American Soldier

Almost a century has passed since the signing of the armistice on 11 November 1918. Of all the soldiers who went through that hell on earth, photographs, letters, stories and old uniforms kept in attics are all that is left. Thanks to a collection of more than ten thousand documents, the author allows us to follow these young men with previously unseen photographs. All these faces, sometimes smiling, sometimes serious, have a story to tell. Many collectors have also allowed us access to their most precious objects, the fruit of their relentless research that helps save these objects that went through four terrible years of oblivion and destruction. Finally, being in the era of Internet, many links allow you to retrace the history of your ancestors and their regiments.

In 1917, the American army joined the war, boosting the morale of existing troops and offering a momentum to the offensive. Initially a small and poorly equipped force of 135,000 men, the American army was rapidly transformed into an expeditionary force which, by the end of the conflict, comprised 2 million men. The subject of this short book is a non-exhaustive study of the American soldier's equipment and his commitment within the American Expeditionary Forces in France in 1917-18.