The 372d Infantry: a Marching Tradition

n.p., 1944. 1st ed. Paperback. Good. photos, 54p. Softcover in original wrapper. 28cm. Cover rather scuffed and soiled with about one-half of rear panel with an extensive, but not showing through, brown stain. Rather heavy vertical crease. Moderate browning, soiling and other wear. Well-worn but basically sound. Scarce item about this African Amnerican military unit. The 371st and 372d Infantry Regiments were seconded to the 157th Infantry division of the French Army in 1918 during World War I and were involved in significant military action as part of the France's "Red Hand Division. The 372d was reconstituted in the National Guard in 1925 until World (truncated) War II. The Regiment was not attached to a Division and served stateside and in the territory of Hawaii during World War II. Colonel Edward Orval Gourdin, a double Harvard graduate (undergraduate and law school) and a silver medalist at the 1924 Olympics, was the Regiment's commanding officer during World War II. He was later the first African American appointed as a Massachusetts Superior Court judge in 1951 and had achieved the rank of Brigadier General when he retired from the National Guard in 1959. The original owner of this book was a Staff Sergeant in the Regiment. Signed on first blank page by 14 individuals -- most seem to be fellow NCOs. (Inventory #: 90244)