Harry Joseph Akins and Charles Jeremiah Akins
World War I Veterans
By Camille Arbogast
During the First World War, brothers Harry Joseph and Charles Jeremiah Akins both served overseas as part of the 26th Division. They were born in Waterbury, Connecticut, to John and Mary (Sullivan) Akins; Harry on April 26, 1895, and Charles on September 26, 1896. Their siblings included Francis Xavier born in 1900, Helen in 1910, Benedict Gregory in 1914, and Margaret Mary in 1919, as well as four siblings who died before 1910.
The Akins were living in Jersey City, New Jersey, by 1910. John, a New Jersey native, worked as a japaner at a button works. Harry, while still attending school, was an errand boy at a grocery store. Around 1913, the family moved to Dorchester, where they lived at 80 Wrentham Street in the Ashmont neighborhood. The 1916 Boston directory listed John as a button maker and Harry as a steamfitter.
During the Mexican Expedition of 1916, Harry and Charles enlisted in the Massachusetts National Guard. Harry joined up at the guard’s summer training ground in Framingham, Massachusetts, on June 27. He served with Troop D, 1st Separate Squad Cavalry, also known as the Roxbury Horse Guards. Charles had some difficulty initially being accepted for service. An article in the Boston Globe reported, “since the Militia was first mobilized at the Framingham camp two weeks ago the boy has persistently sought to have his name set down on the rolls of the regiment. He accompanied the [Massachusetts] 9th [Regiment] to its camp and stayed there patiently, petitioning the authorities daily to be taken in.” On July4, he visited “the recruiting station in the 9th Regiment Armory on East Newton st,” where he put “forth his need for a pair of shoes and his desire to shoot Mexicans as his reasons for desiring to enlist. Akins … bore prima facie evidence that he was sadly in need of a new outfit. In the blank on the enrollment petition reserved for ‘occupation’ Akins wrote ‘unemployed.’ The bellicose enthusiasm and physical strength of the lad counted much in his favor, however, and if he passes the doctor’s requirements he will be sent to Framingham Wednesday morning.” According to his service record, Charles entered the Massachusetts National Guard on July 8. It seems he added a year to his age in order to enlist, as his military records use a birth year of 1895. Both Troop D and the 9th Massachusetts served along the Mexican border.
Guardsmen were called for service again on March 20, 1917, shortly before President Wilson asked Congress for a declaration of war against Germany. Charles reported for duty on March 25, 1917, and mustered as a private in Company C of the 9th Regiment of the Massachusetts National Guard on April 4, 1917. War was declared two days later. Harry reported for duty on July 25, 1917, and on July 31 mustered as a private in Troop D, 1st Squad Cavalry, Massachusetts National Guard. According to an article in the Boston Globe, “When the call came to go to France, Harry told his mother he was going, saying if he did not get into action at once he would never wear the uniform again.” In August 1917, the Massachusetts National Guard units were reorganized; the 9th Massachusetts became the 101st Infantry, and Troop D of the 1st Squad Cavalry became Company D of the 102nd Machine Gun Battalion. Both units were part of the 51st Infantry Brigade of the 26th Division, or Yankee Division.
On September 7, 1917, Charles sailed for France with Company C on the USAT Tenadores, leaving from Hoboken, New Jersey. Harry sailed from Hoboken on the USACT Antilles on September 22. After further training at Neufchateau, France, the 26th Division went to the front in early February 1918, in the Chemin des Dames defensive sector. In early April, they moved to the Toul-Boucq defensive sector.
On April 20, Harry was at Seicheprey, on the Saint Mihiel salient, when the Germans attacked. According to The History of the Yankee Division, they were “German ‘Sturntruppen,’ or Hindenberg’s Traveling Circus … These were a body of picked shock troops, who traveled from place to place, along the German line and delivered raids at regular intervals. After a heavy bombardment they came over, about 400 in number, with about 2,500 Germans following.” General Clarence Ransom Edwards described the attack, “The Germans swept down into the middle of the town. They overran our machine guns … Three of our machine-gun crews were found sitting on their machines with their heads down. Only one man got away alive.” Harry was killed in action that day.
Mary Akins shared some of her feelings about her son’s death when, in the spring of 1919, a parade was held in Boston to honor the 26th Division. There was discussion of including caskets in the parade, and in March 1919 Mary wrote to voice her objection. “Every man and woman, boy or girl, that has loved ones sleeping in France will miss them from the parade and our hearts are broken going out to see this parade and we don’t want to see those coffins. When the coffins come over with the dead heroes, we then will watch and march to their last burying place in the United States … I have my dearly beloved boy over there, but his spirit will be with us on the day of the big parade. I watched him march away from Framingham that beautiful evening, Sept 21, 1917, never to return again, and I think my heart went with him as he told me, ‘Mother, don’t cry now.’ I told him I wouldn’t and didn’t, for his sake. I have one real boy with Co C, 101st Infantry— God bless him! and send him and all our boys safe home to their own home town. A proud mother but with a heart wound that will never heal.”
