Allies Day 1917
|
|
AMERICAN ARMIES AND BATTLEFIELDS IN EUROPE American Battle Monuments Commission U.S. Government Printing Office The definitive battlefield guide book for the AEF. Has descriptions of all combat and support activities, tour driving routes and lots of maps. |
THE MEASURE OF AMERICA'S WORLD WAR AERONAUTICAL EFFORT Gorrell, Edgar S. Our Aviation Editor says the Gorrell Reports are the bible for information on the Air Service during the Great War. |
THE US AIR SERVICE IN WORLD WAR I [4 Vol.] Mauer and Mauer Government Printing Office Not reviewed for this work. |
AMERICA'S FIRST EAGLES By Lucian Thayer McGee and Bender, eds. James Bender Publishing, 1983 Not reviewed for this work. |
U.S. WARSHIPS OF WORLD WAR I Silverstone, Paul H. Doubleday, 1970 Excellent, but hard to find resource book. Use Janes World War I volumes if you cannot find this one. |
THE UNITED STATES ARMY IN THE WORLD WAR: 1917-1919 [17 Vol.] U.S. Army U.S. Government Printing Office Official Histories of every U.S. Division of the AEF are also available. There are usually two types, a brief operational summary with maps published by the American Battle Monuments Commission and a comprehensive work by the U.S. Army. |
THE UNITED STATES ARMY IN THE WORLD WAR: 1917-1919 [17 Vol.] U.S. Army U.S. Government Printing Office Official Histories of every U.S. Division of the AEF are also available. There are usually two types, a brief operational summary with maps published by the American Battle Monuments Commission and a comprehensive work by the U.S. Army. |
ORDER OF BATTLE OF US LAND FORCES IN THE WORLD WAR, (3 VOL.) U.S. Army U.S. Government Printing Office The essential research instrument for finding and tracking AEF units at all levels. Available with Official History, American Armies and Battlefields in Europe and other primary source material on a single CD. |
NAVAL AVIATION IN WORLD WAR I Van Wyen, Adrian O. Government Printing Office Surprisingly, there is no Official U.S. Navy history of the war. We are open to suggestions on the best work comprehensively covering the American Naval effort in the war. |
|
THE UNKNOWN SOLDIERS: AFRICAN AMERICANS IN WORLD WAR I Barbeau, Arthur & Florette, Henri Da Capo Press, 1996 Recent work on a neglected subject. About 180,000 black Americans served in France with the AEF. |
MAKE THE KAISER DANCE Berry, Henry Doubleday, 1978 Stories from old doughboys looking back at their adventures sixty years earlier. |
THE WAR TO END ALL WARS Coffman, Edward M. Oxford Univ. Press, 1968 The definitive work on the American military experience in World War I. If you only read one book from this list, this should be the one. |
YANKS Eisenhower, BG John Free Press, Highly recommended. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
OVER THERE Freidel, Frank Little, Brown, 1964 Excellent introductory work on the AEF. Lots of Signal Corps photos and the author draws on many first hand accounts to personalize things. Good also for younger readers. |
AMERICAN VOICES OF WORLD WAR I Evans, Martin Marix Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2001 Highly recommended. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
RETREAT HELL! WE JUST GOT HERE! Evans, Martin Marix Osprey Publishing, 1998 Excellent illustrated history. Good on uniforms and on covering some of the lesser known operations such as the capture of the St. Quentin Canal. Excellent for young persons. |
OVER THERE - THE UNITED STATES IN THE GREAT WAR Farwell, Byron W.W. Norton & Company, 1998 Not reviewed for this article. |
AMERICAN'S ALL! FOREIGN BORN SOLDIERS IN WORLD WAR I Ford, Nancy Gentile Texas A&M Press, 2001 Contains much surprising information about the confluence of America's immigrant experience and the AEF. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
OVER THERE: THE AMERICAN SOLDIER IN WORLD WAR I Gawne, Jonathan Stackpole Books, 1997 Not reviewed for this article |
