.S. Orders Closing of Honolulu Marconi Station, 1914

MarconiHonoluluIn the early days of the Great War, the U.S. Government was struggling with how to deal with wireless stations in relation to U.S. neutrality. We’ve seen other examples of how they were dealing with communications in the Atlantic.

But the Pacific was also a theater of war, with Japan at war with Germany. In this news clipping from a hundred years ago today in the Bryan (Texas) Daily Eagle and Pilot (October 16, 1914), the U.S. Government had ordered the closing of the Marconi Company station in the Hawaiian Islands.

In violation of U.S. neutrality, the station had sent a message reporting the presence in Honolulu of the German gunship Geier. The U.S. had ordered the station closed unless the company could come up with a satisfactory explanation. Japanese warships were reportedly speeding toward Hawaii.  The next day’s issue of the paper reported that the order to close the station was rescinded, the company having apologized for the breach of neutrality.

The ship was subsequently interned by the neutral United States.  When the U.S. entered the war, the ship was seized by the U.S. Navy and became the USS Schurz.  In 1918, the ship was rammed by a freighter, killing one crewman and injuring twelve.  The ship was then abandoned and sank three hours later.

SMS Geier in 1894. German Federal Archive photo, via Wikipedia.

SMS Geier in 1894. German Federal Archive photo, via Wikipedia.



Sinking of the Metapan

15Oct1914NYWorld

A hundred years ago today, October 15, 1914, the United Fruit Company passenger steamer Metapan, bound for New York from Colon, and the  American-Hawaiian line steamer Iowan, crashed near the entrance of New York Harbor. The Iowan suffered only slight damage, but The Metapan, with 76 passengers aboard, sank rapidly after the crash. Thanks largely to the ship being equipped with wireless, everyone got safely ashore. The Metapan was raised six days later and taken to Brooklyn for repairs.

Until a few weeks prior to the crash, the Metapan had flown the British flag.  With the war, she was hastily registered as an American ship and flew the neutral U.S. flag.

The first ship to respond to the SOS was the British cruiser Lancaster. The dredge Atlantic quickly sent two steam launches, and a number of other small boats gathered quickly. According to press reports, a group of English passengers were singing “It’s a long way to Tipperary” as they boarded the lifeboats.

According to the report in the New York Evening World, the Metapan’s wireless operator, realizing the ship’s predicament, switched over to a storage battery to send the SOS.

The Iowan had entered service only months earlier, and resumed inter-coastal service via the Panama Canal after repairs.  In 1916, the Iowan came under Navy control and served as a troop carrier.   The ship resumed civilian service after the war and in 1942, was transferred to the Soviet Union under lend lease, and was renamed the SS Tashkent.  After World War 2, the ship remained a Soviet merchant vessel until 1966, when she was transferred to North Korea for use as a fish processing ship.  She was finally scrapped in 1969.

References

SS Iowan at Wikipedia

Popular Mechanics, January 1915

Master, Mate & Pilot, Nov. 1914

New York Evening World, Oct. 15, 1914.


German Bird’s Eye View of Paris, 1914

ArizonaRepublican101014

A hundred years ago today, October 10, 1914, the Arizona Republican carried this aerial photo of Paris, taken from a German aeroplane. The paper notes that the pilot and photographer, one Lieutenant Thin, had received the Iron Cross. Undoubtedly the intended audience for this photo was the French: If the Germans can take a photograph from the air, then they can drop a bomb from the air, which is exactly what they had been doing.

In other war news, the papers were reporting that Antwerp had fallen, and that the Belgian government had reconstituted itself inside France.


Private Lauren Gilbert “Duby” Reid, 1896-1918.

LaurenReid

During the centennial of World War 1, this page periodically remembers American servicemen who gave their lives in that war.

