This document provides an overview of Jewish participation and experiences in World War I. It discusses where Jews served with the Central Powers like Austria-Hungary and Germany as well as with the Allies. It describes the formation of the Jewish Legion to allow Jews to fight for Israel's liberation. It details American Jewish support efforts through organizations like the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. It also honors Jewish soldiers who fought and received honors for their valor like military crosses and medals of honor.

2. Jews in the Great War
1914-1918
Richard Goldenberg
Jewish War Veterans of the U.S.A.

3.  Jews with the Central Powers
 Jewish sentiment, 1914-1917
 Jews serving with the Allies
 The Jewish Legion
 American Jewish Support
 American Jews enter the War
 The Jewish Welfare Board
 The Fighting Rabbi of WWI
 Do Jews Fight?

4. “Moses, from whose loins I sprung,
Lit by a lamp in his blood
Ten immutable rules, a moon
For mutable lampless men.
“The blonde, the bronze, the ruddy,
With the same heaving blood,
Keep tide to the moon of Moses.
Then why do they sneer at me?”
-- Isaac Rosenberg
KIA, 1918

5. "May God be with You! Be brave and strong. Fight until your dying
breath for the just cause of the state's father and our dear homeland."
A picture of Emperor Franz Joseph hangs in the background, and a concerned
mother stands beside the father.

6.  320,000 served in the forces of
Austro-Hungary
 About 40,000 killed
 100,000 in the German army
 Some 12,000 killed
 Capt. Ernst Hess and Lt. Hugo
Gutmann award the Iron Cross
to a 29-year-old corporal
named Adolf Hitler.
 20,000 in the Ottoman Empire

8.  Jews lived in large concentrations in the principal areas
of the war
 4 million Jews along Eastern Front (Russia and Poland)
 Germany seen as most progressive European nation
 Kaiser lifts legal restrictions for Jews in service
 “We are all Germans.”
 Russian Pogroms continued into the war years with
massive expulsions from the front line regions
 International Jewry claims neutrality, but many clearly
wanted to see the fall of the czarist regime
 Surge of Zionist sentiment worldwide

11. 1SG Samuel Littman, Brooklyn’s 47th Regiment,
denied officer’s commission from his commander
 “The governor's well known policy on this question should
be understood by all officers of the National Guard, no
matter what their rank, to forbid absolutely any
consideration of the fact of a soldier's race, creed or
religion as a qualification for membership or promotion in
the land and naval forces of this state.”
-- New York State Adjutant General Hamilton, March 1913
 “I am really only interested in seeing the bars of race
prejudice are lowered in the National Guard. My fight is
not for myself, but for others.”
-- Sam Littman, March 1913

13.  From August 1915, the
Jewish Chronicle hung a
huge banner outside its
City of London offices
that read: "England has
been all she can be to the
Jews. Jews will be all they
can for England.”
 It flew for the duration of
the war.

14.  British Jews had a very high per capita rate of
participation, with 41,000 serving out of a total
population of only 280,000.
 “In the British forces, casualties included the names of
8,600 Jews, and in the French forces, out of less than a
hundred thousand Jewish population in the nation,
2,200 were killed in the service.”
Rabbi Lee J. Levinger, A Jewish Chaplain in France, 1921

15.  After the war, the
Association of Jewish
Ex-Servicemen was
formed in part to insist
on the facts of Jewish
contribution, to
brandish Victoria and
Military Crosses in the
faces of fascists and
Anti-Semitic claims of
Jewish wartime
betrayal.

16. Jewish Soldiers at the Western Wall in December 1917.

17. 'Your Old New Land must have
you! Join the Jewish regiment.'
Joseph Trumpeldor

18.  In February 1915, British forces in
Egypt approved a plan to form a
Jewish military unit .
 The first battalion, the Zion Mule
Corps, fought at Gallipoli between
April 1915 and January 1916.
 After that unit disbanded, three more
were set up in August 1917 – the 38th,
39th and 40th battalions of the Royal
Fusiliers, known as the Jewish Legion.
 Jews from all over the world served.
 After the war, the legion was reduced
to one battalion called the First
Judeans, which remained in Palestine.

19. Col. John Henry Patterson

20. American and Canadian Jewish volunteers of the 39th Battalion in Windsor,
Nova Scotia prepare to sail for Palestine to serve in the Jewish Legion, April 1918

23. Zeev Jabotinsky David Ben Gurion (r.) and Yitzhak
Ben Zwi

25.  The war unites the many different strands of the
American Jewish community — Germans, Eastern
Europeans, Orthodox, Reform and socialists — around
the single issue of helping their brethren in war-torn
Europe and in Palestine.
 Creates American Jewish Joint Distribution
Committee, collecting $63 Million.
 American Jews were now seen as international
philanthropists, with wealth and initiative to help.
 The war also elevated philanthropy to a central tenet of
American Judaism.

