Cobh commemorates centenary of American Naval forces arrival during WWI

By Sean O’Riordan
via The Irish Examiner

Captain Daniel Dwyer, USNSome descendants of those who served with the US Navy based in Cork during the First World War gathered in Cobh yesterday, along with a number of American military personnel, to commemorate the centenary of their arrival there on May 4, 1917.

They unveiled a plaque to mark the occasion at the former Admiralty House, which is now a Benedictine priory. The nuns, who are in an enclosed order, seemed to thoroughly enjoy the spectacle of a military remembrance, which included flagbearers, a lone piper, and bugler.

The plaque was unveiled by Elizabeth Helmer, great granddaughter of Commander Joseph Taussig, who led the first six US destroyers into the port.

Tim Forsyth, US deputy chief of mission at the American embassy, said that by the end of the war, 92 of his country’s navy ships had served out of Cork.

For the chief of staff of the US Naval Forces in Europe and Africa, Captain David Dwyer, the event brought back his Irish roots. He said he was very honoured to attend as his great, great, great grandfather emigrated to the US from Cork in 1847.

Read more: Cobh commemorates centenary of American Naval forces arrival during WWI

Remembering World War I

The U.S. Navy arrives in Europe

via The American Battle Monuments Commission

On May 4, 1917 the USS Wadsworth, an American destroyer, arrived in Queenstown, Ireland to support the war effort. Image courtesy Naval History and Heritage Command.Not quite a month after the United States declared war, the first American warships arrived in Europe on May 4, 1917. The Germans had resumed unrestricted submarine warfare in early 1917, leading to more than 800 Allied ships being sunk in a matter of months. Without escorts, these ships served as easy prey for the Germans. This warfare had reduced British grain stores to a critical three week supply. The Royal Navy urgently requested more destroyers for hunting submarines.

The destroyers’ arrival was due in part to the presence in England of an American naval mission headed by Vice Adm. William Sims. A few years before, then Capt. Sims was President of the Naval War College at Newport. Appointed by the first Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), William Benson, together they anticipated a transatlantic naval war involving new challenges and technology. Ashore and in exercises of the “War College Afloat” they studied the role of the Navy in modern war.

By 1917 Benson anticipated a naval campaign in European waters that would require a naval headquarters in England. Sims, with established reputation throughout the Navy, proved the ideal officer for that mission. He traveled to London under an assumed name, in civilian guise, arriving on April 2, 1917 with the intention of establishing direct contact between the United States Chief of Naval Operations, the Royal Navy, and other Allied naval forces.

Read more: Remembering World War I: The U.S. Navy Arrives in Europe

When America joined WWI and became a global power

By Carlos Hamann
via MSN

When America entered WWI, a century ago, its industrial might and vast manpower tipped the balance of the conflict and marked its own emergence as a global power. (AFP photo)When America entered World War I, a century ago this week, the European powers were bogged down in a grinding trench war that had killed millions and ravaged the European continent.

Swinging its industrial might and vast manpower behind France and Britain against Germany and its allies on April 6, 1917, the United States tipped the balance of the conflict and marked its own emergence as a global power.

"World War I was clearly the turning point for developing a new global role for the United States, ushering in a century of international engagement to promote democracy," said Jennifer Keene, a World War I expert at Chapman University in California.

Americans had been keenly following the war ever since it broke out in August 1914, showing broad support for neutrality.

But public opinion changed with the May 1915 sinking of the Lusitania.

The British ocean liner was en route from New York to Liverpool when a German submarine torpedoed it off the coast of Ireland, killing 1,201 passengers, including 128 Americans.

"It seems inconceivable that we should refrain from taking action on this manner, for we owe it not only to humanity but to our own national self-respect," former president Teddy Roosevelt, an influential pro-allied hawk, told the New York Tribune at the time.

Read more: When America joined WWI and became a global power

Doughboy MIA adds new name to missing list

By Robert J. Laplander
Directing Manager for Doughboy M.I.A. and Finding The Lost Battalion

A couple months ago or so we were contacted by Mr. Stephen Gehnrich, who alerted us to the fact that a sailor from his county in Maryland who was lost at sea and memorialized on a plaque to the soldiers and sailors who gave there lives from that county in the war was NOT listed on the official list of missing in action assembled following the war, as posted on the Doughboy MIA website.

We launched an intensive investigation, as the 100th anniversary of the loss of the sailor – Seaman Herbert H. Renshaw – was coming up fast (May 22nd), and prepared our case. If we could put this one to bed, we wanted to do so before that date got here, if we could.

