Last Doughboy Dies

[Squiggy]

Frank Buckles, the last surviving World War One veteran died over the weekend at the ripe old age of 110.

From CNN

Buckles, who served as a U.S. Army ambulance driver in Europe during what became known as the “Great War,” rose to the rank of corporal before the war ended. He came to prominence in recent years, in part because of the work of [spokesman David] DeJonge, a Michigan portrait photographer who had undertaken a project to document the last surviving veterans of that war.

 

[Kirby]

Rest in peace Mr. Buckles, thank you for your sacrafice. It's a sad day for history, but the Doughboys are all together now.

 

[Mr Light]

I'd never heard the term Doughboys before. Is that a word for WWI soldiers?

 

[J.T.B.]

^ American soldiers, anyway. It was in use before that, but that's when it became best known. It was basically like "G.I." in WW2.

--Justin

 

[marillion]

Safe home sir, and thank you for your service.

I did a quick google and found that there's no definative, agreed upon answer as to why American soldiers were called that.. Some say it's because of their love for doughnuts, their dusty appearance after marching in the desert, or even because most of the soldiers were inexperienced and "soft" like dough...

 

[Sector 7]

From the Oxford English Dictionary Online:

dough·boy)

Pronunciation:/ˈdōˌboi, /
noun

• 1 a boiled or deep-fried dumpling.
• 2 informal a US infantryman, especially one in World War I. [said to have been a term applied in the Civil War to the large globular brass buttons on the infantry uniform; also said to derive from the use of pipeclay 'dough' to clean the white belts worn by infantrymen]

Also, the term G.I. stands for General Infantry. "Knowing is half the battle." -G.I. Joe

Smooth journey, my fellow American veteran. Your wars are over now. May you find true peace, sir.

 

[Subcommander R.]

An era is ending, these vets are disappearing fast. Its up to the rest of us to make sure history remembers them and their war.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

I think we find it easy to forget, after the horrors other wars have brought us, just how terrible World War I was in its own right. It even included one of the first WMD uses (poison gas).

I know it's not much, but I have tried to pay tribute to these fine veterans in my fanfic.

Look at the casualties for this ONE battle, the one that I had lend its name to AR-558: Arras. ONE battle...and all these people wounded or killed. It's truly horrific.

I hope that with Corporal Buckles' passing, we will never, ever forget him and his comrades for plunging into the gates of Hell so that we did not have to.

 

[the 4th hanson bro]

He also survived a Japanese prison camp in the Phillippines as a civilian and he was a leading advocate for a national WWI memorial.

RIP.

 

[captcalhoun]

G.I. is a noun used to describe members of the U.S. armed forces or items of their equipment.[1] The term is now used as an initialism of "Government Issue" (or often incorrectly "General Infantry"),[2] but originally referred to galvanized iron.
The letters "G.I." were used to denote equipment made from galvanized iron, such as metal trash cans, in U.S. Army inventories and supply records.[3][2] During World War I, U.S. soldiers sardonically referred to incoming German artillery shells as "GI cans." In that same war, "G.I." started being interpreted as "Government Issue" and said as an adjective of anything having to do with the Army.[2]

and now you know.

rest easy, soldier. it's over now.