Peter L. Belmonte

By October 1918, the U.S. had more than a million men fighting in the Meuse-Argonne campaign. The American Expeditionary Forces' logistics army, the Services of Supply (SOS), provided critical support to the combat forces. An enormous array of maintenance, medical, motor transport, railroad, quartermaster and engineer units served in this role--as well as British women from Queen Mary's Army Auxiliary Corps, African American labor and pioneer regiments, a U.S. Marine brigade led by a legendary officer, volunteers from the Salvation Army, Chinese laborers and even German prisoners of war.. The SOS kept American soldiers at the front supplied with "bullets, bandages and beans" while repairing weapons, producing vast quantities of lumber, buying horses from Spain, operating a massive railroad network, caring for the sick and wounded, fighting fires on troopships, driving trucks under enemy fire and administering a notorious prison. This book gives a full account of perhaps the most overlooked yet crucial military effort of World War I.

Much has been written about the exploits of the American Expeditionary Forces, the men and women sent overseas to fight during World War I, but much less is known about the two million who served in the Army without ever setting foot on foreign soil. This book examines the history of depot brigades, development battalions, U.S. Guards units, Students' Army Training Corps, and other "forgotten" troops charged with training soldiers, guarding installations, and performing myriad other duties. It also chronicles the service of men like actor Jimmy Cagney, author F. Scott Fitzgerald, movie director Frank Capra, children's author Ludwig Bemelmans, and the two million others who served in the United States during the war. At the time, many of these men considered themselves unfortunate cast-offs, doomed to spend the war safe at home while their friends served in combat overseas. But, in the end, it was largely because of them that America could field an effective fighting force.

Baseball is the most American game. No other sporting contest so closely reflects the American psyche and culture. Its uniqueness comes from the fact that part of the game is clearly defined and unchanged since play first began, while another part of the game fluctuates and changes constantly. And if baseball is the truest American game, the Doughboys of the Great War were its most loyal proponents. By 1918, there were over four million of them: two million in France fighting in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive and another two million in stateside training camps awaiting their turn to cross the Atlantic to the Western Front. Playing wherever they could find enough room to throw a ball, they brought the game with them into the front lines and then into the occupation of Germany. Sharing their military service, in combat and on the baseball diamond, were a number of famous professional ballplayers, managers, lawyers, politicians, and even an umpire.

This book covers the entire spectrum of military service during World War I. It gives examples, including many photographs, from almost every ethnic and national group in the United States during this time. Including draft registration, induction and training, stateside service, overseas service, combat, return home, and discharge, learn the history of America’s foreign-born soldiers during World War I and how they adapted to military service to become part of the successful American Expeditionary Forces.

Thousands of Calabrian immigrants served in the United States military during World War I, but their story has not yet been told. Historian Peter L. Belmonte has undertaken that task. This book shows over 70 Calabrian-American soldiers in uniform during the war, along with short military biographies of each man. Coupled with his first three volumes, this book goes a long way to uncovering the story of a group of men from a common region who fought for their adopted country during a cataclysmic war a century ago.

This is the third volume in a series documenting the US World War I military service of immigrants from Calabria, Italy. Historian Peter L. Belmonte has been researching these men for twenty years and now he presents the fruit of his on-going work. This volume contains the military service records of about 280 men from the province of Cosenza, including the villages of Aprigliano, Casole Bruzio, Castiglione Cosentino, Cellara, Dipignano, Figline Vegliaturo, Lappano, Mangone, Paterno Calabro, Pedace, Piane Crati, Pietrafitta, Rovito, San Pietro in Guarano, Serra Pedace, Spezzano Grande, Spezzano Piccolo, Trenta, and Zumpano. In addition there are a few men from villages covered in previous volumes, such as Carolei, Castrolibero, Cerisano, Domanico, Lattarico, Marano Marchesato, Marano Principato, Mendicino, Rende, Rota Greca, San Fili, San Marco Argentano, and San Vincenzo la Costa.

Hundreds of thousands of Calabrians--inhabitants of Calabria, the region that makes up the toe of the Italian boot--came to America in the decades before World War I. Thousands of them served in the US military during that war, and until now no effort has been made to document their history. Historian Peter L Belmonte begins this monumental task by concentrating on the area around the city of Cosenza, the provincial capital of Calabria's northern province. This second volume contains the military history of more than 290 veterans and focuses on immigrants from the villages of Carolei, Castrolibero, Cerisano, Domanico, Lattarico, Mendicino, Montalto Uffugo, Rende, Rota Greca, San Fili, San Marco Argentano, and San Vincenzo La Costa.

Millions of Italians came to the US between 1880 and the eve of World War I. As many as 300,000 of them served in the United States military during the war. Tens of thousands of Calabrians--inhabitants of Calabria, the region that makes up the toe of the Italian boot--came to America in the this so-called Great Migration. Thousands of them served in the US military during that war, and until now no effort has been made to document their history. Historian Peter L Belmonte begins his task by concentrating on the area around the city of Cosenza, the provincial capital of the northern province of Calabria.This case study focuses on one specific group of immigrant soldiers: men who were born in, lived in, or whose family came from the neighboring villages of Marano Marchesato and Marano Principato, province of Cosenza, in the southern Italian region of Calabria.By examining the service more than 170 men, this book lays the foundation for further studies of Italian immigrant soldiers in general, and Calabrians specifically. Their military history highlights the role of the US military; they served in every type of unit from stateside camps to the trenches of France and even to the Siberian wasteland. Many of the men suffered life-changing wounds; their story is told here.

Nearly 100 years ago, on October 4, 1918, on a muddy, poison gas-soaked hillside in France, the U.S. 26th Infantry Regiment jumped-off amidst a hail of shell fire and machine-gun fire to begin the final push to end World War I. For the next 39 days, with little respite, the regiment fought desperately against a determined, well-armed foe. This is the story of a single regiment in a successful, highly acclaimed “Regular Army” division, during the greatest American battle to date. This is not a dry recitation of facts, but an in-depth examination of a single regiment that allows the reader to appreciate the intricacies of small-unit action and the problems associated with leading platoons, companies, and battalions in battle during the Great War, while at the same time depicting the human drama associated with the terrible carnage