THE LAST DAYS OF INNOCENCE: AMERICA AT WAR 1917-1918 Harries and Harries Vintage Books, 1998 Not reviewed yet. |
DOUGHBOYS: THE GREAT WAR AND THE REMAKING OF AMERICA Keene, Jennifer D. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001 Super on the social heritage of the AEF experience. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
The AMERICAN HERITAGE HISTORY OF WORLD WAR I Marshall, BG S.L.A. American Heritage, 1964 Strong on American Participation with good maps and photos. |
THE DOUGHBOYS Mead, Gary Overlook Press, 2001 Excellent update on the AEF by a British journalist. More systematic than the Stallings's work of the same title. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
THE DOUGHBOYS Stallings, Laurence Harper & Row, 1963 A perennial favorite written 45 years after the war by a Marine veteran who lost a leg at Belleau Wood and later co-wrote the play What Price Glory? And the film The Big Parade. Another very good read about the general history of the AEF. This book contains the reflections of one man (like William Manchester's World War II memoir Goodbye Darkness) and its value is in setting the "tone of the times," not for its rendering of facts. History it is not, a good read it is. |
|
AT BELLEAU WOOD Asprey, Robert Putnam, 1965 The story of the bloody action the Marine Brigade of the 2nd Division fought in the defense of Chateau-Thierry. |
THE TEST OF BATTLE [Meuse-Argonne] Braim, Paul Univ. of Delaware Press, 1987 Highly critical account of the AEF's greatest battle by a Viet Nam era soldier and military historian. |
U.S. INFANTRY WEAPONS OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR Canfield, Bruce N. Andrew Mowbray Publishers, 2000 The definitive work on the subject. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
DEVIL DOGS: FIGHTING MARINES OF WORLD WAR I Clark, George Presidio, 1998 Fine new work focusing on the Marine Brigade which fought with the 2nd Division at Chateau-Thierry, Soissons, St. Mihiel, Blanc Mont and crossed the Meuse River the last day of the war. Very critical of the mis and over use of the Marines and their Army mates in the 2nd Division. |
THE RAINBOW DIVISION IN THE GREAT WAR Cook, James J. Praeger Publishers, 1994 Interesting look at the division which contained National Guard units from 26 states and the District of Columbia. Use of personal materials like letters and diaries and the maps make this work especially Interesting. The Division was among the earliest arriving and most active of the AEF. |
THE MIDNIGHT WAR Goldhurst, Richard McGraw Hill, 1978 Good detail and insights on the AEF missions to Northern Russia and Siberia which saw action long after the armistice in France. |
THE LOST BATTALION Johnson and Pratt Bobbs-Merrill, 1938 The story of the 308th Infantry and associated units of the 77th Division that found itself surrounded in the Argonne, terribly mutilated and eventually relieved. |
GAS AND FLAME IN THE WORLD WAR Langer, William L. Story of the engineering units that operated both poison gas and flame-throwers during the war. |
INFANTRY IN BATTLE The Infantry School A. survey of infantry tactics of the World War selected and with commentary by the Faculty of the Infantry School at Fort Benning under the direction of Colonel George C. Marshall. |
THE DEFEAT OF IMPERIAL GERMANY: 1917-1918 Paschall, Rod Algonquin Press, 1989 Includes key chapter critical of AEF tactical doctrine. |
TREAT 'EM ROUGH - THE BIRTH OF AMERICAN ARMOR Wilson, Dale E. Presido, 1989 Comprehensive treatment, especially good on "lessons learned." Covers both Patton's work in France and Eisenhower's work at Camp Colt, Pennsylvania. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
|
THE YANKEE MINING SQUADRON OR LAYING THE NORTH SEA MINE BARRAGE Belknap, Reginald H. US Naval Institute, 1920 The story of how American ships laid 95% of the 60,000 mines used to block German Submarines in the North Sea. |
U-BOATS DESTROYED: THE EFFECT OF ANTI-SUBMARINE WARFARE, 1914-1918 Grant, Robert M. Putnam, 1964 American ships played a big role in escorting convoys. |
