History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present, Volume I, Part 84

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858-
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1362

USA > California > Fresno County > History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present, Volume I > Part 84

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

With its two national guard companies accepted in the service, and the Home Guards drilling in the Fresno Auditorium, the state under orders received October 18, 1917, abandoned the lease of the city armory on I Street and surrendered possession. A rental of $150 a month was being paid for the upstairs premises with no present use for them during the war. Not since 1884 had there been a time when Fresno was without a city armory.

A warm greeting was given Fresno's Companies C and K of the Second Infantry Regiment as they passed through Fresno with the other companies of accepted state regiment from the north in two sections of a train of twenty- one passenger cars with a dozen freight car loads of equipment en route on the evening of October 29, 1917, to the army cantonment at San Diego.

The first men from the county to leave for the national army training camp at American Lake in Washington brought to Fresno something of the war consciousness. The early draft departures were these: September 9, 1917, as the first contingent forty-five men; September 20 second of 352; October 5 third of 353; November 4 fourth of 183. There have been other draft departures, small and large since then, including one of colored boys exclusively. The two national guard companies took away 240 men, the company recruited as a machine gun corps seventy, another as an artillery battery as many and probably 500 from the county enlisted in the regular army and navy branches and marine corps, all of which found Fresno a good enlisting field.

Monday, the 11th of November, 1918, will be a memorable date in his- tory. It was Der Tag of the acceptance of the armistice conditions exacted by the allied nations from conquered and vanquished Germany in the most cruel and inhuman war waged since the days of the early barbarians. The beaten Huns were given a taste of some of their own schrecklichkeit in the conditions. The news of the signing of the armistice came long after the hour of midnight. A great din was raised with the blowing of sirens and whistles and the ringing of bells. There was a wild and delirious parade between the hours of two and two-thirty A. M., to be resumed by another noisy and riotous parade at nine A. M. with speechmaking from the steps of the courthouse. A public holiday was proclaimed and the jubilation con- tinued throughout the day and was furiously resumed at night until every one was exhausted. On the afternoon of Friday, three days before, false telegraphic report had come of the signing of the armistice and the expectant started a jubilation parade that did not grow to great dimensions so rapid was the circulation of the falsity of the telegraphed report.

Total subscriptions to the Fourth Liberty Loan were $6,989,047,000, the oversubscription having been $989,047,000 or 16.48 per cent. and every federal reserve district having exceeded its allotted quota. The fourth was by far the greatest war loan ever floated by any government. All the over- subscribed war loans and the war savings stamps raised $17,852,000,000 in popular loans, not including the not accepted over-subscriptions. The San Francisco district's quota was $402,000,000, the subscription $459,- 000,000, percentage 114.17. The district was seventh in over-subscrip- tions in the twelve federal reserve districts in the nation. The war savings amounted in November, 1918, to $879,300,000. By the terms of the bonds,

565

HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

the treasury by exercising its options can cancel in the nation's war debt for redemption in installments every five years until 1947.

December 1, 1918, the chairman of the History Committee of the State Council of Defense reported that California was entitled to carry 1,033 gold stars in its war service flag and of this number 421 were killed in action, 139 died from wounds received in battle and the remainder made the sacrifice in airplane accidents and as the result of other causes. Los Angeles county made the largest contribution with 315, San Francisco is next with 134, and Alameda County with 102. Fresno reported seventeen killed in action, six died of wounds, sixteen of disease and ten from other causes; total forty- nine, being fourth in the list of counties. The state furnished for the national army and navy a total of 137,033 men between the time the national guard of the state was ordered mobilized March 26, 1917, and the signing of the armistice. The first men called into the service were the three state infantry regiments, the Second, Fifth and Seventh. The naval militia was called into the service April, 1917, the day that the declaration of war was signed. All state organizations were called into the federal service on or before August 5, 1917, and made up a total of 11,562. California's contribution of men to the national service was made up as follows :

