Our Varied Service

Knoxville Men Swearing in for Service

Exclusive of a few companies and one division, there were no other units or organizations in the army in which the men and officers from Knox County were gathered distinctively and into large groups during the war.  Through assignment and transfer, as well as on account of the different times at which they entered the service of the government in its multitude of branches, the large majority of those who went to war from this city and county -- above 4,000 in number -- were scattered throughout all the arms of our military and naval forces.

To understand thoroughly this diffusion and wide separation of men in the army, a condition which applied to every section and locality, it will be necessary to trace briefly the growth of our military forces under the stress of a great emergency.  In its expansion from a small, compact organization of about 190,000 in time of peace, with virtually only four distinct branches -- infantry, artillery, cavalry and engineering -- to a huge, multiplex organization of more than 3,500,000 men under arms, our army underwent a complete transformation.  Quite as striking as its growth in numbers was the increase in the variety and complexity of special services and special branches, made necessary by the waging of war under new conditions and at a great distance from home.

As an illustration, the motor transport service, which was quite unknown before this war as a distinct organization was almost as large in numbers on the day the armistice with Germany was concluded as our whole army was before the war began.  The air service had more than 200,000 men and officers assigned to it.  The chemical warfare branch required the employment of almost a division for its special work.

The units of the national guard divisions were organized before this great expansion took place.  The individual companies were recruited from the same town or section.  They were composed of men who had been boys together, who knew each other intimately, and whose officers were men whose leadership they accepted.  When the call into federal service on August 5, 1917, came, and they went away to training camps, the same basic organization was maintained.  There were some infusions of draft troops in the fall of 1917 to bring these companies up to the new war strength, but the personnel remained largely the same throughout the war.  When the fighting was over, the men returned home in the same companies and same regiments, for the most part, with which they had departed two years before.  The companies had the same nucleus with which they went away to war.

Quite the reverse was true of the men who were in the regular and national army divisions.  After the declaration of war, the regular army regiments were expanded into three regiments each.  Each of them was made up of one-third veterans and two-thirds recruits or drafted men.  Many of the old men in the original regiments were transferred to the national army divisions as commissioned and non-commissioned officers.  They were scattered throughout the United States to assist in the training of the new men.

After the organization of the first national army divisions, this dispersion of men from the same section became even greater.  This was due to two entirely different causes, whose full effect became in evidence during the spring and summer months of 1918, when the majority of all the men drafted were called to the colors.

The national guard and regular army divisions, which were selected to go to France first because of their earlier training, began to suffer casualties and to dwindle in strength after a few weeks in the trenches.  There was need constantly of a large reservoir of man power from which replacements could be drawn periodically to fill these divisions.  It was found better policy to refill them in this way than to create new divisions to take their place in the line.  To meet this situation and to keep a steady flow of men to France to fill the gaps, infantry and artillery replacement camps were established in this country to train men for this work.  Instead of becoming a component part of some new division, the draft boards sent large groups of men directly to these camps, from which they were scattered throughout the combat divisions in France.

Under this policy, Knox County men filtered into regular army, national guard and national army combat divisions.  They were as likely to be assigned to a regiment of Californians or New Yorkers as to one of the Tennessee units.  They were used wherever the needs of the moment were greatest.  Sectional lines and previous residence were disregarded absolutely in the assignment of troops.  The War Department recognized this gradual amalgamation of the three grand divisions of the combat forces of the army and ordered that all officers and men should wear the same collar insignia, the large "U. S."

There was another factor which added to this dispersion of men from the same county, state and section.  By the spring of 1918, all the numerous special branches and services in the army had been organized on a skeleton basis.  Men of special, technical training were needed to fill them to their proper strength.  The government permitted men of this type with these special qualifications, even though they were registered and subject to call later into the service, to enlist in those branches for which they were fitted best.  Regular calls were sent out from Washington to the draft boards, asking for men of this quality.  Hundreds of Knox Countians came under this classification and rendered their service to the government in this way.

Finally, to complete the thorough dispersion of men of the same city or county, the local draft boards were ordered to send recruits to many different camps over the country.  In the beginning of the operation of the draft law, Knox County boards sent these men only to Camp Gordon.  But in the heavy calls of the summer months of 1918, men were ordered to Camp Sevier, Camp Shelby, Camp Greene, Camp Jackson, Camp Taylor, Camp Sherman, and other cantonments.

