Remembering those Lenawee County residents who 'gave all' in war efforts

This week Americans will celebrate Veterans Day. A day set aside to recognize the men and women who have served in the armed forces, whether during peacetime or wartime.

Established after the First World War as Armistice Day to commemorate the armistice signed on the “11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month” of 1918 and effectively ending the war, President Dwight Eisenhower changed Armistice Day to Veterans Day in 1954.

When the United States entered the war on April 6, 1917, Lenawee County stepped up.

No less than 1,744 Lenawee County residents served, with at least nine crossing the border to volunteer in the Canadian Army.

Although Veterans Day is intended to honor living veterans, it is also a time when those veterans look back in remembrance of comrades who were not so fortunate.

Keith Derbyshire, a volunteer in the archives at the Lenawee Historical Museum, is compiling detailed information to memorialize those who never came home, regardless of how or where they died. Many were killed or mortally wounded in battle, while others died from disease in a war fought during the Spanish flu pandemic. Some who died from disease, died in the U.S. during training while others died either aboard ship on their way to war or somewhere in Europe. Sadly, disease claimed more lives than the battlefield.

Lenawee County lost 84 soldiers, sailors, Marines and an Army nurse. Eight are remembered below.

Pvt. Rexford Robert Gaddy, 18, of Tecumseh contracted measles while in training at Camp MacArthur in Waco, Texas. Measles led to broncho-pneumonia and on Jan. 20, 1918, Gaddy became the first Lenawee Country man to die in the service of his country in WWI.

Pvt. Orvel V. Blakeley, 19, was from Clayton. Blakeley served in Company C, 126th Infantry, and was the first Lenawee County man to die in France. Oddly, the official record states that he was murdered. The same record has a footnote saying he had previously been reported to have drowned on Jan. 27, 1918. His obituary in the March 4, 1918, Daily Telegram simply states, “Whether he died from some natural cause or from a trench injury is not known.”

Pvt. Claude Thomas Annis, 29, died of wounds received in action while serving in Company B, 126th Infantry, Adrian’s Guard unit in the 82nd Division. Annis was killed on Aug. 8, 1918, in Crezancy, Aisne, France. He was Adrian’s first combat death. The Adrian VFW bears his name.

Pvt. Ralph Carpenter, 20, of Hudson died on a troop ship on Oct. 4, 1918, while deploying to Europe. He succumbed to pneumonia, likely brought on by the Spanish flu. Like many others from around the country, Carpenter made it through training and died of disease on the way to war.

Given the realities of war, it isn’t over until it’s over.

Sgt. Arthur O’Dell, and Pvts. Henry C. Rosenberg and Conrad Albert Frank Carlin, three of Lenawee’s war casualties, all died on the last full day of the war, Nov. 10, 1918, within 24 hours of the armistice.

O’Dell, 35, of Adrian of the 2nd Motor Transport Corps, accidentally drowned in a canal near his station at about 8 p.m. No details of the accident have been found.

Rosenberg, 30, of Adrian was in the 328th Machine Gun Battalion. Rosenberg was killed in France between 2 and 3 o’clock on the 10th. Although he died in battle, the exact action and location of his death is unknown.

Carlin, 24, of Adrian served in the 329th Machine Gun Battalion. He was killed while his unit was pursuing retreating Germans. The retreating Germans turned and made a last stand at Jametz, France. Conrad died instantly when struck by shell fire.

Nurse Julia Lide, 45, of Adrian was a veteran of the Spanish-American War. When World War I broke out, Lide was superintendent of Emma L. Bixby Hospital in Adrian. She joined the Harper Hospital Unit from Detroit on June 9, 1917. She served in hospitals in France for 18 months. During the war, she and her unit were cited for bravery under “heavy fire and aerial bombardment” on the front near Chateau-Thierry. She continued caring for the wounded in France after the armistice and died of a noncombat illness. One source speculates she may have contracted the Spanish flu, whereas the official Army records report that she died of peritonitis, probably due to a ruptured appendix.

She died in Base Hospital No. 10 in France on Feb. 24, 1919. She is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

The effects of the war were felt by virtually every family in the county — no — by virtually every family in the country and probably much of the world. For men and women returning from the war, and the families of those who would never return, it was a bittersweet mixture of thanksgiving and mourning.

Bob Wessel is vice president of the Lenawee Historical Society and can be contacted at LenHist51@gmail.com.

This article originally appeared on The Daily Telegram: Bob Wessel: Remembering those county residents who gave all in war