WWI 79th ID Accolade

November 5, 2024

Pvt. William C Walters

26 June 1896, New York

3195430

Co. G, 316th Infantry Regiment, 79th Division

Wounded in Action: 30 September 1918, Meuse Argonne Offensive

On Sunday morning, September 29, the fourth day of the drive, the 316th was ordered to attack from Bois 268. Asthe troops debauched from the woods they were met on the brow of the slope by terrific machine-gun fire from the woods ahead and crossfire from the flanks, the bushes in the open valley to the northwest, and from Madeleine Farm, with its red-cross flag. Captain Benjamin H. Hewit, Lieutenant Daniel S. Keller, Adjutant of the First Battalion, andLieutenant Fitzharris, Third Battalion Intelligence Officer, were killed a few hundred yards ahead of "268." Lieutenant Ivan L. Lautenbacher was mortally wounded, and Lieutenant Richard Y. Naill, Intelligence Officer of the First Battalion, Lieutenant John J. Pickard, and Lieutenant Charles M.Hoffman were wounded. The lines were greatly depleted by severe losses, and the advance on the left, exposed to fire from front and flank was checked 300 meters north of *'268." On the right, however, a number of men dashed into the edge of the woods, about fifty in number, under Captain Somers, Lieutenants Murdock, Home and Bliss. This heroic group fought ahead through the woods, struggling hand to hand with machine gunners, and established a scattered defensive line just inside the northern edge of Woods 250, holding this position all day. Meantime, orders arrived from the 157th Brigade for a reorganization and a second attack in the afternoon with the reorganized 313th Infantry in the advance and the 316th Infantry, consolidated as one battalion under command of Major Parkin, following at 600 meters. The attack was launched at 14 H 00, and again through the enemy barrage the troops advanced across the open into the thick underbrush of Woods 250. The 313th Infantry had received orders to withdraw, and Major Parkin's men, alone, pushed ahead into the woods, joining the small band that had been in the northern edge since morning. The woods were swept by heavy enemy artillery fire which killed a great many of the men. It was in these woods that Captain Alan W. Lukens met his death. The artillery barrage of the enemy also inflicted heavy casualties in the vicinity of Regimental Headquarters on the 42 edge of 268. Shortly after the attack commenced, a bursting high explosive killed Regimental Sergeant-Major Harold H. Bair, and Colonel Charles, who was dictating a message to him at the time, was wounded in the thigh. LieutenantColonel Robert L. Meador was given temporary command of the Regiment. At 15 H 50 a message was received from Brigade Headquarters to reorganize and establish a defensive line on the northern edge of the Bois de Beuge. At various intervals messages were sent forward into the woods to the First Battalion, but the runners never lived to deliver their messages. The First Battalion remained in the woods, penetrating them against snipers and machine guns, to the very tip of the Bois de Cunel, where the dead bodies of members of the Regiment were found later by the Graves Registration Service. The regiments on the right and left had faUed to reach the line of the woods, and there the battalion remained, without support. At dusk, Lieutenant Goetz, who had been in the woods with Major Parkin, returned to the Regimental P. C. with the news that the unit was still in the woods, never having received orders to withdraw. An officer was sent to the artillery to postpone fire which might be directed upon the woods, and Lieutenant Goetz returned to Major Parkin with orders to withdraw after dark, finding his way across the battlefield to the lone battalion. At 21 H 00, Major Parkin started back from the woods with 160 men, and a few minutes later, shells from the American artillery commenced dropping in the woods behind them. That night a defensive line was thrown out in shell holes several hundred yards in front of the Bois de Beuge, with the 145th Infantry on the left and the 315th on the right. All day Monday the Regiment held this position in the Bois de Beuge, the companies reorganizing to permit more effective defense. The enemy harassed the woods with shell fire. Meanwhile relief had become imperative, not only on account of constantly mounting losses, but because of the impossibility of getting food and water to the men. The road to the supply dumps was choked and jammed to a dead standstill, holding up ammunition and supplies of every description, and tying up many ambulances with their loads of wounded. At 16 H 00 the veteran Third Division appeared behind the hill of Montfaucon and, in unwavering 43 lines of section columns, advanced through heavy fire and effected the relief. The Regiment was then led back under a fire of high explosive, shrapnel and gas, which inflicted several casualties, including the wounding of Captain James P. Montgomery. South of Montfaucon the column was reorganized, and the Regiment marched as a unit into Malancourt, reaching that devastated village after dark. The whole Division was concentrated in the vicinity, and the troops spent the night in the open, without blankets, in shell-holes amid the barbed wire entanglements southwest of the ruined town. The enemy kept dropping heavy shells into Malancourt all night.