27. During and after World War I, those wanting to send money to family
and friends overseas, line up at a JDC Transmission Bureau. c. 1917 (The
American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee)

29. • About 250,000 Jewish
soldiers served in the
United States.
• Conscription and a true
national army.
• Some 40,000 were
volunteers.
• About 10,000 officers
• About 3,500 Jews were
killed in action or died of
wounds.
• An estimated 12,000 Jewish
personnel wounded.
Sgt. William Shemin, Bayonne, NJ

30.  Regional makeup of troops
persist in National Guard, early
units drafted from like areas.
 69th New York, the famed Irish
Brigade, adopts its Jewish
officers and soldiers.
 77th Infantry, composed of
draftees from NYC region.
 “What you're up against major,
is a bunch of Mick, Pollack,
Dago, and Jew boy gangsters
from New York City. They'll
never surrender. Never.”
The Lost Battalion, 2001

31.  Capt. Bencin Riseman, 26th
Yankee Division,
Massachusetts National
Guard and sons Jay and
Joseph.
 “Whatever may have been
said about the Jewish soldier,
I am willing to back him
against all others for sobriety,
loyalty, bravery and
intelligence. There is no
better soldier, when well
trained, than the Jew.”

33.  Formed April 9, 1917, three
days after U.S. declares war.
 Supports Jewish soldiers
and recruits and trains
rabbis for the military
chaplaincy.
 Provides support materials
to chaplains and lay leaders
and maintains a presence at
military installations .
 A link between the soldier
and the Jewish homefront .

37.  Elkan Voorsanger resigns as assistant
rabbi of Congregation Shaare Emeth in
St. Louis to enlist as a private in May, 1917.
 He was with the first American soldiers to
go overseas to France and quickly rose up
the ranks to sergeant, lieutenant,
chaplain, captain and senior chaplain of
the 77th Division.
 Voorsanger came in contact with the JWB
as a soldier-recipient when the
organization supplied him with an
automobile, making it possible for him to
visit Jewish fighting men.

38.  Voorsanger always went over the top
with his men. He was the division
burial officer, school and
entertainment officer, and the Jewish
Welfare Board adviser to the 77th
Division.
 Captain Voorsanger had the highest
praise for the men in the 77th, quoted
as saying that the "Jewish men in this
division were good soldiers, brave,
fearless, and resourceful. They fought,
knew how to fight and were glad to do
it."

39.  “Wherever it will not interfere with military operations soldiers
of Jewish Faith will be excused from all duty and where
practicable granted passes to enable them to observe Jewish
Holidays as follows: from noon Sept. 6th to morning of Sept. 9th
and from noon Sept. 15th to morning of Sept. 17th. If military
necessity prevents granting passes on days mentioned provision
should be made to hold divine services wherever possible."”
AEF Field Order, September, 1918
A group of Jewish welfare workers at Le Mans,
France, in March 1919. From left to right, George
Rooby, Julius Halperin, Frank M. Dart, Chaplain
Lee J. Levinger, Adele Winston, Charles S.
Rivitz, David Rosenthal and Esther Levy.

40. “But the shadow of war was dark upon us all. We were in the
uncertainty, the danger, the horror of it. We felt a personal
thrill at the words of the prayers,—"Who are to live and
who to die; who by the sword and who by fire."
We recited with personal fervor the memorial prayer for our
fallen comrades. Many among us were eager to give thanks
at recovery from wounds. Therefore, the desire for a
religious observance of our solemn days was all the greater.
Men came in from a hundred miles, often walking ten
miles to a train before they could ride the rest.”
Rabbi Lee J. Levinger, A Jewish Chaplain in France, 1921

41.  “The Jewish soldier demands no defense and needs no
tribute. His deeds are written large in the history of
every unit in the AEF; they are preserved in the
memory of his comrades of other races and other
faiths.”
 “Ignorance, suspicion, ripening with knowledge into
understanding and admiration—that was the usual
course of events.”
Rabbi Lee J. Levinger, A Jewish Chaplain in France, 1921
 Jews, who made up 3 per cent of the U.S. population,
contributed 5% to the losses of the U.S. Army

