BOOTH and GILES - receive Silver Star Citation

BOOTH, GILES

Posted By: Roseanna Zehner (email)
Date: 12/30/2005 at 07:45:59

Opinion Tribune
December 31, 1931

Giles of Co. I Is Given Silver Star Citation by U.S.A.

Former Glenwood Boy Who Served With Company I on Border and Over Seas, Given Citation by Government for Act of Bravery

Silver star citations for gallantry in action were awarded to two western Iowa world war veterans by the war department in Washington D.C., last week. They are: Warren A. Booth, Shenandoah, and Oscar M. Giles, of Glenwood.

Booth, formerly a corporal in Company A, 168th Infantry Forty-Second Division, was honored for gallantry in action at Sergy, France, July 28, 1918. While serving as a member of a patrol sent into Sergy to ascertain if it were still occupied by the enemy.

"In town, the patrol encountered violent machine gun fire which resulted in all other members being killed or wounded."

The award to former Sergeant Giles, also of the 168th Forty-Second Division, is for bravery during the St. Mihiel offensive, Sept. 13 to 18, 1918. Giles voluntarily joined a raiding party and went forward into the enemy lines and assisted in capturing prisoners and material, the citation declares.

Giles is now at the Colorado State hospital. He was a member of the famous Company I of the late World War and was employed as a cook at the State Institution here in Glenwood at the time of his enlistment. He went with the company to the border in 1916, and then over seas. He returned o Glenwood at the close of the war and resumed his position at the State Institution for a time. Leaving here he went to the western coast and he is in very poor health at the present time being as mentioned above, in the Colorado State Hospital.