MWSA Review

He Charged Alone is the story of World War I Medal of Honor recipient Private First Class Frank Gaffney. Gaffney served with Company G, 108th Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army’s 27th Division during 1918. His unit assaulted the Saint Quentin Canal tunnel, an extremely fortified portion of the Imperial German’s Army Hindenburg Line, the last line of defense protecting Germany’s occupied areas of Belgium and northeastern France.
The story covers Gaffney’s early life, civilian working life, and his journey from civilian to World War I “doughboy” as well as his combat experiences, including the tremendous acts of heroism that earned him the Medal of Honor. We get a fairly complete picture of Frank Gaffney as a man, both in and out of uniform.

Gaffney was assigned as a Lewis gunner, which was a “light” machine gun carried and employed by one soldier as a part of a three-man team. The team also consisted of an assistant gunner that carried extra ammunition and a soldier equipped with a standard rifle to provide protection for the two men dedicated to the operating the Lewis gun. Gaffney’s exploits, as reported at the time, deemed him second only to Sergeant Alvin York, America’s preeminent Medal of Honor recipient and “war hero” to the American masses in 1918. Both Gaffney and York earned their medals during the same massive Allied campaign that broke the back of the German Army, at a high cost in U.S. casualties, but essentially ending the war.

The author constructs a rich backstory of PFC Gaffney’s time in the hastily constructed basic training camps of the World War I American Expeditionary Force, including training received by both British and French soldiers in the United States. The perilous voyage to France, in which his convoy engaged with a prowling German U-boat submarine, is detailed, and then the extended period of further training and introduction to the front-line trenches in France is covered.

The author does an outstanding job of balancing details with quotes from Gaffney. Where there are no direct references by Gaffney, the author weaves information available from the officers and men of Gaffney’s unit, associate units in his regiment, and his division. The story flows in a smooth and logical manner. I highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in World War I and U.S. Army combat history or stories of exceptional valor in combat.

Review by Terry Lloyd ( February 2023)

 

Author's Synopsis

Frank Gaffney was a 33-year-old papermaker from Western New York when America entered the Great War in 1917. While his age exempted him from serving in the military, Gaffney ran to the colors anyway. He fought bravely on Belgian and French battlefields as a U.S. Army soldier with the 27th Division's 108th Infantry Regiment. On September 29, 1918, Gaffney singlehandedly breached a section of Germany's Hindenburg Line, coming away with 80 prisoners. Six grateful nations recognized his bravery, including his own. In June 1919, the United States awarded him the Medal of Honor. Years later, the 27th Division's commanding general, Maj. Gen. John F. O'Ryan, wrote of Gaffney, "…no one man had performed more daring exploits and had exercised a bigger influence upon those about him by the gallantry of his conduct." 

In He Charged Alone, John Strasburg chronicles the life of a First World War American soldier whose bravery was once compared to that of the legendary Sergeant Alvin York. The author weaves together Gaffney’s personal correspondence with military/government records, newspaper accounts, and published unit histories. Nearly fifty illustrations--photographs and maps--augment the narrative. 

Much of the book focuses on Gaffney's military service, heroism on the battlefield, and subsequent rehabilitation from a combat injury he received in the war's closing days, but not overlooked are Gaffney's upbringing and how he managed the burden that comes with being a Medal of Honor recipient. At its core, this book memorializes a true American hero from New York State who, in life, was admired by people across the country but, in death, has been nearly forgotten. In He Charged Alone, Frank Gaffney's legacy returns to the fore, where it belongs.

Format(s) for review: Paper Only

Review Genre: Nonfiction—Memoir/Biography

Number of Pages: 249

Word Count: 59,000