42.  1,100 valor citations, 150 Distinguished Service Crosses,
Three Medals of Honor
 Four French Medaille Militaire and 174 Croix de Guerre
 Corporal Abel J. Levine, Company A, 107th Infantry.
 For extraordinary heroism in action near Bony, France, Sept.
29, 1918. After his platoon had suffered heavy casualties and all
the sergeants had been wounded, Corporal Levine collected
the remaining effectives in his own and other units, formed a
platoon and continued the advance. When his rifle was
rendered useless he killed several of the enemy with his pistol.
He was wounded shortly afterward, but he refused assistance
until his men had been cared for and evacuated.“

43.  Private Morris Silverberg, Company G, 108th Infantry.
For extraordinary heroism in
action near Ronssoy, France,
Sept. 29, 1918. Pvt. Silverberg, a
stretcher bearer, displayed
extreme courage by repeatedly
leaving shelter and advancing
over an area swept by machine-
gun and shell fire to rescue
wounded comrades. Hearing
that his company commander
had been wounded, he
voluntarily went forward alone,
and upon finding that his
officer had been killed,
brought back his body."

44. Sydney Gumpertz Ben Kaufman Phillip Katz
 Of the 124 Medals awarded, seven were to Jews

45.  97 years later, President Obama presents Medal of
Honor for Sgt. William Shemin to his daughters
 Shemin ran into
no-man’s land
three times to
carry wounded
soldiers back to
shelter. At 19-
years-old,
Shemin took
over his platoon,
leading his
soldiers to safety
and suffering a
bullet wound to
the head

46. “This is not just about my father,” Elsie Shemin Roth said.
“It’s really a thank you for the Jewish people.”

47.  Born 1878, emigrates from Russia in 1898.
 Enlists 1899.
 When aunt cries, "Sammy, you’re crazy! Don't
you know soldiers get killed?” he replies,
"Maybe, but they don’t charge you anything to
eat.”
 Serves in Philippines, China, Texas
 Central American Soldier of Fortune
 Mexican Revolution with Pancho Villa
 US scout for Pershing in 1916 in Mexico
 At 39, enlists in 141st Infantry, 36th Division.
 At St. Etienne Dreben captured a machine-gun nest,
killing forty Germans, receiving the Distinguished
Service Cross
 Pallbearer to Unknown Soldier, 1921.
 Dies in 1925 of accidental medical injection.

48. Now whenever I read articles
That breathe of racial hate,
Or hear arguments that hold his kind to scorn,
I always see that photo
With the cap upon his pate
And the nose the size of Bugler Dugan's horn.
I see upon his breast
The D.S.C.,
The Croix de Guerre, the Militaire
-- These, too.
And I think, Thank God Almighty
We have more than a few
Like Dreben,
A Jew!
There's a story in that paper
I just tossed upon the floor
That speaks of prejudice against the Jews;
There's a photo on the table
That's a memory of the war
And a man who never figured in the news.
There's a cross upon his breast --
That's the D.S.C.
The Croix de Guerre, the Millitaire,
-- These, too.
And there's a heart beneath the medals
That beats loyal, brave and true --
That's Dreben,
A Jew!
Damon Runyon, “Hail Dreben”, 1942

49.  Confronts KKK attempts to join American Legion in El
Paso, Texas, introducing prohibitions against it:
 "These men, oath-bound to secrecy, hide behind their
masks and say that because I am a foreign-born Jew I am
not good enough to be an American. Every time America
has called for volunteers, I have put on the uniform.
They did not ask me at the recruiting office if I was a
Jew, and they did not ask me on the battlefield what my
race or religion was. . . The soldiers didn't wear masks in
France, other than gas masks, and they don't need them
now."

50. WILSON: "Here's your olive branch. Now get busy."
DOVE OF PEACE: "Of course, I want to please everybody,
but isn't this a bit thick?"

51.  The Effects of the Bolshevik Revolution in the U.S.
 Antisemitism
 Jewish association
with communism,
socialism, labor
 Anti-immigration
 Future Jewish
generations now
American-born
 1920s ‘Red Scare’

53.  “In the American forces during the World
War, the Jew has proved himself a
devoted patriot and a heroic soldier, and
this time he has done so in broad
daylight, before the eyes of all the world.
 “When I asked a boy from one of our
machine gun battalions why he led a
group of volunteers in bringing some
wounded men of another regiment, an
act in which the only other Jew in the
company had been killed and for which
my friend was later decorated:
 "Well, chaplain," he answered me, “There
were only two Jewish boys in the company
and we'd been kidded about it a little. We
just wanted to show those fellows what a
Jew could do."
David Ben Gurion