In Remembrance - the First World War

In Remembrance

The First World War

Corporal Kenneth Lewars Steck
Corporal Steck was born in York, Pennsylvania, but grew up in Carlisle. He was the son of Dr. and Mrs. A. R. Steck. He attended York Collegiate Institute and the Dickinson Preparatory School before entering the Philosophical course at his hometown college as a member of the class of 1919. While at the College he was a member of Phi Kappa Sigma.
He withdrew in the spring of 1917 to join the Army and was assigned to the Engineering Corps. He died of pneumonia on April 24, 1918 at his army camp near Anniston, Alabama. He was twenty-five years old.
He was the first Dickinsonian and the first man from Carlisle to die in the Great War. His death was announced in the Dickinsonian on May 2, 1918.

First Lieutenant Charles O'Brien
Lieutenant O'Brien was a student at the Law School, attending in the Law class of 1912 after graduating from Bucknell University in 1909. He was a member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity.
He was from Nanticoke, Pennsylvania, and was serving in the 77th Division of the American Expeditionary Force when he was killed in action on September 6, 1918.

John Wiley Day
John Day, from Concord, Pennsylvania, was a graduate of the Dickinson Law School in 1910, having earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from Waynesburg College in 1905. While in Carlisle, he represented both the Law School and the College in track, relay, and baseball, and served a a vice-president of the Athletic Association. He was also Editor-in-Chief of Microcosm, and a member of Delta Chi fraternity.
He was serving in a machine gun battalion in France by mid 1918 and died there on September 9, 1918.

Second Lieutenant David Mohler Rupp
Lieutenant Rupp was born in Shiremanstown, Pennsylvania. He attended the Conway Hall Preparatory School and then spent two years at Lafayette College before returning to Carlisle and enrolling at Dickinson. He completed the Classical course in 1916 and went on to the Dickinson Law School. He was a member of Phi Gamma Delta.
He enlisted in 1917, took his officer training course at Fort Niagara, NY and was assigned to Company C of the 313th Infantry, 79th Division, joining it at Fort Meade in Maryland. His unit left for France on January 13, 1918 and he was killed in action on September 26, 1918.

First Lieutenant John Harold Fox
Lieutenant Fox was from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and seemed to commute from there while taking the Latin-Scientific course in the class of 1914. He left at the end of his junior year and by late 1917 had graduated from the Officer Training School at Fort Niagara, New York. He was assigned to the 316th Infantry of the 79th Division and was promoted to first lieutenant in January 1918.
He was killed in action in France on September 26, 1918, the same day as his fellow Dickinsonian in the 79th, David Rupp '16.

Private Oscar Maclay Hykes
Oscar Hykes was born in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania on March 13, 1894. He had entered the Conway Hall at Dickinson College in 1914 and later studied the Philosophical course at Dickinson as a member of the class of 1918. While at the College he was a member of Belles Lettres Literary Society and Phi Delta Theta fraternity.
He enlisted in spring 1918 and trained at Camp Lee, Virginia until May 1918 when he was assigned to the 37th Division's 146th Infantry Regiment and joined the fourth platoon of Company H in that unit. The 37th left Hoboken, New Jersey on June 15, 1918 and arrived in France a week later. Private Hykes and the 37th joined the Meuse-Argonne battles on September 20. On September 28, he was seriously wounded under artillery fire and died September 30, 1918 in a field hospital. The Shippensburg American Legion Post 223, organized in 1919, was named for the fallen infantryman.

* The editors thank the Shippensburg Historical Society and the Carlisle Sentinel for valuable assistance with this entry.

Captain John Zug Steese
Captain Steese was born June 27, 1884 in Mount Holly Springs, Pennsylvania, the son of James and Anna Steese. He prepared at the State Normal School in Millersville, Pennsylvania and entered Dickinson with the class of 1904 in September, 1900. He was a member of Phi Kappa Sigma but left the College in 1902 and returned to Mount Holly. There he worked for the Mount Holly Paper Company.
He was commissioned and rose to the rank of captain in the Chemical War Service of the United States Army. He died of influenza at Camp Humphreys on October 2, 1918.