State troops

11,562

Army volunteers

32,686

Navy volunteers

17,458

Marine Corps

2,254

Draft inductions

73,073

Total

137,033

The armistice had been signed, the censorship lifted and the war was practically over before the people of Fresno first learned of the career on her first trans-Atlantic voyage of the good ship Fresno built in record time, launched on the Alameda estuary on the bay of San Francisco and unheralded sent on her mission as one of the vessels of the war emergency Yankee merchant fleet. The news came in a round-about way and because of the censorship escaped the notice of the newspapers. After her launch and trial trip, the people of Fresno had lost all trace of the existence of the craft. The news came to the city clerk of Fresno from the city clerk of Manhattan Beach, Cal., Llewellyn Price, who is also the city recorder and assessor. The writer's oldest son Llewellyn J. Price had volunteered into the service, was assigned to the Fresno, rated quartermaster, third class, and having had sea experience was the first hand to take the wheel as she left the dock in San Francisco on her first across-the-sea voyage. That voyage was not withont incident. "My idea in writing to you," said the writer. "was in the belief that the citizens of Fresno should know and be proud of the record of the ship bearing the name of Fresno." After taking on a general cargo at San Francisco, the Fresno made the trip to New York via the Panama Canal and joined a British convoy of thirty-one vessels all told with a British bat- tleship at the head as flagship with admiral on board. When only a few hours out of New York, the convoy was attacked by a German submarine. Young Price was sleeping at the time but awakened by the rush of shrapnel overhead rushed on deck to behold the sub not far astern coming after the Fresno and firing 4.7 shell and shrapnel. Orders were signalled to disperse at top speed and in an hour the Fresno had caught up with the admiral, the boys in the fire room blowing the boilers off all the time. As they made the first quick turn to dodge, the sub dropped a shell in the Fresno's wake. One of the convoyed having engine trouble had dropped astern and the sub gave this vessel battle. In an exchange of shots the sub was hit and at once submerged. An American destroyer leading the convoy circled back as the sub arose badly damaged and after taking off the crew blew up sub.

566

HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

On the voyage a sailor on one of the ships died and was buried at sea with half mast colors and other ceremonies. Nearing the British coast, the con- voy was joined by more destroyers, also hydroplanes and dirigibles until the craft were covered from every angle. The fleet laid over one night at Spithead, Eng., proceeding next morning across the Channel to Le Havre to discharge cargo, returning to England where it joined another convoy homeward bound, the vessels scattering after getting through the submarine zone and making good sailing time until within 100 miles from the American coast. About an hour before sunset a hydroplane was sighted and were found aboard three men almost dead-two ensigns and a machinist-who had been adrift two days and three nights having run out of gasoline. They had drunk all the water from the radiator and had only a five-cent bar of chocolate between them in that time. Their joy was frantic at being rescued.

After hoisting the plane aboard, the Fresno proceeded to New York. "My boy says," wrote the informant, "the crew is sure a nervy bunch, all of them being real men, and the City of Fresno can well be proud of them and the record of the ship. They are now (November 15, 1918) on their second trip, and it is hoped that it will be as successful as the first was."

Fresno County and city had nearly 800 technical army deserters accord- ing to the final report of the exemption boards-that is to say that number of registrants did not answer questionaires or appear for physical examina- tions. The 800 were nearly all of foreign birth and illiterates, hundreds of them working at the time in the district but leaving afterward and to locate those transients would have been equal to the task of finding the needle in a haystack.

Audit for two years of receipts and expenditures of the Fresno Chapter of the American Red Cross showed income up to June 30, 1918, $92,622.48, cash in bank $4,989.24 and cash in hand $45.80.

The Fresno report on the fourth Liberty loan made the following showing :

County subscription

$5,946,550

County quota

4,501,000

Oversubscription

$1,445,550

Fresno city subscription

$3,886,900

Fresno city quota

3,009,200

Oversubscription

$ 877,700

County subscribers

11,732

City subscribers

20,381

Total

32,113

Each of the twelve community centers oversubscribed.

