Index to the General Order of the 1st Infantry Division, in World War I
Distinguished Service Cross 45
Silver Star Citation / Silver Star Medal 16,132
French Croix De Guerre 20
Total Awards 16,197
This book has 303 pages
ISBN 978-1-932891-72-0
Library of Congress
Control Number Pending
Order of Battle
1st Division Headquarters Troop
1st Infantry Brigade
2nd Infantry Brigade
16th Infantry
18th Infantry
26th Infantry
28th Infantry
1st Machine Gun Battalion
2nd Machine Gun Battalion
3rd Machine Gun Battalion
1st Artillery Brigade
5th Field Artillery
6th Field Artillery
7th Field Artillery
1st Trench Mortar Battery
1st Engineers
2nd Field Signal Battalion
1st Train Headquarters & Military Police
1st Supply Train
1st Ammunition Train
1st Engineer Train
1st Sanitary Train
Field Hospital No. 2
Field Hospital No. 3
Field Hospital No. 12
Field Hospital No. 13
Ambulance Company No. 2
Ambulance Company No. 3
Ambulance Company No. 12
Ambulance Company No. 13
Campaign Credits
Mondidier-Noyon
Aisne-Marne
St. Mihiel
Meuse-Argonne
Defensive Sector
This work includes all
citations and decorations cited in the general orders of the 1st
Infantry Division for service during World War I, as published in Volume 23
of World War Records, 1st Division A.E.F., Regular, by the
War College in 1930. Please note that many decorations presented to members
of the 1st Infantry Division were cited in general orders of
other commands. I have made no attempt to list the unit awards or battle
credits.
Awards of the Distinguished Service Cross and the French Croix
de Guerre were occasionally announced in the 1st Infantry
Division’s general orders. The vast majority of decorations announced in the
1st Infantry Division’s general orders were citations. These
Silver Star Citations after 1932 could be converted into the Silver Star
Medal. It is important to remember that not every citation issued during
World War I warranted the Silver Star Medal. Therefore, it is important to
consult each citation to insure that it meets the “Gallantry in Action”
requirement.
Since Oak Leaf Clusters were not used to denote additional citations until the creation of the Silver Star Medal in 1932, the original orders do not mention them. I have noted when I believe that the citation recipient may be entitled to an Oak Leaf Cluster. This normally occurred when they were mentioned in more then one citation. I have noticed several occasions where soldiers were cited more than once in the same general order. It is assumed that each of these citations would warrant the Silver Star Medal or Oak Leaf Cluster if all other requirements were met. An issue arises when the same individual is cited twice in General Order #1 of the 1920 Series. This general order basically cites each member of the 1st Infantry Division who was wounded or killed in action during World War I. These multiple citations appear to stem from the individual being wounded in more then one campaign. However, there are very few occurrences of multiple citations to the same individual in General Order #1 of the 1920, which leads me to believe it was never the intention of the commander to issue a citation for each wound. This theory is backed up by the very few occurrences of multiple citations compared to the number of 1st Infantry Division soldiers wounded more then once. If one assumes this theory is correct, as I have, then the multiple citations are just administrative errors. As such they are not included in this work as additional awards. The number of Oak Leaf Clusters noted in this work only represents the number of times the solider was cited by the Commander of the 1st Infantry Division; it does not represent the number of Oak Leaf Clusters the solider is entitled to.
Continuing of the subject of citations issued in General Order #1 of the 1920 series, it is interesting to note that the compilers of World War Records, 1st Division A.E.F., Regular purposely choose to omit a number of citations from their work. I state this because each citation was issued an extract number; this extract number corresponds to the 1st Infantry Division Silver Citation Star Certificate number presented. There are gaps in the extract numbering sequence as follows:
4646, 5297, 8000, 10234, 10235, 11580, 11622, 11833-11837, 11857-11874, 11912, 12027, 12052-12059, 12219, 12229, 14020, 14049, 14161, 14211, 14233
The only other logical explanation would be omission due to administrative error. Locating and checking the original general order to see if these extract numbers were used could confirm this. I have attempted, without success, on a number of occasions to access World War I general orders while at the National Archives.
I do plan to continue to search for the World War I general orders as my research time allows. However, this reference should prove to be very useful in identifying World War I Silver Stars Medals and Purple Heart Medals, since the vast majority of Silver Star Citations were issued by the 1st Infantry Division and General Order #1 of the 1920 Series is basically a list of every 1st Infantry Division soldier entitled to the Purple Heart Medal.
This work contains the majority of Silver Citation Stars awarded to members of the 1st Infantry Division, it is by no means all the Silver Citation Stars received by members of this division. Citations from brigade commanders meeting all other requirement also qualified for conversion to the Silver Star Medal. The citation issued by the commanders of the 1st Infantry Brigade, 2nd Infantry Brigade and the 1st Field Artillery Brigade are not included in this work.
Members of the 1st Infantry Division were also issued citations from the War Department, AEF Headquarters and other commands. Another important issue when dealing with World War I Citations is to realize that a solider could have been cited by his brigade commander, divisional commander and by Pershing for the same action and their three citations only warrant one Silver Star Medal, because they are for the same action. Likewise if he was cited and was later presented with the Distinguished Service Cross of the same action, the Distinguished Service Cross superceded his citation/s and no Silver Star Medal was authorized. This is why it is important to locate each citation and review the text not only to see if it meets the “Gallantry in Action” requirement but to see if any other citation superceded it.
While compiling this listing I have made the following additional observations:
| 1.) The ranks given in the citations appear to the ranks held at the time the citations were issued rather then when the deed occurred. As such, some citations give ranks not in use during WWI, but were in use in the 1920s. | |
| 2.) There is a high frequency of misspelled names. This is not limited to the source used to compile this work but also applies to most works done during the World War I era. I would have to assume that there was a very limited supply of manpower with typing skills that the army could draw upon at the time. The other issue, I feel, stems from the flood of immigrants from Southern Europe and Eastern Europe. These immigrates had names unfamiliar to the average citizen, thus making them more difficult to spell. I feel language and social barriers compounded this problem. | |
| 3.) Some general orders cite soldiers from the 1st Military Police, which would indicate a regimental-sized unit, by the omission of a designation of any other size. However the 1st Infantry Division’s Military Police organic asset was the 1st Military Police Company, which was a part of the Train Headquarters and Military Police. Since I can not determine what was intended, I have left each entry as it appeared in the original order. |
Every effort has been made to minimize errors and misspelled names. An error may be attributable to the source document, or may have occurred while transcribing the names/units. Some of the original documents are of very poor print quality, making them difficult to decipher.