Russell Cole Flegal, USMC, Class of 1918

Russell Cole Flegal
From Clearfield, Pennsylvania, he entered the College in 1915 as a member of the class of 1918, taking up the Philosophical course. A popular student and enthusiastic musician, he was a member of the Union Philosophical Society, Phi Delta Theta fraternity, the Glee Cub, and the Mandolin Club.
By 1917 he seems to have been a part-time student, working in the summer of 1917 on a farm till he joined the United States Marines. He trained at Parris Island, South Carolina and then served with the Sixth Regiment, USMC. He was in France by February 1918, was gassed in April and wounded on July 18 during the battle of Chateau Thierry. He was killed in action at Mount Blanche Ridge, near Chateau Thierry, on October 7, 1918.
He had earlier been awarded the French Croix de Guerre for his July efforts.

Frank Oliver Shauck
A member of the class of 1919 studying the Latin-Scientific course, Shauck was from New Freedom, Pennsylvania. He was a member of Belles Lettres and and active in the Dickinson Y.M.C.A.
Enlisting sometime during the middle of 1918, he entered the Army's Chemical Warfare Service and died in Washington, D.C. on October 12, 1918.

Corporal Hobart Fabian Irelan
Corporal Irelan was a popular and involved member of the class of 1919. He was studying the Philosophical course and participated in an array of campus activities, including the Y.M.C.A., Belles Lettres, Kappa Sigma fraternity, and his class basketball team. A promising musician, he was influential in the Glee CLub and the College Band. He was from Atlantic City, New Jersey.
He left his studies at the end of the 1917-18 academic year to enlist. He served as a corporal in the Chemical Warfare Service and died on October 18, 1918.

Lieutenant Earl Eugene Rahn
From Birdsboro, Pennsylvania, Lieutenant Rahn entered the College in 1909, He began his academic life in the Scientific course but then changed to the Philosophical course. An active and popular student, he participated in activities ranging from track, and drama, to Glee Club and debate. He wrote for the Dickinsonian and had a poem entitled "Fate" published in the 1915 Microcosm. In the most cruel of ironies, this poem deals with the possibility of early death. Rahn graduated as a Bachelor of Philosophy with his class of 1912.
At the outbreak of war, he enlisted and took his officer training at Fort Oglethorpe, Tennessee before moving on to his unit at Columbia, South Carolina. His regiment was in France by mid 1918 and he was "struck down in youth" at Bois de Lar Rapp on October 18, 1918.

Cadet William Prettyman Taylor, Jr.
Cadet Taylor was the son of Rev. W.P. Taylor '90 and arrived at Dickinson from Georgetown, Delaware with the class of 1918, enrolling in the Latin-Scientific course. He was a member of Belles Lettres, of Phi Kappa Sigma. and the Y.M.C.A. He was also a companion of Russell Flegal (above) in the Mandolin Club.
A junior when he enlisted, he entered the Aviation Service and trained first at Princeton, New Jersey and then in the Fifth Air Cadet Squadron at Ellington Field outside of Houston, Texas. He died there of influenza on October 19, 1918.

Sergeant John Taylor Richards, Jr.
A member of the class of 1918 from Hazleton, Pennsylvania, studying the Philosophical course, Richards was active at the College in the Y.M.C.A.. He also was a member of Phi Kappa Sigma fraternity and a participant in freshman football.
He left to enlist in the spring of 1917 and served in the Quartermaster Corps of the A.E.F.. He arrived in France in November 1917 and died there on October 22, 1918.

Lieutenant Samuel J. Harris
A member of the class of 1919 from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, he began the Classical course. He was soon a member of Beta Theta Pi. Thereafter information on Harris becomes sparse. It is known that he was gone from the College by May 1917.
He joined the U.S. Army as a Private, rose to the rank of Sergeant before taking his officer training at Camp Meade, Maryland. He was promoted to First Lieutenant and lost his life in the course of the conflict.

James Wolcott Gooding
This member of the class of 1915 entered Dickinson in 1911 but had withdrawn in 1913.
In the Great War, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and died at Cape May, New Jersey.

Sergeant Richard H. Vaughan
Sergeant Vaughan was a member of the Law School class of 1918. A "long, lanky, and lean" man from Royersford in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, he was a member of Delta Chi and served as Class Vice President in his "middler" year.
He served in Company A, 111th Infantry as part of the A.E.F. and was "mentioned in dispatches" for his actions in France, at Fismette, in August, 1918. The citation read, in part, that Vaughan, though already "severely gassed" and wounded in the scalp on August 9, showed "extraordinary heroism" in refusing "to be evacuated and continued to command his platoon for four days until relieved." The official dispatch concluded that by Vaughan's "bravery and encouragement to his men he exemplified the highest qualities of leadership."
He was later killed in action.

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