HVT – April 19, 1919

CORP. BEVINS HOME FROM FRANCE

After having endured every hardship and privation and faced every danger that goes hand in hand with modern warfare for eighteen months in a foreign country, Corporal George W. Bevins, a former Amenia boy, who as a member of the 162^ndInfantry, part of the famous Fighting 26^th, (New England) Division, when Waterbury companies entered the trenches near the famous Chemin des Dames, a year ago last February, returned to the home of his mother, Mrs. Jerome Tobin, Waterbury, Conn., a few days ago.

Corporal Bevins landed at Boston April 8^th, on the transport Agamemnon. He joined Company H. of the old 2^ndConnecticut Infantry June 1^st, 1917, and was assigned to guard duty at strategical points throughout Connecticut, and was concentrated with the remainder of the 2^ndRegiment at Yale Field New Haven early in July for training preparatory to going overseas.

On September 21, his company, as part of the 2^ndbattalion, set out for “over there” on the transport Lenape.The ship almost foundered, however, after it was three days out, the battalion put back to land again, being quartered at Fort Totten, Long Island, until October 27^th, when it left New York on the British liner Adriatic, arriving at Liverpool on November 7^th.

The 26^thwas the first National Guard division, and, in fact, the first full division to arrive in France. No other American division has seen so long and continuous service at the front.

The Division was the first to take over a sector at the front as a division. They fought at Chemin des Dames, at Toul, at the second battle of the Marne, where they delivered the blow that sent the Hun reeling back from the salient, the apex of which was Chateau Thierry; they fought at St. Michel where they were given the most difficult sector, and they fought in the bloodiest of battles, in front of Metz and on the Meuse, the Argonne country and at Verdun, extending over a period of nine months, from February 6, 1918.

The casualties of the 26^thDivision, New England’s National Guard contribution to the overseas forces, were 11,955 men, according to compilations from the War Department reports. The list includes 1,730 officers and men killed, 3,624 severely wounded, 2,819 wounded slightly, 3,363 gassed, 283 missing, and 136 taken prisoners.

The Yankee Division captured 3,148 Germans, including 61 officers.

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