These Maine men answered the call when the US entered the Great War
By Jonathan Bratten, Special to the BDN
Posted May 28, 2017, at 9:59 a.m.
Men of the 2nd Maine at the Subcaliber Rifle Range at Camp Keyes, 1917
On April 6, 1917, the United States entered the Great War. Six days later, a telegram from the War Department arrived at Camp Keyes in Augusta: The 2nd Maine Regiment was ordered into active service.
“I am, in consequence,” the letter from Secretary of War Newton Baker read, “instructed by the President to call into the service of the United States forthwith, through you, the following units of the National Guard of the State of Maine.” President Woodrow Wilson and Congress had exercised their right to mobilize the National Guard in a state of war for the first time since the signing of the National Defense Act of 1916.
The 15 companies of the 2nd Maine began recruiting to wartime strength in towns across the state. On July 5, the companies began to assemble at Camp Keyes in Augusta.
Who were the men who made up this 2,002-man organization? More than 50 percent were traditional National Guardsmen who had been with the regiment since they were mobilized to the U.S.-Mexican border in 1916 and before. Men signed on eagerly to serve with “the Old Second.”