One hundred years ago today: end of the “War to End All Wars”

One hundred years ago today — at 11 am on Monday, November 11, 1918 — the “Great War,” World War I, ended in Europe. At “the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” the big artillery stopped firing in France. The big guns fired continually until 10:59:59.

During his entire first term, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson resisted American involvement in the European war that pitted Germany against England and France. He was re-elected in 1916 with a pledge to “keep us out of the war.” But only a month after being sworn in for his second term, Wilson changed course. He asked for and got a declaration of war from the U.S. Congress in April, 1917. Wilson then called it the “War to end all wars.”

It was a hideous, chaotic war, hand-to-hand combat, millions of soldiers and civilians killed. A century later there are still no dependable numbers on how many actually died. Estimates vary from 20-million to 40-million. Although America sent troops to Europe relatively late in the war, the country experienced 360,000 war casualties — 126,000 Americans killed and another 234,000 American troops wounded.

The marble monument in front of the Union County Courthouse lists the names of 31 young Union county men, who lost their lives in World War I. Many of the family names are still prominent.

In alphabetical order, the Union County listed dead on the monument at the courthouse are:

Jesse H. Alexander
Henry A. Allred
Paul O. Coker
Jay Crawford
George O. Daniel
James B. Donald
Jesse Dorsey
Paul M. Eason
George F. Fields
Francis H. Floyd
Harve Foster
Curtis Henry
Amos Hodge
Edd Holley
Chester R. Jones
L. W. Kitchens
Jim Longest
Grover C. Mahan
Bolen McDonald
Corbett Meador
Willie Mitchell
Victor Parks
Jim Pegues
Guy Potter
Arthur A. Rogers
James R. Rowland
Cleveland Swann
Sherman Swann
Carrol Whittington
William L. Williams
Milford Young