Read more: Doughboy MIA adds new name to missing list

Four Questions for Colin Williamson

"This is something that we should never, ever, forget."

By Chris Isleib
Director of Public Affairs, U.S. World War One Centennial Commission

There is a special partnership that we should all be aware of. It is taking place between our friends at the Blinded Veterans Association, here in the U.S., and the Blind Veterans UK. Both organizations are national charities for vision-impaired ex-Service men and women. Blind Veterans UK started during World War I, and BVA began during World War II.

The two groups have come together to help each other with exchange visits, in a program they call Project Gemini. These exchange visits center on joint U.S. and UK cooperation regarding military eye injuries, blind services, blast Shell Shock to TBI, and vision research today.

The first exchange visit took place last month in Washington DC, on the anniversary of WW I with the strong support of the American Embassy London, and British Embassy DC. The visit included meetings with senior DOD and VA officials, as well as meetings at British Embassy DC with Major General Richard Cripwell and his military staff, visits with U.S. Senator John Boozman, tour of Capitol, meetings at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and public education lectures on 100 year history war injuries, plus Shell Shock- verses Blast Concussions to Today’s TBI lecture from historian at Defense Center of Excellence (DCoE.) at National Medical and Science Museum.

Colin WilliamsonThe group also toured Arlington National Cemetery with the Old Guard, and were able to present a Poppy Wreath at the Tomb of Unknown Soldier, as a nod to the Blind Veterans UK origins from World War I. The next exchange visit will take place in London, May 21st to May 28th. There will be public educational seminar which will include DOD military trauma vision ophthalmologists experts on TBI- Shell Shock then to blast concussions today, vision research, and history rehabilitation services 1917 to Today. Plus the UK Surgeon General is Opening Speaker for this seminar.

We caught up with one of the Project Gemini participants, Colin Williamson, to talk about this special program.

You are with the Blinded Veterans UK, an organization that has roots in World War I. Tell us about the work that your people do.

My name is Colin Williamson and I am member of the Blind Veterans UK. I was fortunate enough to have been invited to attend the week in DC as part of the Project Gemini group from Blind Veterans UK. Tom and I actually started the programme together back in 2011 and I’m really very passionate about this project and its objectives.

Read more: Four Questions for Colin Williamson

Four Questions for Teresa Van Hoy

"How fragile peace can be if prudent voices go unheeded"

By Chris Isleib
Director of Public Affairs, U.S. World War One Centennial Commission

You and your students have been putting together an amazing documentary mini-film series on World War I. Tell us about it.

Professor Theresa Van Hoy

How did this project come about? Was this part of scheduled curriculum, or was it a grand idea that someone was able to win support for? What challenges did you face -- What was your students reactions to this opportunity?

We have the World War I Centennial Commission to thank for the genesis of this project! Because the WWICC was listening, my students felt empowered to speak. The first to welcome their voices was General Alfred Valenzuela, thereafter, Monique Seefried and many others both at WWICC and TX WWICC. We also drew inspiration from two Frenchmen who made military history come alive for my students. Gerard Mignard and Michel Benoit helped transformed my students' microdocumentary films from course assignment to clarion call.

Read more: Four Questions for Teresa Van Hoy

National Park Service shares forgotten WWI stories from Parks

By Nathan King
National Park Service

What do Homer Saint-Gaudens, women’s suffragettes, Theodore Roosevelt, the Gettysburg Battlefield, a copper mine in Michigan, and Irving Berlin have in common? They all have a connection to World War I through the national parks.

Departing soldiers wave to the Statue of Liberty, ca. 1917 (NPS).To tell these stories in honor of the WWI centennial, the National Park Service (NPS) launched an all-new NPS WWI website.

Park rangers, historians, and other subject matter experts contributed all new material, sharing untold stories from the parks. As the project developed, and more and more stories came to light, it was as though we had discovered an exciting new dimension to the parks, and we were eager to share it.

For example, many Civil War battlefields are now national parks. The Civil War was just fifty years before World War I, and many of the battlefields were still reserves that would not be transferred to the NPS until the New Deal era (the NPS was created in 1916). Many of these Civil War battlefields were used as training grounds for WWI. On the fields of Gettysburg, Maj. Dwight D. Eisenhower was training Americans to maneuver tanks in 1917. On the site of the Petersburg Battlefield, where Civil War entrenchment tactics reached their zenith, 20th-century Americans were digging trenches on the same ground to apply the knowledge of the nation’s bloody past to a new war. You can still walk these hallowed grounds.

