They knew it was the end. Weakened by four years of war, the reality had
finally dawned on the Germans that their armies could never stop the
combined might of the Allied forces, now bolstered by the fresh,
enthusiastic Americans, who were now determined to be involved in the
conflict that had engulfed the world.
The US effort in 1918, in what became known as the Hundred Days
Offensive, was focused on the Argonne Forest. It was there that
1,200,000 men were deployed in what was to be the largest offensive in
the United States' military history.
It was in the fighting in the Argonne Forest that one of the most
remarkable incidents in the entire First World War took place. In
October 1918, Corporal Alvin Cullum York single-handedly captured 132
Germans and killed twenty-one in a desperate fire-fight.
York's battalion of the 328th Infantry Regiment had become pinned down
by heavy machine-gun and artillery fire. Its commander sent Sergeant
Bernard Early, four non-commissioned officers, including the recently
promoted Corporal York, and thirteen privates to infiltrate the German
positions and neutralise the machine-guns.
The small American force came upon a large group of enemy troops having
breakfast, and these were taken prisoner. They then came under fire from
German machine-guns which left eight men were killed or wounded and York
as the senior NCO. York and the survivors returned fire and silenced the
enemy, allowing the Americans to rejoin their battalion with the 132
prisoners in tow.
York was promoted to Sergeant and he received the Congressional Medal of
Honor.
The site of this famous action was believed to have been identified in
2009 and a memorial erected by the French authorities. However, a team
of archaeologists, with help from the French Department of Archaeology
and the use of modern day Geographic Information Science, believe that
the memorial is incorrectly situated, and have uncovered thousands of
exhibits to support their claim.
Complete with detailed plans and diagrams, and a rich variety of
photographs of locations and artefacts, Michael Kelly presents not only
a fascinating account of York's determined courage, but also a detective
story as the team unravels the evidence to reveal the exact ravine where
the most famous US military action of the First World War took place.