HOSTILE SKIES [US Air Service] Hudson, James J. Syracuse University Press, 1964 Not reviewed for this article. |
U.S. BATTLESHIP OPERATIONS IN WORLD WAR I [US Air Service] Jones, Jerry W. US Naval Institute, 1998 Covers the forgotten service of a US Battleship Squadron with the British Grand Fleet. Critical of US Gunnery of the period. |
THE SPLINTER FLEET OF THE OTRANTO BARRAGE Millholland, Ray. York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1936 Story of sub-chasers at the southern end of the Adriadic. |
ADMIRAL SIMS AND THE MODERN AMERICAN NAVY Morison, Elting Naval Institute Press, 1984r Good on birth of convoy system. |
UNITED STATES NAVAL AVIATION, 1910-1918 Shirley, Noel Schiffer Publishing, Ltd., 2000 Not reviewed for this article. |
Outstanding information on World War I aviation including extensive material on the U.S. Air Services can be found in the back issues of three outstanding, journals published by World War I Aero Historians: |
|
TOWARD THE FLAME Allen, Hervey Doran, 1926 Hervey Allen's account of his experiences as an infantry lieutenant showed that one man's battle role was so insignificant that the war aims faded into the background. Once in action, the individual's struggle to survive eliminated all other considerations. In most cases, success depended on a combination of fortunate circumstances, seldom on skill. Allen's graphic account of service in the 28th Division, Pennsylvania National Guard, AEF, and the vicious battle for Fismes and Fismette during the Aisne-Marne offensive of 1918 is very lucid. The five day fight for Fismette was said to have been the worst five days of fighting by the American Expeditionary Forces. This book is very candid in its observations and formed a basis for some of Allen's later war stories. |
ALONG THE ROAD Barber, Thomas H. Dodd, Mead & Co., 1924 Thomas Barber, formerly a captain in the Pioneer Infantry, writes graphically about twelve ordinary days of combat experience by his engineer company in the Meuse-Argonne Campaign. Barber has presented a small cross section of that war with which the majority of the AEF were familiar. Reading Barber's book is akin to the feeling one has when striking gold on a worked-out claim. A tale told with simple vigor that, to those who knew the Argonne front, will make the shadows of October 1918 leap out from the past into sharp reality. Such boldness and homely honesty of line could only have been drawn by one endowed with rare powers of observation and human sympathy. |
NO HARD FEELINGS Barkley, John Lewis Cosmopolitan, 1930 John L. Barkley's narrative takes the reader from Château-Thierry to the Argonne, where he was a recipient of the Medal of Honor. |
OVER THERE: A MARINE IN THE GREAT WAR Brannen, Carl Andrew Texas A&M Press, 1996 Firsthand account of action on the Western Front compiled by the subject's son J.P. after his death. Enhanced by battlefield photos taken by the father during the war and by the son 75 years after. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
PERSONALITIES AND REMINISCENCES OF THE WAR Bullard, Robert L. 1925 Lots of insights from an Army commander who also proved to be a shrewd observer and capable author. |
FIGHTING THE BOLSHEVIKS: THE RUSSIAN WAR MEMOIR OF PRIVATE FIRST CLASS DONALD E. CAREY, US ARMY, 1918-1919 Cary, Neil [ed.] Presidio Press, 1997 Fascinating tales by a draftee "Polar Bear" who served in the AEF to Northern Russia. Compiled by his son. |
ON THE FIELD of HONOR: A COLLECTION OF WAR LETTERS AND REMINISCENCES OF THREE HARVARD GRADUATES WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES IN THE GREAT CAUSE Elliot, Paul B. D. B. Updike, 1920 The Merrymount Press. A collection of wartime letters written by three young lieutenants in the AEF, all three of whom were killed in action. Don't let the title of this book fool you! In reading these letters, the reader cannot help but become emotionally involved with the feelings of these men. |
