Welcome to the Geneablogger's First World War Challenge blogposts
roundup! I received a number of posts for the Challenge, so many in
fact that it's going to take two posts here to share them with you all.
It's a wonderful collection of posts, with submissions from Australia,
New Zealand, Ireland, Canada, and the United States. Some are new,
some are old; some are from familiar blogs, and some from blogs new
to me. They are all fascinating.
So let's get started with Part One!
When Jill Ball researched about her grandmother's first husband for an
ANZAC Day challenge, she discovered a story that started in England,
moved to Australia, and ended on a battlefield in France. Her post on
GeniAus is entitled ANZAC Day Blog Challenge @Kintalk
Alona Tester shares with us a wonderful picture of her great grandfather
Otto Rafael Winter a Finnish born immigrant who was proud of his
new country and joined the army when the War came. See it in the
post Anzac Day Blog Challenge: He Was Proud to be Australian on the
lonetester HQ blog.
Irish support for the Allied side in the War was complicated by the issues
of Irish independence and British rule. I'm Irish-American on my Mom's side
so I was fascinated when I read Dora's recounting of the predicament of
her relative Frank McGrane in Conscription Into The Great War- An
Irishman's Story at her Black Raven Genealogy blog.
World War One ushered in the age of modern warfare with trench warfare
and gas attacks.Christine Blythe of Empty Nest Genealogy writes about two
granduncles whose bodies were never recovered while serving in France
in WWI War Stories.
Brenda Dougall Merriman's father was a pilot for the Royal Flying Corps and
kept a diary of his experiences. I think they'd make a great movie! See for
yourself in "Fell about a thousand feet" at Brenda's blog.
Some of us had relatives in several countries who fought in the War.Schalene
Dagutis had one from the U.S. and another from New Zealand, and honors
them in a Memorial Day post, Honoring those Who Died in the Service of
Their Countries at her Tangled Roots and Trees blog.
When Kathryn Creeden ordered the service record of her great grandfather's
brother from the NARA, she discovered a fascinating story of a man who
joined the U.S. Army shortly after deserting from the Marines. Eventually
he ended up fighting in the War in the Canadian army. Kathryn details his
journey on her blog Kathryn's Quest in the post Military Monday - Deserter
Becomes WWI Hero
Amanda Pape's blog is the wonderfully named ABT UNK. Her contribution
to the Challenge is a picture of her grandfather and his two brothers, all of
whom served in WWI. You can see it at her post Wordless Wednesday: "3
service stars in the window."
In Guy W. House, "Dorene from Ohio" of the Graveyard Rabbit of Sandusky
Ohio blog salutes the service of a cousin who died before she was born.
Donna Mierzejewski-McManus likes to research the people whose headstones
she's photographed in a Toledo cemetery and in her post Toledo’s World War I Veterans’ Experiences she tells the stories of two Polish-American soldiers.
The name of her blog is Toledo's Kuschwantz.
Shelley Bishop gives us the story of her granduncle who served in a heavy
artillery unit and survived the Battle of Argonne Forest over at her blog
A Sense of Family in Roy D. Eberhard, World War I Soldier: 52 Ancestors
Because of the infamous records fire of 1973, Jenny Lanctot had to resort to
other sources to find out about her great grandfather's WWI. Her persistence
paid off and she shows us what she found in Harold John Crowe – Indiana
National Guard (WWI) at Are My Roots Showing?
While actually hostilities broke out on 28Jul 1914, most cite the assassination
of Archduke Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo a month earlier as the start of the War.
John Newmark of the TransylvanianDutch blog tells us where his ancestors
were on that fateful day, June 28, 1914.
North Dakotan Adolph Myren's story is typical of many American soldiers
in both World Wars. It's recounted by Mary P Nelson at Celebrating Family
Stories (Another great blog title!) in Military Monday: Adolph Myren.
Like Jenny Lanctot, Cheri Hudson Passey's research into her relative Frank
E. Sullivan Sr.'s World War 1 service was complicated by the 1973 NARA
records fire. She was able to find some information, though, in other
documents and she describes what she found in Military Monday - Clues
From WWI Discharge Certificates at Carolina Girl Genealogy.
Carol A. Bowen Stevens over at Reflections from the Fence had the same
problem as Jenny and Cheri as she researched her WW1 veteran relative:
a lack of records. She turned to the newspaper collections at Ancestry.com
and through them shows us how a small Iowa town dealt with the draft
registration and enlistment of their young men. It's in World War I Soldier ::
Roscoe Clyde Lashbrook.
At her Heritage Zen blog, Cynthia Shennette's grandfather was a mechanic
in the fledgling U.S.Army Air Service. She uses pictures, postcards, and
records to construct a timeline of his military service in Over There!: My
Grandfather and World War I
Not many Americans know about a badly managed British expedition to Russia
during the War that included some American troops. Miriam Robbins' great
grandfather was one of the soldiers and she tells his story of that campaign
in A Polar Bear in North Russia at AnceStories: The Stories of My Ancestors.
Sara Campbell has a real treasure: the letters her grandfather sent home from
boot camp and then the front in France. They were sent to his sister and to
his future wife and give us a look at what a young soldier saw and thought
about in wartime. They're at Sara's post WWI Chronicles of Pvt. Will Coleman
on her Remembering Those Who Came Before Us blog.
Some soldiers lost their lives in battle, some from illness, and some died
from their injuries after they'd returned home. Wendy Grant Walter tells us
of one such cast on her blog From A to Zophar in her post Howard Mellor
Grant-Veteran of World War 1.
This concludes Part One. Some of the participants submitted lists of posts
they've written on the War, and those will be covered in Part Two.
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