Thomas Henry Davis

Thomas Henry Davis was born to Andrew (1856-1934) and Francis (Nash) (1866-1955) on 24 February 1888 in Hampton, Virginia, the third of nine children; Oma (1884-1885), William (1886-1936), Don (1890-1969), Harry (1892-1975), John (1896-1990), Nannie (1898-1924), Collis (1900-1974), and Arthur (1904-1996).

Davis stated, on a medical diagnostic report in 1934, that his sister Nannie died at the age of 23 due to tuberculosis that she had “all of her life”; when his mother was pregnant, she had tuberculosis, and therefore gave her daughter the disease when she was nursed.

After graduating from high school in the 1910s, Thomas began working as a bellman at a hotel in Hampton near Lincoln Street; at the time of enlistment, Thomas was working as a dining car waiter for Watterson Dining via Atlantic Coast Line Railway.

Thomas enlisted in the U.S. Army on December 14, 1917 in Hampton, Virginia; Private Davis and his company left Hoboken, New Jersey on the U.S. Army Transport Ship George Washington on 15 June 1918, arriving at Brest, France, on 21 June. Then-Private First Class Davis received the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions on 30 September 1918, near Binarville, France;

“The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross to Private First class Thomas H. Davis (ASN: 1799330), United States Army, for extraordinary heroism in action while serving with Sanitary Detachment, 368th Infantry Regiment (Attached), 92d Division, A.E.F., at Binarville, France, 30 September 1918. Private Davis, with an officer and another soldier, voluntarily left shelter and crossed an open space 50 yards wide swept by shell and machine-gun fire to rescue a wounded soldier, whom they carried to a place of safety”.

Awarded DSC by CG, AEF, November 17, 1918. Published in G.O. No. 20, W.D., 1919. Medal No. 1053.

Private 1C Davis and his company left Brest, France on the U.S. Army Transport Ship Harrisburg on 5 February 1919, arriving at Camp Upton, New York on 11 February. Private 1C Davis was Honorably Discharged at Camp Meade, Maryland on 4 March 1919.

Thomas H. Davis served with Company [A], 1st Battalion, 368th Infantry Regiment, 184th Infantry Brigade, 92nd Division of the American Expeditionary Force. During the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, Pvt. Davis would take part of a rescue mission alongside two other men, for which he would be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.

28 September, 1918:

Beginning in late September, 1918, the 368th Infantry Regiment was attached to the French 11th Cuirassiers to form “Groupement Durand.” The purpose of this French and American Brigade was to keep liaison between the French 1st Dismounted Cavalry Division on their left and the American 77th Division on their right. However, after being ordered to secure a small stretch of the Argonne forest that stood between Allied forces and the small French town of Binarville, they would struggle to uphold this mission. During a period of intense combat beginning on 25 September, the 368th Infantry Regiment regularly lost contact with all surrounding forces.

Communicating with neighboring units was difficult in the Argonne’s rugged landscape.

By 28 September, the 368th had become completely disorganized and bogged down amidst the miles of mud, barbed wire, and shattered woodland that blocked their way to Binarville. To make matters worse, the 368th had been facing severe supply shortages since the operation began, most notably including a lack of safe drinking water. Regardless, after spending the morning hours rearming and reorganizing, the thirsty and demoralized men of 2nd and 3rd Battalions, 368th Infantry Division, renewed their assault on the German lines only to quickly become scattered and forced to retreat once again. The company commanders in these battalions, having witnessed four whole days of carnage, were beginning to reach their breaking point.

German snipers terrorized the 368th Regiment’s rear-lines throughout the offensive.

Many good men had been lost in the repeated assaults on the German lines. The conditions of the battle, which included fighting uphill in the freezing rain across four years’ worth of overgrown barbed wire and muddy trenches while under constant machine-gun fire and artillery bombardment, were enough to make even the most battle-hardened soldiers crack. Further, it was believed that German snipers were using a tunnel-system to harass the American’s rear-lines, which put even men held in reserve on edge. After facing all of this, only 1st Battalion, 368th Infantry Division, was deemed combat-capable as it had spent these first four days in reserve.

Observing that the American units had become completely exhausted and could no longer complete their objective, the French assigned detachments of the 9th Cuirassiers and 10th Dragoons to reinforce the battered 368th. These new men were under express orders to take Binarville, unlike the Americans who had received a confusing mix of orders to keep contact with friendly forces, scout the German lines, and simultaneously advance through the enemy’s stronghold.

29 September, 1918:

Though the French Cavalry had initially fought from horseback, by 1918 they had adapted to the conditions of the First World War and began to fight on foot.