Examination of the personal war records of the men, whose photographs are shown elsewhere in this volume, will reveal the fact that there was hardly a division in our army, a camp in this country, or a single one of the branches of the service, in which there were not a few Knox Countians.  They were throughout the majority of the combat divisions; in the infantry, artillery, cavalry, quartermaster corps, and engineering branches; in the motor transport service, the many phases of railroad work in France, in the staff schools and staff headquarters; in mobile ordnance repair shops, in pioneer regiments, labor battalions; cooking and baking schools, gas and flame service, and in the many subdivisions of the service of supply.

This diversity of service both at home and abroad has made it next to impossible, therefore, to sketch in one volume, or even in many volumes, the history of the organizations of all the men from Knox County who played some part, either large or small, in the greatest of all wars.  Such a history would be a complete story of the war in all its phases and of the battle actions of many companies, regiments and divisions.  Its scope would be so extensive as to preclude its treatment in a volume of this size.  The personal records of the Knox County men, which are given later, tell the principal facts of their military careers and of their military service.

[Photo at right - "Soldiers of the Air:  A battle formation flight of seventeen army airplanes at Kelly Field, San Antonio, Texas."]  The fighting operations of the majority of these men, however, are comprised in the St. Mihiel and Argonne Forest battles, which constitute the distinctive, offensive accomplishment and contribution of the American Expeditionary Forces in winning the war.  Several divisions, sooner or later, were stationed elsewhere, either entirely or in part throughout the fighting, but always under the British or French High Command.  They made glorious records on whatever front or in whatever sector it was their lot to be engaged.  The Thirtieth and Twenty-seventh divisions fought side by side with the British throughout their service in France.  The First, Second, Third, Fourth, Twenty-sixth, Twenty-eighth, Thirty-second, and Forty-second divisions took a very weighty and active part under the French during June and July, 1918, in checking the German drive toward Paris, while their assistance in the counter-offensive of Marshal Foch, beginning July 18, was the main factor in causing the German evacuation of the Marne salient.

The St. Mihiel and Argonne battles, however, stand out above all the engagements of the American forces during the war, because they were fought in American sectors, under American leadership, and largely by American troops.  The larger number of our combat divisions, twenty-four out of the twenty-nine which had battle experience, engaged in one or both of these great offensive operations.

To describe at some length these battles, together with the operations of the Thirtieth Division in Belgium and in the Somme offensive, should include, then, in a general way the principal activities on the front of the men from Knox County who were privileged to have a part in the fighting.  Reference to the accompanying maps will make clear some of the difficulties that they encountered, show what parts of the line were held by the divisions of which Knox Countians were members, and the strategy which the American and allied commanders employed in accomplishing their ends and bringing the Germans to their knees.

The same conditions, which operated to separate and scatter the men who went into the army, also applied to those who went into the navy, air service and the marines.  In no camp, training station, naval base or battle fleet were there gathered more than a handful of men who were from this city or county.  Yet they served with the same fidelity, endured the same hardships, made the same sacrifices that their brothers did who fortunately were grouped together in larger numbers and in distinctive units.  Only their personal records will ever reveal the quiet, unostentatious service they rendered.  No class of men worked so hard, so long hours, or were so constantly exposed to danger as the men in the navy.  Yet there was little of the spectacular in their work which brought them before the public eye like the soldiers who took part in some memorable battle.

This great majority of Knox Countians, who were submerged in the different varieties of war service, returned home as they left.  They came by ones and twos and threes.  Some were discharged a few days after the armistice was signed.  Most of them were mustered out during the spring and summer of 1919.  A few, who were in the last divisions to leave Germany as part of the army of occupation, did not receive their discharges for nearly a year after fighting had ceased.  There was no blare of trumpets or reception committees to meet them.  They came in quietly, and, after a few days of rest, went back to the occupations and professions in which they were engaged before war called them to their country's standard.  They had done their full duty.  They were glad to lay aside the livery and pursuit of war and return to the labors of peace.

[Photo at left -- Knoxville soldiers receiving citations]

Except as noted, all HTML code and graphics in the URL path [http://www.knoxcotn.org/military/wwi/] were created by and copyrighted 2001-2003 to Billie R. McNamara.   All rights reserved.   Please direct all questions and comments to Ms. McNamara.