A DOUGHBOY WITH THE FIGHTING 69TH - A REMEMBRANCE OF WORLD WAR I Ettinger & Ettinger White Mane Publishing, 1992 See the previous review. The Fighting 69th was one of the National Guard units assigned to the 42nd Division. It was redesignated the 165th Infantry. This causes no end to confusion since the film about the units experience in the AEF was called THE FIGHTING 69TH not THE FIGHTING 165TH. |
ALL FOR HEAVEN, HELL OR HOBOKEN THE WORLD WAR I DIARY OF CLAIR PFENNIG, FLASH RANGER… Finan, Anthony [ed.] Crimson Shamrock Press, 1999 Editor Finan does an outstanding job blending together the fascinating - but very rough - comments of Private Pfennig with his own descriptions of the overall situation surrounding Pfennig's activity. |
SOLDIERS MARCH
Fredenburgh, Theodore Harcourt, 1930 Examines 18 months in the life of an American non-com with the Field Artillery, AEF, in France in 1917-1918. |
AMERICAN WOMEN IN WORLD WAR I: THEY ALSO SERVED Gavin, Lettie University Press of Colorado, 1997 A thorough work on an almost uncovered subject. The author discusses the contributions of individuals in the military; medical, nursing and rehabilitative services; and volunteer organizations including the YMCA, Red Cross and Salvation Army. Especially notable for the appendices listing the remarkable number of women who were decorated or killed while in service. While only a few women volunteers were killed by enemy fire, the Spanish Flu pandemic took a terrible toll among those who cared for the sick. |
ONCE A MARINE.
Hemrick, Levi E. Carlton Press, 1968. Although written some forty years after the war, Mr. Hemrick presents a thought provoking memoir of his service in the Marine Corps during World War I. |
I REMEMBER THE LAST WAR
Hoffman, Robert C. Strength & Health Publishing Co., 1940. Infantry officer's service with the 111th Infantry Regiment, U.S. 28th Division, AEF. |
SERVICE RECORD: BY AN ARTILLERYMAN.
Jacks, Leo V. Scribners, 1928 Artillery service in the AEF- 119th Field Artillery Regiment, 32nd Division. |
SERGEANT YORK - AN AMERICAN HERO Lee, David Univ of Kentucky Press, 1988 Excellent retelling of the famous Doughboy's great feat of October 8, 1918. But it strongest sections are on York's later life as entrepreneur and American hero. |
SUDDENLY I DIDN'T WANT TO DIE Mackin, Elton Presidio Press, 1995 Private Mackin participated in every campaign in which the Marine Brigade saw action. A runner with the 1st Battalion, Fifth Marine Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division, he miraculously escaped serious physical injury, but as this evocative memoir shows, his psyche did not. In the tradition of All Quiet on the Western Front, Mackin offers a soldier's eye view of not just the horrors of battle, but also the subtle little everyday experiences that make the life of the combat soldier both tolerable and soul-shattering. |
THE PRICE OF HONOR: THE WORLD WAR ONE LETTERS OF NAVAL AVIATOR KENNETH MACLEISH MacLeish, Kenneth; Edited by Geoffrey L. Rossano. Naval Institute Press, 1991 Recommended by several members of the Great War Society. MacLeish was the brother of WWI veteran and poet Archibald MacLeiesh whose works are represented in our Doughboy Verse article. |
WHEN THE WORLD WENT MAD
Morgan, Daniel Christopher Publishing House, 1931; Pike, 1993 Memoirs of a marine sergeant in the 77th Co., 6th Machine Gun Battalion, U.S. 2nd Division, who went through all five of the USMC campaigns in World War I. Sgt. Morgan does a good bit of editorializing, and is very acrimonious, but his book contains many gems of eloquence. |
MEMOIRS OF WORLD WAR I Mitchell, William Random House, 1960r Self-promoting, but essential information on the air war and the formation of the US Air Service. |
MY EXPERIENCES IN THE WORLD WAR [2 Vol.] Pershing, John J. Frederick A. Stokes, 1931 Utterly essential, but at times, just dry as dust. |
