The Lynchburg Musketeers in World War I: From Guardsmen to Doughboys

My research paper entitled “The Lynchburg Musketeers in World War I: From Guardsmen to Doughboys” is a textual and investigative study that traces the development of a local company of men from Lynchburg, Virginia that went from the National Guard to the U.S. Army before and during World War I. The Lynchburg Musketeers was a small militia organized in the fall of 1915 that became Company L of the National Guard’s 1st Virginia Infantry Regiment in the summer of 1916. My paper centers around the firsthand account of Edley Craighill, a member of the Lynchburg Musketeers, in his 1931 work, The Musketeers. After training in Lynchburg and service on the Mexican border in 1916, Company L of the 1st Virginia Infantry Regiment became Company L of the 116th Infantry Regiment of the 29th Division of the U.S. Army in 1917. The 29th trained at Camp McClellan near Anniston, Alabama before being sent to France in the summer of 1918. Company L fought in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive later that year under the command of Captain Alfred D. Barksdale, one of the original officers of the Lynchburg Musketeers. My paper argues that the Lynchburg Musketeers were better off than many of their countrymen in World War I because they had the advantages of early training, experience in the National Guard in 1916, and being able to face the hell of war alongside comrades from their hometown. My research could be of particular interest to a local history journal or museum in Lynchburg and the state of Virginia at large. In the future, my paper could be expanded into a study of the 29th Division in World War I.