>

IAGenWeb Iowa in the Great War

 

Report of the Adjutant General of Iowa
 

Iowa National Guard Activities

In Each Company

--------------------

    
      (Duty) Sergeants will be selected whose order of rank among themselves is as follows: Second, third, fifth, sixth (machine Gun Company, second, third, fifth.)
      Corporals will be selected whose order of rank among themselves is as follows: Tenth, eleventh, eighth, third, second,, sixth, thirteenth, fifteenth.
      Wagoners will be selected by taking the even numbered in the alphabetical list of their names.
      First class privates will be selected by taking the even numbered in the alphabetical list of their names.
      Privates will be selected by taking the odd numbered beginning with (1) in the alphabetical list of their names until the quote is completed.
 
      After the call of the President of July 3, 1917 which was the final call for the National Guard units, permission was granted for the organization of several new units. According to this authority a field hospital was immediately organized at Iowa City under the of Major Frank L. Love. This was given Federal recognition but was denied the right to be mustered into Federal service as a National Guard unit. They therefore asked to be individually inducted into service according to the selective regulations and were sent to Fort Riley, Kansas for this purpose. After being individually inducted into service they were then re-organized as a field hospital company. Major Love was not sent with this unit but was later called into service.

      The proclamation of the President dated July 3, 1917, not only called Iowa Guardsmen to Federal service, but also drafted them into the Army of the United States on August 5, 1917. Paragraphs two, three and four of the proclamation say:

 

    II.  Under the authority conferred upon me by clause second of section one of the Act of Congress "to authorize the President to increase temporarily the military establishment of the United States," approved May 18, 1917, I do hereby draft into the military service of the United States as of and from the fifth day of August, nineteen hundred and seventeen, all members of the National Guard and all enlisted members of the National Guard Reserve of the following States, except members of staff corps and departments not included in the personnel of tactical organizations, and except such other officers of the National Guard as have been or may be specially notified by my authority that they will be notified, to wit...................Iowa...................................................  

     III.  All persons hereby drafted shall on and from the fifth day of August, nineteen hundred and seventeen, stand discharged from the militia, and, under the terms of section 2 of the Act of May 18, 1917, be subject to the laws and regulations governing the Regular Army, except as to promotions, so far as such laws and regulations are applicable to persons whose permanent retention in the military service on the active or retired list is not contemplated by law.

    IV.  The members of each company, battalion, regiment, brigade, division, or other organizations of the National Guard hereby drafted into the military service of the United States shall be embodied in organizations corresponding to those of the Regular Army. The officers not above the rank of colonel of said organizations of the National Guard who are drafted and whose offices are provided for in like organizations of the Regular Army, are hereby appointed officers in the Army of the United States in the arm, staff corps or department, and in the grades in which they now hold commission as officers of the National Guard, such appointments to be effective, subject to acceptance on and from the fifth day of August, nineteen hundred and seventeen, and each of them, subject to such acceptance, is hereby assigned as of said date to the organization in the Army of the United States composed of those who were members of the organization of the National Guard in which at the time of draft he held a commission. The non-commissioned officers of the organizations of the National Guard the members of which are hereby drafted are hereby appointed non-commissioned officers in their present grade in the organizations of the Army composed of said members and shall in each case have the same relative rank as heretofore; and all other enlisted men are hereby confirmed in the Army of the United States in the grades and ratings held by them in the National Guard in all cases where such grades and ratings corresponded to grades and ratings provided for in like organizations of the Regular Army, all such appointments of non-commissioned officers and confirmations of other enlisted men in their grades to be without prejudice to the authority of subordinate commanders in respect of promotions, reductions and changes in, enlisted personnel.

 

~reference: State of Iowa 1918, Report of the Adjutant General of Iowa, for the Biennial Period Ended June 30, 1918. Louis G. Lasher, Adjutant General. Published by the State of Iowa, Des Moines

~ contributed by Cay Merriman for Iowa in the Great War Special Project

 

back to Iowa in the Great War Home