Leon F Kingdon - The County and the Kaiser

Private, Co L, 148th Infantry, 37th Division.

Died November 1, 1918, of wounds received in action near Cruyshautem, Flanders, Belgium. Age 27.

Town: Stafford

Burial: Flanders Field American Cemetery, Plot C Row 1 Grave 19, Waregem, Belgium (also memorial stone in Stafford Rural Cemetery, Old Section, Stafford, Genesee County, New York)

Note: Leon F Kingdon can easily be confused with two other Lee or Leon Kingdons who were also living in Genesee County prior to and during World War I. One was mistakenly included—in addition to Leon F Kingdon—on County List 4, and some newspaper accounts also confuse the different individuals.

Leon Francis Kingdon was born in Stafford (Genesee County), New York, on October 7, 1891. He was the eldest of eight children of farmer William Kingdon and wife Sarah nee Gill Kingdon. Leon had four brothers (Earl, Merton, Floyd, and Lester) and three sisters (Bessie, Carrie, and Ruth).

Apparently Leon lived with his family in Stafford nearly all his life, only moving to Batavia shortly after his marriage to Miss Mary Louise Crouse on August 23, 1917. The 1892 NY Census shows the Kingdons in Stafford with Leon, at age 1, the only child. Eight years later, the 1900 US Census shows the Kingdon family, still in Stafford, with two additional sons and a daughter. The 1910 US Census, 1915 NY Census, and 1917’s Farm Journal Illustrated Directory of Genesee County all list the Kingdon family with all eight children in Stafford. Leon’s listing in Genesee County’s 1917 “Militia Enrollment List,” entered on June 21, less than five weeks before his marriage, also lists him still in Stafford.

According to his draft registration card, Leon worked as a day laborer for the Johnston (later named Massey Harris) Harvester Company in Batavia. He was inducted on April 27, 1918, and two days later left with a Genesee County contingent of 27 draftees for Camp Dix, New Jersey, home of the 78th Division. On June 10, he was transferred to the 37th Division, and assigned to Company L of the 148th Infantry. He shipped out for France less than two weeks later, on June 22. Leon never saw his daughter, Ruth Margaret Kingdon, who was born in September, 1918, and died suddenly when just eight months old on May 21, 1919.

There is some uncertainty over the date of Private Kingdon’s death, and whether he was killed in action (meaning he was killed outright on the field of battle) or died of wounds (meaning he died after receiving medical aid). All newspaper reports, as well as Kingdon’s NYSS, his listing in the NY Roll of Honor, and several documents in his Burial Case File, say that he died of wounds on November 1, 1918. The American Battle Monuments Commission’s WWI Database, though not giving a cause of death, also lists November 1 as the date.

However, a searcher’s report in Private Kingdon’s Burial Case File states unequivocally that he was killed in action on October 31, 1918. The report quotes Sergeant Lon Huffman of Kingdon’s Company L, 148th Infantry: “Pvt. Kingdon was struck in the heart by a machine gun bullet and died instantly. He was killed on the 31st of October, 1918. Was buried near Olsene, Belgium.”

The 148th Infantry was engaged in combat on both October 31 and November 1, as part of the Allies’ Ypres-Lys offensive in Belgium. On October 30, the 37th Division took up positions along the Belgian front in Flanders to assist the French Army’s efforts to push back the German line. At 5:30 a.m. on October 31, a general attack was launched, with the 148th Infantry jumping off just east of Olsene, Belgium. The 3rd Battalion, including Kingdon’s Company L, was at the left center of the division’s leading assault wave. Fighting eastward against stiff artillery and machine-gun fire, the troops pushed the enemy back about 2-1/2 miles to a high ridge west of Cruyshautem (shown on most current maps as Kruishoutem), where intense machine-gun fire stopped the advance. The attack was renewed the next day, November 1, and the troops advanced another six miles to the west bank of the Escaut (also known as the Scheldt) River at Heurne against relatively light resistance, due to the enemy’s overnight withdrawal across the river.

Because nearly all sources say that Private Kingdon died on November 1, 1918, of wounds received in action, he is listed correspondingly here. It should be noted, however, that he may well have been wounded or killed on October 31, the day of heaviest fighting, as stated in the searcher’s report. Further suggesting this possibility are map coordinates from documents in Kingdon’s Burial Case File that place the location of his battlefield grave in an area near Cruyshautem, where the 148th Infantry’s 3rd Battalion is likely to have fought on October 31.

Private Leon F Kingdon’s remains now rest in the Flanders Field American Cemetery at Waregem, Belgium. Kingdon is profiled in a book about the American soldiers buried in that cemetery (yet to be published in English, but partially presented online) by Belgian author Patrick Lernout.

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November 29, 1918 Batavia Daily News p1 c5

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Source: New York Service Summary from Abstracts of World War I Military Service, 1917-1919, NY State Archives, Albany, New York