GEORGE C. MARSHALL...1880 -1939 Pogue, Forrest Viking, 1963 The World War I sections demonstrate how his Great War experience prepared George Marshall to lead the US Army to victory in the Second World War. |
FIGHTING THE FLYING CIRCUS Rickenbacker, Edward Frederick A. Stokes, 1919 Dazzlingly exciting - of course Capt. Eddie brags a bit - but he was a great observer of the action in the skies and the advancing AEF down below. |
THE LION'S PRIDE: THEODORES ROODEVELT'S FAMILY IN WAR AND PEACE Edward J. Renehan Oxford University Press, 1998 Four of Teddy Roosevelt's sons, one daughter, plus a son and daughter in law all served in France during the Great War. The death of his aviator son Quentin, however, seems to have directly contributed to his death, just six months later. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
VICTORY AT SEA Sims, Admiral William S. Doubleday, 1920 Pulitzer Prize winning account by the leader of the US Naval mission to European waters. Since there was never an official US Navy history covering World War I, this is a doubly important work. |
UNTIL THE LAST TRUMPET SOUNDS : THE LIFE OF GENERAL OF THE ARMIES JOHN J. PERSHING
Smith, Gene John Wiley & Sons, 1998 More of a character study than a detailed biography. Click here to view extended excerpt. |
DO YOU WANT TO LIVE FOREVER?
Suskind, Richard Paperback edition only, Bantam, 1964 A very good read about the marines at Belleau Wood. Be forewarned, however, that the book does not represent accurate history. |
FIX BAYONETS ! Thomason, John W. Scribners, 1926 Five short stories built around the actions of the 49th Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment at Belleau Wood, Soissons, and Blanc Mont. A superlative story of combat in the 4th Marine Brigade of the 2nd Division, AEF. Thomason's descriptions of combat on Hill 142 are without peer, however, they are not an accurate chronicle of events and should not be read as such. |
BLACK JACK:...PERSHING [2 VOL] Vandiver, Frank Texas A&M Press, 1977 Probably the best, comprehensive biography available on the Commander of the AEF. Fulsome with praise like almost all treatments of Pershing. |
SUICIDE BATTALIONS
Westover, Wendell Putnam's, 1929 Machine-gun officer's service with the 4th Machine Gun Battalion, 2nd Division, AEF. |
LETTERS WRITTEN BY A 22 YEAR OLD LIEUTENANT IN THE WORLD WAR TO HIS PARENTS AND OTHERS
Wood, Lambert Metropolitan Press, 1932 These letters written home by a young AEF combat officer perhaps express the feelings of the average American soldier better than most writings. After reading these letters you will hopefully know what the war was about as far as the American soldier was concerned. The soldier writer of the beautiful letters was killed at Soissons. |
|
IT WAS LIKE THIS: TWO STORIES OF THE GREAT WAR Allen, Hervey; Illustrated by Lyle Justis Farrar & Rinehart, 1940 "Report to Major Roberts" tells of a young Yank lieutenant who comes to enjoy killing and whose only hold on reality during combat is his title, "Blood Lust" sees the transformation of a simple youth into a professional soldier via a heavy-handed introduction to the horrors of combat. |
THROUGH THE WHEAT Boyd, Thomas Scribners, 1923 Boyd's book stands at the top of the list. War's utter waste and futility permeate Boyd's novel. During the Château-Thierry and Soissons battles, Boyd revealed in each member of a marine platoon his motives for fighting, his fears, and his ambitions. He knew the men who fought and he has crystallized their actions, both physical and mental, with an unerring pen in this novel concerning marines in France during World War I and their adjustment to the daily tasks of surviving under front-line conditions and the constant advance into almost certain death. Considered by many to be not only the best combatant story of the World War I but the best American war book since "The Red Badge of Courage." |
