Army, VA Chiefs Attend WWI Memorial Ceremonial Groundbreaking

By Richard Sisk
via the Military.com web site

WASHINGTON, DC — In a shabby, partly abandoned little park about a block from the White House, dignitaries gathered Thursday to make amends for the "national tragedy" that left World War I off the roster of America's conflicts that have memorials in Washington, D.C.

General Mark A. Milley, U.S. Army Chief of Staff, speaks at the ceremonial groundbreaking for the National World War I Memorial at Pershing Park in Washington, D.C. Nov. 9, 2017. (DoD photo by EJ Hersom)Once the homeless were cleared from the area, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley; Veterans Affairs Secretary Dr. David Shulkin; and Sandra Sinclair Pershing, the granddaughter-in-law of World War I commander Gen. John J. "Black Jack" Pershing, joined others in taking gold-colored shovels to turn over soil brought from a century-old battlefield in France.

"It's a national tragedy that the millions of vets of the 'Great War' who were the parents of the greatest generation have not been memorialized in our capital," said Terry Hamby, a Vietnam veteran and commissioner of the U.S. World War I Centennial Commission.

"Today, this groundbreaking service starts a process of erecting a memorial," Hamby said, just days before the nation again marks Veterans Day, which began as "Armistice Day" after World War I.

Hamby spoke in front of posters and placards put up by the commission to tell some of the story of the 4.4 million Americans who answered the call to arms for the "war to end all wars."

There was a quote from an Australian trooper to his new American trench pal: "You'll do me, Yank, but you chaps are a bit rough."

That translates as admiration in Australian for the "Doughboys" of the 131st and 132nd regiments of the 33rd Division of the Illinois National Guard, who had just gone over the top in a frontal assault that drove back the Germans in the French summer of 1917.

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