Before I get started at the beginning of my grandpa's war story, I can't resist sharing some photos from this past weekend. My sisters came to visit and brought along a suitcase, the trunk and a couple of boxes that we hadn't really looked through much. I'm feeling disappointed in advance for the day that we dig through the last box but in the meantime we are still discovering so much cool stuff.
A big suitcase was chock full of my grandpa's uniforms including a heavy overcoat and a couple of blankets (one looks to have some blood stains on it). I'm sure this woolly fabric kept the soldiers warm but oof is it scratchy. The uniform jacket pockets were full of goodies including the "victory medal" showing that my grandpa served in the defensive sector at St. Mihiel and Meuse-Agronne.
In the pocket over his heart was a letter. It's addressed to "Dear friend (unknown)", which makes me think it was sent as part of a program encouraging people to write letters to soldiers to help with morale. My grandpa's name is on the envelope though so I don't quite get how it worked. The letter is pretty goofy, written by Olive V. Kinnarney in Framingham, Mass., who apparently also sent along some home made fudge. It's dated April 10, 1919 and addressed to my grandpa (with no postage) in Camp Devens, Mass., which is where he landed for a stretch on the way home. "Well soldier boy," Olive writes. "If you can give this candy a good home and would like some more to keep it company I'd just as soon burn my finger again in the attempt to make some more for you."
It was particularly cool to see and feel all of the uniforms because by now I've seen a lot of pictures of my grandpa wearing them -- both at the time he was in the war and later. He was so active in the American Legion which I imagine is why he suited up now and again. We even have a picture of him in the uniform with my dad when he was just a boy. My dad was born in 1935 so this shot was taken maybe 20 years after the war ended.
Some goggles we found in a trunk
My dad and my grandpa
Also in one of the trunks was the bayonet from the end of my grandpa's rifle. There's a stamp on it that says 1897 which may indicate that it went with a Winchester rifle used in WWI and known as a "trench gun," according to Wikipedia. The trunk also had two framed items: one a picture of C. R. Edwards who was the commander of the 26h Division, the Yankee Division, in which my grandpa served. The Yankee Division drew from six New England states: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont. Notice Ohio isn't one of them. How my grandpa ended up in that division I'm not sure. But the cool thing is that it turns out Edwards was from Cleveland, just like my grandpa.
The other framed item is a fancy certificate naming my grandpa as having served in the Yankee Division in the war and signed by Edwards. On the back is a sticker with my great grandmother's name -- my grandfather's mother -- and a number. I've dug around into documents on Ancestry, thanks to the work my cousin has done building a family tree there, and it looks like my great grandmother lived out her final days in a small-ish place for elderly people. My sisters and I wondered if perhaps this certificate was hung on the wall of her room. I have no idea if that's the case but it's interesting that her name is on the back and I love the idea of her hanging it on the wall with pride.
Over the weekend we uncovered far too much to share here all at once so I'll leave you with just a couple more tidbits. One is a card that shows payments for "war risk insurance." The policy would pay out $10,000, which 100 years ago must have been quite a lot of money!
The other card is a recipe for a remedy for asthma. I find this one particularly interesting. My dad always said he thought his lungs would "get him" just like his dad and that would be due to breathing in nasty stuff on the job (my dad told me he and his pals would warm their hands over pots of molten lead that they used for soldering pipes. I can't imagine it could be good to breathe that stuff in.). But this card with the asthma remedy is with all the stuff of my grandpa's from just after the war, which would seem to indicate that he had lung issues before he'd spent much time working as a plumber. One of the trunks has his gas mask and it's easy to try to connect the dots and wonder if his lungs were damaged in the war. We haven't yet pulled out the gas mask from its canvas bag -- my brother in law thinks we might want to be careful about that because who knows what might be trapped in it. I'll do some investigating before I decide to unpack it. One fun twist to the asthma remedy is that at the bottom of the card is the name Herman Krebs and the address of a drug store. My dad always talked about a good pal of his growing up who he referred to as "Krebsy" and I wonder if that might have been Herman's son.
In the picture below, the gas mask is in the canvas bag on the left of the trunk. The helmet, which my sister put on her head and said was very, very heavy, has what looks like a hand drawn tree. I've seen that design in photos online and it appears to indicate the Yankee Division 102nd infantry regiment, which is where my grandpa served.