THREE SOLDIERS Dos Passos, John Doran, 1921 Reprinted 1964. An American war classic that traces the experiences of three doughboys through World War I, showing how all are broken by the pressures of conflict and the "system"; a bitter attack on what the author conceived as the misery, tyranny, and degradation found in Pershing's American Expeditionary Forces. |
COMPANY K March, William [Identified as William March Campbell in some editions.] University of Alabama Press, 1996r Arguably the best work of American Great War fiction is William March's 1933 classic Company K. March, the pen name for William Edward Campbell, served with the 5th Marines in France and was awarded the Croix de Guerre, the Distinguished Service Cross and the Navy Cross for his heroism under fire. The book contains 113 small chapters that works its way through the entire personnel roster of the fictitious company. March manages to completely capture every aspect about the war in the highly personal insights of the men of Company K. Company K, arranged after the manner of the Spoon River Anthology, presents brief consecutive soliloquies by over one hundred members of a Marine Corps rifle company in WWI, most of them characterized by a morbid wit and a tone of bleak resignation. |
OVER THERE Fleming, Thomas 1992 General Pershing and his staff arrive in France live La Guerre Deluxe, but when casualties mount a terrific toll is taken. |
One of the best and most prolific writers of AEF fiction - Dave & Mike
|
GOD HAVE MERCY ON US: A STORY OF 1918 Scanlon, William T. Houghton Mifflin, 1929 The author was with the 97th Company, 3rd Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 4th Marine Brigade, U.S. 2nd Division and wrote this first person fictional memoir of Marines in action from Belleau Wood to the Armistice. |
PLUMES Stallings, Laurence Harcourt, Brace, 1924 Stallings, who lost a leg while a marine officer in Belleau Wood, is well qualified to write of the treatment accorded our wounded men in post-war days. Stallings reiterated war's destruction of individual rights in his novel, Plumes. Richard Plume, descendant of many civilian-soldiers, went to war against his wishes and returned from France with a shattered leg. Plume comes to hate war. A moving novel dealing with an infantry officer's combat experiences and the sordid treatment accorded him as a severely wounded and crippled veteran in the postwar years. Later, at a rally when the crowd sang "America," he mused: "War was wrong. Fighting was stupid...never was a battle worth while." He fought futilely to expose war's shams. Patriotic slogans, the return to "normalcy," and the resistance of those who thought his behavior "un-American," convinced him there was no use struggling to avoid another war. This is a soul-wrenching story of what war has done to a human body and of AEF amputees in post-war Washington, D.C. |
SQUAD Wharton, James Grosset & Dunlap, 1928 Very good account of life in the AEF and of infantry combat. The war chronicle of eight men, the smallest of military units - a squad, and their feelings. The critics said of this book, "What All Quiet on the Western Front does for the common soldiers of the German Army, this book does for the doughboys of the AEF." |
Sources and thanks: Email Editor David Homsher with your suggestions. David is a veteran of U.S. Army service during the Korean War, and now retired, is a historian-writer of the American soldier and his battlefields. Dave has traveled extensively over many of the battlegrounds of both World Wars and he is currently writing a soon to be published series of guidebooks to the American battlefields of the World War I in France and Belgium. California's Book of Gold is the listing of every Californian killed in the Great War. It bears inscriptions from both Marechal Foch and General Pershing. Lost for many years, it is now on display at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Lincoln Park, San Francisco. MH |
To find other Doughboy Features visit our |
Membership Information Click on Icon |
For further information on the events of 1914-1918
visit the homepage of |