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Remembered Today:

U.S.A. Casualties of the Great War do-able!


museumtom

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I was just mulling around in my head why is it not possible to nail down the U.S.A. casualties with a bit more oomph. Lots of States it seems had their records burnt in various fires, but surely there is a way forward to step over this hurdle and nail it for once and for all.

On 'tinternet there are thousands of databases that are free to use and with a focused determination I am sure they could be used to have an end product.

Let us see what we have regarding casualties. Soldiers of the Great War is a cracker and if you print it all out you will have 2,200 pages of those who died during the conflict, the problem is that most of those named in it were brought home after the war. If you correlate that with the American Battle Monuments Commission, you will get a kind of a fist of it but there will still be thousands missing. 

The draft cards, can be accessed free of charge in familysearch.org/ after you register for free. 

By cross referencing Pershings regular casualty reports with the draft cards and the State Rolls of honor another hurdle will be crossed.

Some States had Rolls of Honor, Massachusettes and New York, in my opinion, being the best of them.

As I see it, not everyone who had a draft card served, but those who served, if they were not already serving in 1917, had a draft card.

Newspapers also have a great input in this, not only the U.S. newspapers but also those in Europe, Australia, etc.

I see each State had affiliations with various units and divisions and most of these histories are freely available to download.

I have not found a database yet that records the bodies returned to the U.S. after the war but I am sure somewhere such a record exist.

Another record which is fantastic is a record of every soldier who died from each State who died in the war, with his date of death, unit and service number. 

 

Just thinking out loud lads and lassies, just thinking...can it be done?

Kind regards.

 Tom.

 

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It's worth remembering that some men who served with the US forces appear on British War Memorials and Rolls of Honour.

RM

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13 hours ago, museumtom said:

 

I have not found a database yet that records the bodies returned to the U.S. after the war but I am sure somewhere such a record exist.

Tom

After years of searching I have not come across one. If you find one I'm sure I wouldn't be the only one interested :rolleyes:

Kind Regards

Aled

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Thank you Maureene, clive-hughes and Carmania.

 I was sure I seen someone, at some point within the past couple of months post a sheet showing returning soldiers and wondering if one of them was returned dead, but I cannot find it now. Perhaps the returning soldiers are listed with the returning bodies?

Happy New Year to all.

 Kind regards.

 Tom.

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A significant part of US dead in the Great War did not have to be repatriated because they died at home.....about one third of the total, I would guess.

 

Deaths from the influenza pandemic accounted for a great many of these.

 

phil

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Pleased to help you, Tom.

 

On my bookshelves I have a volume on casualty figures for wars over the past half millennium ,  which us compiled by an American expert by the name of Clodfelter, and it contains some meticulous compilations of US casualty data, including, of course, those of  the Great War.

 

I’ll be happy to cite any information it provides.

 

Happy New Year to you,too.

 

Phil

 

 

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I have wrestled with this for the best part of two decades

 

AMBC records only account for those graves/memorials under their care (a fraction of the total)

 

The federal structure of the USA means there are sometimes dual sets of records (state/national) but often gaps in both.

The US Federal Govt archive of WWI records in St Louis was the victim of a catastrophic fire which punches a huge hole in the federal records

State records vary massively in comprehensiveness and detail.

 

Just to give some insight during the war  13% of the US military were "regulars" 10% were National Guard (state troops) and 77% were conscripts ("National Army")

 

On the up side in terms of tracing individuals  there are a lot of unit histories (published in the 20s) which contain rosters, and there are lots of local county rolls as many states, and counties within states compiled records however as these were based on self reports they vary considerably in reliability (and coverage -- some counties published records others did not and there are no comprehensive lists) and there are no comprehensive lists of which counties compiled these rolls - I have a list from IL from the 1920s about published and planned honour rolls but how reliable this is up for grabs - I have used it to track down rolls for a couple of dozen illinois counties but it would be a monumental effort to repeat this nationally.

 

You have to dig fairly deeply in US records to distinguish between "battle deaths" in the AEF and "deaths in service" (stateside and in Europe)

Officially:

the US lost 125,000 lives between declaration of war and July 1 1919

115,660 of these were "overseas"

31% were in the US 36,050

69% were in the AEF 76,610

 

In terms of the nature of the casualties

50% were disease (57,460) -- influenza/pneumonia accounts for 83.6% of these (meningitis and TB being the other highest at @ 4% each)

43% were battle deaths (50,280)t

7% were "other" (7,920)

 

I have not been able to find any systematic records regarding repatriation of remains (these are sometimes listed on ship's manifests)  -- which continued into the mid 1920s.

Sometimes the only record (as Carmania can attest...) is local newspaper announcements.

 

Chris

 

Edited by 4thGordons
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Excellent analysis, thank you very much for your experience and sight.

Kind regards.

 Tom.

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What a brilliant resource, I did not find that one. Thank you very much Jim.

Kind regards.

 Tom.

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THIS IS A DECENT collection of links (National WWI Museum in Kansas City curates it)

 

 

THIS is the first volume of the state by state listing "Soldiers of the Great War"

Chris

Edited by 4thGordons
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Excellent stiletto and Chris, great sites.

 Kind regards.

 Tom.

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