No military organization of Fresno found its way as an original and intact unit to the battle fronts in Europe. The machine gun company of eighty-seven men recruited in Fresno was attached as a unit of a regimental organization that was sent across and was in the Ninetieth Division. The "Grizzlies" from California were still in military training camp in France when the armistice was signed. The "Grizzlies" (One Hundred Forty- fourth Field Artillery), Col. Thornwell Mullaly, were among the first troops returned to America from the continent and Bordeaux for San Francisco to be quartered at the Presidio for demobilization. Fresno's Companies C and K of the Second Infantry Regiment of the State National Guard were accepted for the national army but afterward consolidated as Company L of the One Hundred Fifty-ninth Infantry Regiment. After acceptance into the service the Fresno units lost their local officers by transfer in the regi-

567

HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

mental organization for the good of the service and to break up the too personal relations between officers and men from a common home locality. The Grizzlies, notable California regiment, of the Fortieth Division-fifty- eight officers and 1.440 men, arrived at New York January 3, 1919, by the transport Matsonia. This division composed of Colorado, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and California troops was located at Revigny and St. Dizier when the armistice was signed. Fifty-five per cent. of the 691 men of the One Hundred Forty-third Artillery of the division were members of the California National Guard, the returning units comprising headquarters, supply and Batteries C, D, E and F. The returning number by the Matsonia was 3,207 officers and men, with 140 wounded.

Rand McCabe, who had the distinction of being the first Fresno boy in France to have his name appear in the casualty list. added later the further distinction of being with the first Yanks to enter for occupancy the German principality of Luxemburg, as he wrote to his father.

Lieut. Harry Janson of Bakersfield, son of H. D. Janson, a former raisin grower of Fresno, looked not upon the price to hear his mother's voice upon arrival at New York from France on Christmas eve. He called her up on the long distance telephone at the Hotel Tegeler at Bakersfield. Step- mother and son talked for four minutes and the charge was twenty-four dollars.

The story of California's participation in the government's war meas- ures has vet to be told. That task will be accomplished by the County War History Committees named under state authority in connection with the State Council of Defense. The matter is being collated as available in com- pleteness and not neglected as to time as was done after the Civil War, be- cause it will be a record of the greatest war of all times for which the masses were called upon to make personal sacrifices, money contributions to the nation, and comply with demands as never before exacted. In California's contributions to the war, the San Joaquin Valley did its full share. To the four Liberty bond loans nearly 100,000 individuals and firms in the valley subscribed $45,178,810. Counties and towns went over their quota, some as high as 300 and 400 per cent. over. War saving stamps of the value of $3,978,774 were bought. The pledges were for almost as much more. Four- teen chapters of the Red Cross in the valley counties contributed $753,316.88. This money for war work was raised in two war fund drives. The membership of the chapters was in the hundred thousands and the war articles that were manufactured are counted by the millions. For United War Work the seven organizations were given a half million in the last drive and in the previous one a quarter of a million. More than $30,000 was given in the valley for Belgian relief, besides tons upon tons of clothing and shoes. According to draft figures and recruiting estimates, nearly 19,000 went forth to the war in army, navy and marine corps of America, or of allied nations. The exemp- tion boards inducted 9,336 men into the military service. A total of 90,216 registered for service. Available records show that 451 secured com- missions in army or navy, thirty-five in the navy. Casualty lists up to De- cember 21 showed that 142 men were killed in action, thirty-five died from wounds, thirty as the result of accidents and 142 from disease-total of 349. There were forty-six listed as missing, five of these located afterward in German prison camps. Total wounded at the date named 328, making the then known casualties of the valley 723.

Company C of Fresno of the Second Infantry of the National Guard en- trained for service April 2, seventy strong, and Company K, 112 strong, April 4, 1917. They were officered as follows: C- Capt. Frank D. Hopkins ; Lieutenants Beach E. Traber and Edward C. Neal. K-Capt. C. H. Fowler ; Lieutenants Arthur H. Drew (afterward taking training in officers' school, attached to U. S. Infantry Regiment and sent on the Siberian expedition via San Francisco) and Emery C. Burroughs. The orders to recruit to war

568

HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

strength and be ready to be nationalized were received March 25 and the call to report at state camps on the thirtieth.

Sergeants M. Abbey and Phillip H. Williams were the longest stationed in Fresno in charge of the U. S. marine and army recruiting service respec- tively. The Canadian and British recruiting offices had joint use of the recruit- ing offices for a time.

The Home Guards of Sanger were mustered in with seventy-five on the roll which roster was reduced and maintained at fifty-seven. Leroy Wal- ton, principal of the Tampa, Ariz., high school, was the organizer while at home on summer vacation but returning in September. Ensign J. L. Hand elected captain was called for service in the navy and Ben Rose, captain of the high school cadets, was chosen commander. As the other guard com- panies in the county they were uniformed in khaki and equipped with Win- chester rifles.

