American Expeditionary Forces Memorial

About

The American Expeditionary Forces Memorial is a monument to the landing of the American Expeditionary Forces in France in 1917, during the First World War. It features a large bronze sculpture designed by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. It was erected in Saint-Nazaire in 1926, destroyed in 1941 during the German occupation of France in the Second World War, and recreated and resettled in 1989.

Background: The United States joined the First World War on 6 April 1917, and the first elements of the 1st Infantry Division disembarked near Saint-Nazaire on 26 June 1917 (the command of the American Expeditionary Forces in Europe, Major General John J. Pershing, transported separately and arrived in Boulogne-sur-Mer two weeks earlier). After the war ended, a monument to the disembarkation was proposed in 1923 by the formation US Army Major Roynon Cholmeley-Jones. The initial suggestion was for a large clock to be built in a square in the town of Saint-Nazaire, but that quickly changed to a bronze sculpture designed by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. A 30 in (76 cm)–high model of the sculpture is helped by the Preservation Society of Newport County. The bronze for the sculpture was cast and assembled...