General Pershing WWI casualty list
{{Short description|US military-produced casualty list}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=May 2022}}
File:Evening public ledger., April 03, 1918, Postscript Edition.png, April 3, 1918, with General John Pershing]]
File:Sacrifice, Airmen honor solemn promise to fallen comrades 150524-F-IM453-045.jpg, United Kingdom]]
File:View of interior dome from below - District of Columbia War Memorial, West Potomac Park, Washington, District of Columbia, DC HABS DC-857-16.tif, West Potomac Park, Washington, DC]]
The General Pershing WWI casualty list was a list of casualties released to the media by the American military during World War I. Newspapers like the Evening Public Ledger (EPL) would title the list's summary, General Pershing Reports or Pershing Reports.{{harvnb|EPL|1918|p=6}} The name General Pershing refers to General John Pershing, who was in command of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF), the expeditionary force of the United States during World War I. While fighting the Germans on the Western Front the AEF would take daily casualties in the form of those killed in action (KIA), those who died from their wounds, those who died from disease, accidental deaths, soldiers missing in action (MIA) and soldiers wounded in action (WIA). These numbers would be tabulated by the American military and then released to the American news media.
After the war, the real numbers were mined from the military bureaucracy as opposed to the fog of war. During World War I, 4,734,991 served in the American military.{{harvnb|DeBruyne|2017|p=2}} There were a total of 116,516 deaths, with 53,402 of those occurring in battle. Another 63,114 died of noncombat reasons, including about 45,000 due to the 1918 outbreak of Spanish flu; 30,000 soldiers died before they even reached France.{{harvnb|Wevera|van Bergenc|2014|p=}}{{harvnb|Byerly|2010|p=}} Of those that survived the war, 204,002 were wounded in some way.
The list
One of the publications that printed this data along with the names who were reported dead and wounded was the Evening Public Ledger, a Philadelphia newspaper published from March 25, 1836, to January 1942. On November 5, 1917, the EPL published a story with the headline "Casualty List In First Action Thrills Nation". In the article it listed the first three American deaths in the war: McLean County, Kentucky's Corporal James Bethel Gresham, Private Merle Hay from Glidden, Iowa, and Private Thomas Enright of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.{{harvnb|EPL|1917|p=1}} They had been killed in a skirmish on November 3, 1917. In addition to the three Americans KIA the casualty list printed that five were WIA and twelve soldiers were MIA. Initially, the casualty lists were published with casualty's name and their address. From March 9, 1918, the list was "denatured" or stripped of home addresses.{{harvnb|EPL (A)|1918|p=4}} On April 2, 1918, the American War Department said that the only source for casualty lists would be the American command headquarters in France (Pershing's AEF).{{harvnb|EPL (B)|1918|p=1}}
April 1919
March 1919
February 1919
January 1919
December 1918
November 1918
October 1918
September 1918
August 1918
July 1918
June 1918
May 1918
April 1918
March 1918
February 1918
January 1918
December 1917
November 1917
See also
- Deadliest single days of World War I
- List of maritime disasters in World War I
- List of battles with most United States military fatalities
- World War I casualties
==Bibliography==
Notes
{{reflist|20em}}
References
- {{cite journal |last=Byerly |first= Carol R. |date= 2010 |title=The U.S. Military and the Influenza Pandemic of 1918–1919 |journal= Public Health Reports|volume= 125|issue=Suppl 3 |pages=82–91 |publisher=United States National Library of Medicine |doi= 10.1177/00333549101250S311 |issn=1468-2877|pmc=2862337|pmid=20568570 }}