Private Lauren Gilbert “Duby” Reid of Virginia City, Nevada, died on this day in 1918. He was born in Storey County, Nevada, on March 28, 1896, one of three children and the only son of William Garrence and Ellen Reid. He was wounded by shrapnel in the Bois d’Apremont, northeast of Binarville, Argonne Forest, France, and died of his wounds the next day, October 8, 1918, just over a month before the Armistice. He was one of the Lost Battalion of about 554 men cut off and completely surrounded by German forces during the  Meuse-Argonne Offensive, in which over 26,000 other American soldiers also lost their lives. The battle was the largest in U.S. history, and involved 1.2 million American soldiers. Some 70,000 French soldiers were also killed, as were between 90,000 and 120,000 Germans.

Private Reid served in the U.S. Army, 308th Infantry Regiment, 77th Division, Company G. His grave is at the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery, Romagne, France. His record can be viewed at the website of the American Battle Monuments Commission.

American Legion Duby Reid Post 30, Sparks Nevada, is named in his memory and continues to honor him.

The photo above is from Soldiers of the Great War, Volume 2, page 219.

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British Armored Vehicle, 1914

BritishArmoredVehicle

A hundred years ago today, October 5, 1914, the Klamath Falls (Ore.) Evening Herald carried this illustration of an early British armored vehicle. According to the caption, the vehicle saw service in France and Belgium against regiments of German Uhlans, cavalry that operated as raiders ahead of the main line. According to the report, the armored vehicle carried twenty men armed with rifles, and was used “to considerable effect.”


Chester A. Tongen

ChesterTongen

During the centennial of World War 1, this page periodically remembers American servicemen who gave their lives in that war.

Chester A. “Chesty” Tongen of Zumbrota, Minnesota, was a 1916 graduate of the University of Minnesota, with a degree in pharmacy.  At the University, he was a member of the Scandinavian Literary Society and the Hope Lutheran Society.

He started at the University’s College of Pharmacy in 1912, and his campus address that year is listed in a University Directory as 1609 SE 4th Street, Minneapolis, which currently houses a University parking ramp. He was the son of Andrew H. and Anna M. Tongen and had previously studied at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota.  He was a member of Holden Lutheran Church of Kenyon, Minnesota.

Despite his education, the Great War saw him as a Private. He is listed as having died of disease. I was unable to find any grave for Private Tongen at any of the American cemeteries in Europe, which I suspect means that he died of disease after induction but while still stateside.

His college yearbook bears the quote, “I shall soon have a Norske Apotek all my own.” It was not to be.

The photo here is from Soldiers of the Great War, Volume 2, Page 113.


A Positive Spin on Banking Chaos

ABAcheques

In an advertisement which appeared a hundred years ago today in the New York Sun, October 3, 1914, the American Bankers Association does its best to put a positive spin on things. Instead of announcing the obvious proposition that its travelers’ cheques probably aren’t very useful in Europe, it instead begins by proudly announcing that their sale continues as usual “for use throughout the United States” and that they continue to afford travelers “in ‘the States’ their customary service of protection and convenience in respect to money matters.”

Only then does it go on to announce, in smaller print, that sale of the cheques for foreign use had been temporarily discontinued, given that tourists could not be assured that they would be uniformly honored under conditions which change from day to day. However, it assured that their sale for use abroad would be resumed as soon as conditions warrant.

The ad then seems to downlplay the plight of Americans in the first days of the war, when Americans in London found themselves destitute, despite having travelers’ cheques and letters of credit from American banks. Their plight was relieved only when Herbert Hoover set up shop and started dispensing his own cash “against personal checks signed by unknown but American-looking people on unknown banks in Walla Walla and Fresno and Grand Rapids and Dubuque and Emporia and New Bedford.”

The chaotic situation ameliorated by Hoover with his personal cash was described in much more pleasant terms by the bankers’ association:

Through the co-operation of the Officers of the United States Government, Committees of Bankers in New York, London and Paris were enabled in a very short time to perfect arrangements for protecting all forms of travelers’ credits issued by American institutions and firms, and holders of travelers’ cheques and letters of credit have been by this means relieved from the serious consequences of the sudden paralysis of customary banking facilities abroad.

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