Private, Army Air Service.
Died from injuries sustained in an auto accident near Camp John Wise, Texas, September 21, 1918. Age 24.
Town: Batavia (also Buffalo, Erie County; see text)
Burial: St. Joseph Cemetery, Section 2, Batavia, Genesee County, New York
Joseph A Maher was born on November 25, 1893, in Waterloo (Seneca County), New York, but moved with his family to Batavia (Genesee County) when he was one year old. The September 21, 1918 Batavia Daily News article announcing his death described him as a “well-known Batavia young man . . . held in high esteem by a large circle of friends” and reported that he had relocated to Buffalo three years prior but had otherwise spent most of his life in Batavia.
Correspondingly, the 1900 US Census shows Joseph at age 6 living in Batavia with his parents (John and Mary Maher) and a sister (Mary) at 7 Garfield Avenue. This is the same address given for the Maher family in all subsequent cited sources. The 1910 US Census lists Joseph at age 16 with his parents and three sisters (Mary, Teresa, and Gertrude).
In 1908, according to various mentions in Batavia Daily News articles from that year, Maher attended St. Joseph’s Academy in Batavia and also worked as a clerk for E.A. Friedley & Company, a Batavia cigarist. Later newspaper reports, from 1910 through 1912, refer to him as a student at St. Jerome’s College in Berlin (now named Kitchener), Ontario, Canada. A brief item in the January 19, 1913 Batavia Times announced that he had “accepted a position with the West Shore Railroad Company, and will be located in the office of Michael Hassett, the master mechanic, in Buffalo.”
When Joseph Maher registered for the draft on June 5, 1917, he gave a Buffalo (Erie County) address and listed his occupation as stenographer for the Ford Motor Company in that city. According to the September 21, 1918 Batavia Daily News, however, he was employed at the Curtiss Airplane and Motor Corporation when he joined the service.
Maher was inducted on March 12, 1918 in Buffalo—this explains why he’s listed as an Erie County soldier in the NY Roll of Honor. He was assigned variously to the Army Air Service’s 324th Aero Squadron and 820th Aero Squadron, both based at Kelly Field, near San Antonio, Texas. In August, 1918, he was transferred to Headquarters at Camp John Wise, an Army Balloon School also near San Antonio.
Stories regarding the circumstances of Private Maher’s death were conflicting. The initial report, in the September 21, 1918 Batavia Daily News, stated that he died in an auto accident. Follow-up articles in the September 26, 1918 and September 28, 1918 Batavia Daily News, however, reported that the initial story was inaccurate and that, according to the soldier who escorted Maher’s body to Batavia for burial, he actually had died as a result of falling off a cliff while signaling with flags to an observation balloon. This cause of death was repeated in County List 1 (August 5, 1919 Batavia Daily News).
However, a September 22, 1918 Dallas Morning News article provides a detailed report of Private Maher’s death from an auto accident involving two cars and six people that occurred at night on the road from San Antonio to Camp John Wise. The details of the report are extensive enough to lend it credibility. In addition, his NYSS and the NY Roll of Honor state that he “died of fractured skull (auto accident),” and the Army’s official “Report of Death” in his Burial Case File lists the nature of Maher’s fatal injury as “Fracture, base of skull, accidentally incurred by being thrown from automobile.”
Private Maher’s remains were interred at St. Joseph’s Cemetery in Batavia on September 28, 1918.
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September 21, 1918 Batavia Daily News p1 c6
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September 22, 1918 Dallas Morning News p11 c2
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September 26, 1918 Batavia Daily News p2 c1
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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
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Source: Official Military Personnel File (OMPF), U.S. Army, Archival (conserved burned file); National Archives – St. Louis, Missouri
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Joseph A Maher headstone, St. Joseph Cemetery, Section 2, Batavia, Genesee County, New York
GPS Coordinates: Lat 42° 59’ 19.98” N, Long 78° 10’ 15.869” W (DD: 42.988883, -78.171075)
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Joseph A Maher Sources:
– County Lists 1, 4; also BHR
– Jun 23, 1908 BD p4 c3
– Jun 26, 1908 BD p8 c4
– Sep 7, 1910 BD p4 c3
– Jun 16, 1911 BD p6 c4
– Jun 21, 1912 BD p6 c2
– Jan 19, 1913 BT p4 c2
– Sep 21, 1918 BD p1 c6*
– Sep 22, 1918 Dallas Morning News p11 c2
– Sep 26, 1918 BD p2 c1
– Sep 28, 1918 BD p2 c6
– Sep 28, 1918 BT p1 c6
– “United States Census, 1900.” Online index and images, HeritageQuest.com. Entries for John Maher (head) and Joseph Maher (son, age 6), citing Census Records, Batavia, Genesee, New York; sheet number 18, line numbers 47 and 49, microfilm series T623, Roll 1038, page 101.
– “United States Census, 1910.” Online index and images, HeritageQuest.com. Entries for John Maher (head) and Joseph Maher (son, age 16), citing Census Records, Batavia, Genesee, New York; sheet number 17B, line numbers 91 and 93, microfilm series T624, Roll 951, page 166.
– NYSS
– Roll of Honor (NY State) p 48
– “Maher, Joseph A,” Official Military Personnel File (OMPF), U.S. Army, Archival (conserved burned file); National Archives – St. Louis, Missouri.
– World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918 (Ancestry.com)
– “Camp John Wise Aerostation,” website (http://camp-john-wise-aerostation.com/)
– Email correspondence 15 and 18 September 2011, Richard DesChenes, author of “Camp John Wise Aerostation” website
– Order of Battle of the United States Land Forces in the World War. Volume 3, Part 2, pp 915-16, 934-35
– BCF
– St. Joseph Cemetery tombstone transcriptions, M listings, online, access from USGenWeb, “Genesee County NY Cemeteries” Table of Contents (http://www.usgwarchives.net/ny/genesee/cemeteries/cemeterytoc.htm)
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