Read more: National Park Service Shares Forgotten WWI Stories From Parks

Four Questions for Douglas Mudd

"A greater appreciation for how WWI has shaped our world"

By Chris Isleib
Director of Public Affairs, U.S. World War One Centennial Commission

You have a great new WWI-themed exhibit coming up. Tell us about it. How did it come about?

Douglas MuddYes, we do have a great exhibit coming up! We starting planning for it about two years ago to commemorate the upcoming centennial of the U.S. entry into the war. Rod Gillis and I had been talking about World War I ever since he began work on the commemorative coin project - I believe 4 years ago. I personally have been interested in World War I since I was about 10 years old. I was fascinated by the airplanes and the aces who flew them and started scratch-building them with cardboard and toothpicks. Since then, I have studied the war avidly, so having the opportunity to do an exhibit on the topic was a natural.

My approach to exhibits at the Money Museum is to use history as the starting point - most people have some familiarity with history, but relatively few know much about money or medals. We can teach people of all ages more about money by showing them how money and medals are history in your hands - if you know how to interpret the words and images on them.

Read more: Four Questions for Douglas Mudd

Remembering World War I

American Medical Units mobilize shortly after U.S. enters the War

via The American Battle Monuments Commission

Base Hospital No. 4 during World War I. Image courtesy of the National Library of Medicine. Less than a month after the United States entered World War I, Maj. Harry L. Gilchrist with the U.S. Army Medical Corps received orders to move Base Hospital No. 4 to France. On May 8, 1917 the unit departed New York harbor for Europe, and within weeks it had replaced a British hospital and was receiving patients in Rouen, France. Base Hospital No. 4 was one of six mobilized immediately to assist the British Expeditionary Force in France.

While General of Armies John J. Pershing had not yet set foot in France, British forces could not delay in making an urgent plea for medical support. In total they requested sixteen base hospitals and additional medical staff to assist their forces. Because the British had been fighting for nearly three years, they were in desperate need of fresh staff and support. Fortunately, advanced preparation of the American Red Cross (ARC), the Army, and Allied transportation made an immediate response possible.

The Army had established reserves of medical supplies for 67 field, base, and evacuation hospitals, 41 ambulance companies, and 131 combat regiments. These supplies were distributed from medical depots around the United States, and coordinated by an established system of telegraph communication. Even though the United States had never fought in this type of global conflict, the country managed to mobilize resources in an efficient and quick manner based on the realities of the early 20th century.

The Army Nurse Corps, established in 1901, was supplemented by the ARC nursing reserve with around 8,000 trained nurses ready for overseas assignments. The ARC had been providing services in Europe since fall 1914. It worked closely with the Army and Navy, and other private American medical agencies, and it raised funds, trained reserve staff, and acquired supplies and equipment.

Read more: Remembering World War I: American Medical Units Mobilize Shortly after U.S. Enters the War

 World War I and the U.S. Army

"Its legacy continues to this very day."

By General Barry McCaffrey, USA (Ret.)
via Military Times

World War I transformed America’s Army from a 19th-century skeleton force barely capable of responding to a deadly border raid by Mexican revolutionaries into a potent modern expeditionary power with millions under arms and the resources, skills and battlefield courage to shock the enemy into submission.

By General Barry McCaffrey, USA (Ret.)The transformation would not come easily, but when it did, it would reinvent the U.S. Army in such a profound manner that its legacy continues to this day, woven into the very fabric of its fatigues.

Prior to its entry into World War I, the U.S. prided itself on not having a significant standing army. Its last meaningful engagements had been the Indian Wars of the late 1800s and the Philippines insurrection of 1900. With Congress declaring war on the Central Powers, our armed forces needed to create virtually overnight the organizational structure, staffing and logistics needed to field a modern army. While patriotism was overwhelming, the pragmatic challenge of getting from Main Street to the Marne would test the resources of a country whose entry into a global conflict would propel it to becoming a superpower.

Shortcomings became obvious, such as the absence of effective field artillery, the need to exponentially increase the number of firearms produced in our armories, uncertainty over which vehicles would survive the wear and tear of battered French roads, and much more. While the quartermaster was distributing unprecedented contracts for items ranging from boots to ponchos, the medical corps was trying to figure out how to protect the personal hygiene of millions of young men who hadn’t traveled beyond the county line, much less been deployed overseas. “Over there,” indeed.

Read more: World War I and the U.S. Army: "Its legacy continues to this very day."