Without entering into all the details, suffice it to say that the District Board for Division No. 2 of the Southern District of California handled after organization August 1, 1917, the largest number of cases of any of the five district boards in the state. As organized George C. Roeding was its first chairman. He resigned to take up work with the National Food Administra- tion at Washington. He was succeeded by W. B. Nichols of Dinuba who was called into like service. The district board sat at Bakersfield.

The Coalinga Home Guard Company officially known as the Forty-fifth Company, California Military Reserves, was organized with a charter roll of sixty-nine in August, 1917. Its officers were: Capt. E. J. McCroskey ; Lieuts. L. D. Goldman and R. J. Swanzey, veterans of the Spanish War. It steadily maintained a full membership complement of seventy-five and organ- ized a rifle club.

It was in June, 1917, that Capt. L. T. Stephenson, a veteran of the Spanish War and a company commander of the national guard, was author- ized to organize a machine gun troop in Fresno. Eighty-five were enrolled, the number was reduced by enlistments into active service in other organi- zations but by July 27 the company was inspected for acceptance into the service with eighty-eight men and as officers: Capt. L. T. Stephenson, First Lieutenant F. G. Everts and Second Lieutenants I. F. Toomey, a son of the mayor, and James Madison Jr. The corps entrained August 14, 1917. with a $1,500 mess fund and train loaded down with presents, for the "Lucky" Baldwin ranch, near Los Angeles, and prepared for service at Camp Kearney later. With troop fairly well filled, attention was turned to the field artillery battery that was being organized by Jefferson G. Graves and Dewitt H. Gray and as such mustered in August 4 as a detachment of Battery C with the recruits from Fresno and vicinity. It was encamped at the old Tanforan race track and 104 strong was accepted as a unit for the service and went across sea. It lost its individuality after acceptance into the service.

In connection with the raisin association is a Sun Maid Patrol, a semi- military organization, which sent about 200 of its members into the service after America was engulfed in the European war. The original purpose of the patrol was for a better discipline and spirit and to encourage more effective work by the packing house employes and the members of the Sun Maid Welfare League of the association. The organization of which L. R. Payne was a leading spirit dates from January, 1916. The drill companies of about 250 association operatives were first formed to give special eclat to Raisin Day. They became proficient and by Raisin Day, 1916, were nattily uniformed and were led by a forty-piece band and a drum and bugle corps. They were always features in the public and war parades. The officers were Patrol Major James Hartigan ; Captains Roy A. Bishop and T. E. McKeig- han. War having been declared, the patrol desired to enter the service in a body so high was the spirit but it was not to be and the ranks thinned out with individual enlistments of the eligible.

569

HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

Dikran Davidian of Reedley, who was killed in action November 2, 1918, in France (place of the fighting not named), was the first Armenian youth in the county to volunteer for war service. His last letter to parents stated that he was receiving then special instruction in the use of a new gas.

The Home Guards as at first called was an organization active and fore- most in all the military and practical war work from the first to the last. With an enrollment of from 175 to 200 men at organization in four com- panies reduced later to three, it gave military training to hundreds, fur- nished a half hundred for active duty in the service, was called out on four emergency occasions to patrol the lines at fires, was depended upon as a reserve police force, cleared buildings for the influenza epidemic, furnished all the guard duty on public occasions, participated in numerous parades, helped in the war fund drives, escorted departing draft soldiers, officiated at the burials of the dead and rendered the last honors-in short was a busy organization ready for every call of duty. Six of the officers had seen service in the Philippines and three, long service in the national guard. Scarcely had the latter been called for war service, than the Home Guards were or- ganized as a home military force, the first signing up on the night of April 6, 1917, and the organization perfected November 1 as a battalion of four companies, later designated officially as the Third Battalion, because the third organized in the state. Battalion was later reduced to three companies, the Fifty-ninth forming the nucleus of a national guard company that was never officially organized. The guards were armed with Winchester rifles and unlike the other military organizations wore a distinctive steel blue instead of brown khaki uniform. The major commanding was Edward Jones, who had held like rank in the national guard, with G. C. Hughes as organi- zation adjutant, C. B. Jackson quartermaster and William Glass commissary. The original companies with their officers were :

Fifty-sixth-E. B. Russell captain : Fred Meyer and G. R. Walling lieu- tenants.