Observing the need for the 368th to recover following four days of continued combat, it was decided that 2nd Battalion (which had borne the brunt of the fighting) should be placed in reserve while 3rd Battalion moved to a supporting position. The new frontline would be comprised of 1st Battalion and the summoned French Cavalry Detachments. The 368th Infantry Regiment would not be involved in offensive operations on 29 September, instead receiving orders to rejoin the main force of the 92nd Division, which was now under the command of the French XXXVIII Corps.

Meanwhile, the French Cavalry picked up where the 368th had left off. Their objective for 29 September was to capture Tranchee Dromedaire and the adjacent Tranchee Clothilde, which were now the bulwark of the German defense against both Groupement Durand and the American 77th Division to their right. However, the French soon realized, just as the 368th had before them, that the German defenses in this stretch of the Argonne ran deep. Under constant assault by the German guns, they too struggled to meet their goals, although a section of Tranchee Dromedaire was captured and held by the 9th Cuirassiers. Fearing that their position had now become untenable, the Germans withdrew from their trenches on the night of 29-30 September.

30 September, 1918:

On the morning of 30 September, reconnaissance patrols from 1st Battalion, 368th Infantry Regiment found the sections of Tranchee Dromedaire to their front uninhabited, and so decided to occupy them. However, this caused a small problem as all elements of the 368th Regiment had been ordered to fall back and reorganize at a point well behind friendly lines. 1st Battalion, having moved from their expected position, would not receive these orders. The commanding officer of 1st Battalion, Colonel John Merrill, was left to his own initiative.

A section of the German defenses at Moulin de l’Homme Mort.

When the French 9th Cuirassiers advanced from their own section of Tranchee Dromedaire as part of a sanctioned offensive at 1200 hours (12:00 PM), observers from 1st Battalion, 368th Infantry Regiment saw that their allies had gone on the attack. At 1400 hours (2:00 PM), Colonel Merrill ordered his battalion to join the French in the capture of Binarville, believing that his own orders to attack must have been delayed. Orders or not, he and his men had also grown tired of sitting around while everyone else did all of the work. Such as it was, 1st Battalion advanced under fire from the German lines along the nearby ridge, which included the bastion at Moulin de l’Homme Mort. However, as the 77th Division was simultaneously launching their own offensive against this “Dead Man’s Hill” and heavy rainfall impaired visibility, by 1600 hours (4:00 PM) the French Dismounted Cavalry and 1st Battalion, 368th Infantry Regiment had successfully captured Binarville.

Much of Binarville lay in ruin following the Allies’ capture of the town.

[A] Company, 1st Battalion, 368th Infantry Regiment advanced the furthest, occupying a position just north of Binarville alongside the French 9th Cuirassiers. It was somewhere within this vicinity that Private Thomas H. Davis and two other men, one an officer and the other enlisted, would undertake a daring rescue mission. The enlisted man was likely Private Edward Handy of [B] Company, 1st Battalion, 368th Infantry Regiment. By this point in the operation, the Germans had become wise to the capture of Binarville and were subjecting allied forces within the town to heavy artillery fire. Additionally, German forces in the surrounding hills had a clear view of the fields around Binarville, and could pick-off anyone who strayed too far into the open. It was under these conditions, with little more than the cover of a heavy storm, that Private Davis and the two other men broke from their shelter to save one unlucky man who had fallen in no-man’s-land. Even as the German shells and bullets exploded all around them, the three men dashed across the nearly 50-yard-wide field to rescue the wounded man before turning and dashing the same distance back to safety.

Later that night, messengers would reestablish contact between 1st Battalion and the rest of the 368th Infantry Regiment, bringing with them orders for the men of 1st Battalion to retire from the front.

For his part in this incredible story, Private Davis would be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.

After his discharge, Thomas continued to work for the Atlantic Coast Line as a dining car waiter.

In February of 1934, Thomas was admitted to the Veteran’s Administration Facility in Washington, DC after beginning to exhibit symptoms of advanced Tuberculosis Meningitis, for which he had been unknowingly suffering from for most of his adult life.

Davis stated the following after a series of medical appointments in February of 1934;

“Felt well when discharged. Went to work two weeks later. Have had no sickness up to present illness…the cough has been present all my life, but this did not bother me very much. In the last month or so it has gotten much worse. About a month before Christmas I had some pain in my chest and this got worse gradually. It started in the back of the chest and came forward. At one time it was very severe and caused me to double up…I feel I have been gradually running down for the past ten years. I have never taken very good care of myself.”

He remained in the care of the hospital until his death on 28 September 1934. He never married or had any children.