- {{cite book |last=DeBruyne|first=Nese F. | title = American War and Military Operations Casualties: Lists and Statistics|year=2017| publisher = Congressional Research Service| url= https://fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL32492.pdf }} - Total pages: 38
- {{cite book |last=Hepp|first=John Henry | title = The Middle-Class City: Transforming Space and Time in Philadelphia, 1876-1926|url=https://archive.org/details/middleclasscityt0000hepp|url-access=registration|year=2003| publisher = University of Pennsylvania Press| isbn=9780812204056 }} - Total pages: 288
- {{cite news |ref={{harvid|EPL|1917}} |title=Casualty List In First Action Thrills Nation |url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045211/1917-11-05/ed-1/seq-1/#date1=11%2F01%2F1917&index=4&date2=11%2F31%2F1917&searchType=advanced&language=&sequence=0&lccn=sn83045211&words=action+ACTION+Action+general+General+Honor+HONOR+Killed+killed+killing+Pershing+ROLL+Roll&proxdistance=5&rows=20&ortext=killed+in+action+roll+of+honor&proxtext=&phrasetext=+&andtext=general+pershing&dateFilterType=range&page=1|newspaper=Evening Public Ledger |publisher=Cyrus H. K. Curtis|location=Philadelphia|issn=2151-3945|lccn=83045211|oclc=9355469|date=November 5, 1917|pages=1–22|access-date= January 12, 2018 }}
- {{cite news |ref={{harvid|EPL|1918}} |title=Pershing Reports 387 U.S. Casualties|url=http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045211/1918-09-28/ed-1/seq-6/#date1=09%2F26%2F1918&sort=date&date2=11%2F11%2F1918&searchType=advanced&language=&sequence=0&lccn=sn83045211&index=17&words=ANNOUNCED+Announcements+army+Army+CASUALTIES+casualties+casualty+list+LIST+lists&proxdistance=5&rows=20&ortext=army+casualty+lists+announced&proxtext=&phrasetext=&andtext=&dateFilterType=range&page=2|newspaper=Evening Public Ledger|publisher=Cyrus H. K. Curtis|location=Philadelphia|issn=2151-3945|lccn=83045211|oclc=9355469|date=September 28, 1918|pages=1–20|access-date= November 20, 2017 }}
- {{cite news |ref={{harvid|EPL (A)|1918}} |title=Addressless list of casualties given - War Office issues names after information committee refuses |url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045211/1918-03-09/ed-1/seq-4/#date1=03%2F09%2F1918&index=3&date2=03%2F09%2F1918&searchType=advanced&language=&sequence=0&lccn=sn83045211&words=action+Killed+KILLED+Kills&proxdistance=5&rows=20&ortext=killed+in+action&proxtext=&phrasetext=+&andtext=&dateFilterType=range&page=1|newspaper=Evening Public Ledger|publisher=Cyrus H. K. Curtis|location=Philadelphia|issn=2151-3945|lccn=83045211|oclc=9355469|date=March 9, 1918|pages=1–20|access-date= November 20, 2017 }}
- {{cite news |ref={{harvid|EPL (B)|1918}} |title=Prevent publication of all casualty lists |url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045211/1918-04-03/ed-1/seq-1/|newspaper=Evening Public Ledger|publisher=Cyrus H. K. Curtis|location=Philadelphia|issn=2151-3945|lccn=83045211|oclc=9355469|date=April 2, 1918|pages=1–18|access-date= November 20, 2017 }}
- {{cite news |ref={{harvid|New York Times|1918}} |title= Gen. Pershing Reports One Killed In Action|newspaper=The New York Times |issn=0362-4331|oclc=1645522|date=1918}}
- {{cite magazine |title= The Press: Again, Curtis-Martin| magazine=Time |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,738833-1,00.html|issn= 0040-781X|oclc=1311479 |date=March 17, 1930|access-date= November 18, 2017 }}
- {{cite journal |last1=Wevera|first1=Peter C Wevera|last2=van Bergenc|first2=Leo |date=June 27, 2014|pmc = 4181817 |title =Death from 1918 pandemic influenza during the First World War: a perspective from personal and anecdotal evidence |journal=Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses|volume=8|issue=5|pages=538–546|publisher = United States National Library of Medicine|doi=10.1111/irv.12267|pmid=24975798}}