Fifty-seventh-C. W. Kepley, captain; lieutenants, William Ross and H. H. McClung and D. D. Dennis.

Fifty-eighth-H. A. Sessions, captain; lieutenants William Ross and L. H. Corse Jr.

Fifty-ninth-S. L. Gallaher, captain ; lieutenants, B. U. Brandt and Bert A. Primrose.

The tentative national guard organization movement during the war was abandoned, the U. S. Military Guards of men who qualified for mili- tary war service but not physically fit for the across-the-sea service, taking their place in the government plan at first misconceived and assigned to duty at various posts.

The Fresno County Food Administration which had intimate relation with the home life of the people and with the wheat flour substitutes not soon forgotten was in charge of George S. Waterman, one of the trustees of the city. He had as assistant Miss Flora M. Ebby. The conservation of food stuffs in the county was closely looked after and an immense amount of work undertaken. With this work was connected the Car Service Section of the Division of Transportation, U. S. Railway Administration, with J. W. Walker of the Santa Fe as the chairman.

Fresno is given credit of having been the first community to have set aside a cemetery for the soldier dead in this war-the Liberty Cemetery as it is known. It was formally and publicly dedicated Memorial Day in 1918. The location of this cemetery was made possible by the deed gift by the trustees Sol B. Goodman, Louis Solomon and the late Herman Levy of the four acres of the B'nai B'rith in Mountain View Cemetery and adjoining the G. A. R. cemetery plot. The configuration of the donated acreage is such as to lend itself admirably to landscape purposes. The laying out of the grounds April 11 was by volunteers headed by the mayor. It is planned

570

HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

to permanently improve and beautify it. It has been undertaken to raise by popular subscription $30,000 to erect memorial gates at the entrance and deposit a great granite stone as a monument which shall on four bronze tablets bear the names of Fresno's soldier dead, this monument to be erected on the crest of the rolling hill forming the center of the cemetery acreage. T. J. Hammond is the chairman of the cemetery committee of citizens.

The Fresno Fuel Administration opened its activities November 14, 1917, and the city committee was Charles H. Riege, A. O. Warner and W. B. Holland. A. G. Wishon of the San Joaquin Light and Power Company and other enterprises was county administrator. Its conservation campaign with the Monday and Tuesday lightless nights will not soon be forgotten, nor its campaign in May, 1918, urging the purchase then of wood and coal to save cars in the fall and winter for the transportation of soldiers and food across the continent and on to Europe-to Berlin as the schedule called for then. No pretense will be made to enumerate all the restrictions that were placed and complied with at the request of all the war-time administration boards.

Not until September 30, 1918, were offices opened nor called into being by the State Council of Defense was the Non War-Construction Board. The Fresno committee was constituted of H. A. Pratt, Thomas E. Risley and William Newman. Its duties never went beyond the limitation of construc- tion of buildings of over $25,000 in cost. Its work continued not long before the armistice was signed. For a time and excepting for unfinished work, there was an almost total cessation of new construction.

No organization so jumped into public favor during the war as the Salvation Army and it was because it so speedily found its way into the hearts of the soldiers themselves according to all the advices from the front, where it operated in its huts to cheer the doughboy spiritually and physically with its hot coffee, doughnuts or pies. The aim of the army was at first to work outside of the camps, but the chaplains themselves sought its co- operation. The Salvation Army was close behind the front trenches with its workers and especially the lassies to give the home touch and the cheery smile in providing the field comforts for the men in the trenches. Its work proved one of the features of the war. At inception it was backed by volun- tary subscriptions but demands became so great on it that subscriptions on a large scale were invited. The local county chamber of commerce under- took to raise money for the purpose and though the demand was not great the amount asked for was raised. The boys in the army take their hats off to the men and women of the Salvation Army and its work assumed such proportions at the front, behind the lines and in the training camps that it was one of the war services included in the U. S. War drive of November, 1918. It started its work unostentatiously with the outbreak of war and earned the gratitude of the allied world.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present, Volume I, Part 84

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858- Publication date: 1919 Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company Number of Pages: 1362

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858-
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1362