On March 30, 1922, Harry’s body was returned to the United States on the USAT Cambrai. His remains were initially delivered to his parents, who then lived at 18 Shepard Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts. On April 15, his body was moved to the Council Chamber in Cambridge City Hall where, along with the bodies of two other Cambridge soldiers, it lay in state with an honor guard provided by the Cambridge Post of the American Legion. The next day, Harry’s body was carried to Saint Peter’s Catholic Church in Cambridge, where a service was held in his honor. The caskets of the three soldiers were then “borne on gun caissons” and escorted by a cavalry troop and men from the Cambridge and Old Dorchester posts of the American Legion to the soldier’s lot in the Cambridge Cemetery for burial. As his parents had moved to Cambridge since his death, Harry was honored in that city, but Dorchester also considered him a local hero, and it was noted Harry “is the first ‘gold star’ man of St Mark’s Parish.” A service was held for him at Saint Mark’s on April 16, as well.
Charles remained with the 101st Infantry through the end of the war. On July 10, 1918, the 101st entered the Pas Fini defensive sector at Chateau Thierry. They were part of the Champagne Marne defensive July 15 through 18, then the Aisne-Marne offensive July 18 through 25. September 12 through 16, the 101st fought in the Saint Mihiel offensive. During that time, Charles was made a mechanic. They were stationed in the Troyon defensive sector September 17 through October 8, and participated in the Meuse Argonne offensive October 18 until the Armistice on November 11. On December 1, 1918, Charles was again made a private.
Charles did not participate in the spring 1919 parade in Boston for the 26th Division. Though he appeared on the transport list of USS America along with the rest of Company C, 101st Infantry, he did not sail with them on March 28, 1919. His name was scratched out on the passenger list; he had been “transferred to Belgian Camp, Le Mans.” On May 24, 1919, Charles was transferred to Company M, 321st Infantry. He returned to the United States in June 1919, sailing from Saint Nazaire, France, on the USS Manchuria. He was demobilized at Camp Devens and discharged on June 27, 1919.
On August 31, 1919, at the Blessed Sacrament Church in Cambridge, Charles married Marie Elizabeth Schindler, a waitress from Roslindale. Charles and Marie moved in with his family at 18 Shepard Street in Cambridge and he worked as a pipefitter. In the mid-1920s, he lived at 65 Hammond Street in Cambridge. He may have been the Charles J. Akins, sprinkler fitter, living at 140 Grove Street in West Roxbury in 1929. By 1940, he had moved to Baltimore, Maryland, where he continued to work as a pipefitter. For a time in 1942, his brother Francis lived with him at 307 East Hamburg Street in Baltimore, where Charles was a boarder. That year, Charles reported on his World War II draft registration that he worked at the Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyard in the Curtis Bay area of Baltimore. He later married Gertrude Mae (Moore) Johnson of Baltimore, who had two children from previous marriages. At the end of his life he lived in Arbutus, Maryland, outside of Baltimore. Charles died on October 25, 1978. He was buried in Meadowridge Memorial Park Cemetery in Elkridge, Maryland. He had been a member of Steamfitters Local Union Number 430 and the Morrell Park Post 137, American Legion.
Sources
Military, Compiled Service Records. World War I. Carded Records. Records of the Military Division of the Adjutant General’s Office, Massachusetts National Guard.
Putnam, Eben, ed. The Gold Star Record of Massachusetts. The Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 1929: 454; Archive.org
“Cambridge,” Boston Globe 1 April 1922: 4; Newspaper.com
Selective Service Registration Cards, World War II: Fourth Registration. Records of the Selective Service System, National Archives and Records Administration; Ancestry.com
1910, 1920, 1940 U.S. Federal Census; Ancestry.com
“Six New England Men Give Up Lives,” Boston Globe, 27 April 1918:2; Newspapers.com
Boston directories, various years; Ancestry.com
“Persistence Wins Chance,” Boston Globe, 4 July 1916: 8; Newspapers.com
Lists of Outgoing & Incoming Passengers, 1917-1938, Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, 1774-1985, The National Archives at College Park, MD; Ancestry.com
Benwell, Harry A. History of the Yankee Division. Boston: The Cornhill Company, 1919; Archive.org
“26th Division to March 5 1/2 Miles,” Boston Globe, 28 March 1919: 10; Newspapers.com
“Bay State Heroes Back to Homeland,” Boston Globe, 30 March 1922: 13; Newspapers.com
“Deaths,” Boston Globe, 14 April 1922: 26; Newspapers.com
“Honors for Three Cambridge Vets,” Boston Globe, 17 April 1922: 9; Newspapers.com
“Two Heroes to be Buried at Cambridge,” Boston Globe, 14 April 1922: 2; Newspapers.com
“Dorchester District,” Boston Globe, 17 April 1922: 4; Newspapers.com
“Massachusetts State Vital Records, 1841-1920,” database, citing Marriage, Boston, Suffolk, MA, State Archives, Boston; FamilySearch.org
“United States, Veterans Administration Master Index, 1917-1940,” database, citing Military Service, NARA microfilm publication (St. Louis: National Archives and Records Administration, 1985), various roll numbers; FamilySearch.org
“Death Notices,” Baltimore Sun, 28 October 1978:23; Newspapers.com
“Charles J. Akins,” BillionGraves.com