Merle Hay

By November 1917, he was assigned to Company F along with Corporal James Bethel Gresham and Private Thomas Enright.

After an hour of fighting, Hay, Corporal Gresham, and Private Enright were the first three casualties of the American Expeditionary Force.

An inscription marked their graves: "Here lie the first soldiers of the illustrious Republic of the United States who fell on French soil for justice and liberty."

Hay was then re-interred in July 1921 in West Lawn Cemetery in his home town of Glidden, Iowa.

Robert M. Losey, a military attache, was killed on April 21, 1940, during a German bombardment of Dombås, Norway.

Merle Hay memorial boulder in Des Moines, Iowa
Cartoon published in the November 8, 1917, issue of the Des Moines Register ; Uncle Sam brings home the body. A copy of the cartoon would be placed on a monument to Hay in Glidden.
First three American soldiers to die fighting in World War I, Merle Hay, Thomas Enright and James Bethel Gresham 1917 poster
Monument to James B. Gresham, Merle D. Hay and Thomas F. Enright, designed by Louis Majorelle , erected November 1918 in Bathelémont , destroyed by the Germans in October 1940