Patrick Molyneaux

Private, Co A, 59th Infantry, 4th Division.

 Killed in action near the Bois de Brieulles, France, September 30, 1918. Age 29.

Town:  LeRoy

Burial: Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery, Plot A Row 29 Grave 3, Romagne, France

 

Patrick Molyneaux was born on October 2, 1888 in Listowel (misspelled Listowe on his NYSS), County Kerry, Ireland. According to the 1910 US Census, he immigrated to the United States in 1908, one year after his brother, Edward. Both are shown in that census living as boarders at 13 Maple Avenue in LeRoy (Genesee County), New York, and working as section hands for the railroad. Seven years later, when he registered for the draft on June 5, 1917, Patrick Molyneaux listed his citizenship as “alien” and gave his address as the Central Hotel on Lake Street in LeRoy. He also listed his occupation as blacksmith and his employer as the Schimley Brothers, who are advertised as LeRoy blacksmiths in 1917’s Farm Journal Illustrated Directory of Genesee County.

The November 20, 1918 Batavia Daily News article announcing Patrick Molyneaux’s death reported that he had “several brothers and sisters, among whom are Edward of Gardenville and Mrs. Lloyd Carney of Dansville.” The death announcement in the November 20, 1918 LeRoy Gazette-News lists both those siblings and one other, “Miss Mollie Molyneux” [sic], also of Dansville. Despite apparently having several relatives in the area, his NYSS and various documents in his Burial Case File indicate that Molyneaux gave his emergency contact as William F Niccloy, proprietor of LeRoy’s Central Hotel. In response to a 1929 letter from the War Department inquiring whether Molyneaux had a mother or widow, Niccloy passed along the name and address of Molyneaux’s sister, Mrs. Anna Carney of Olean, New York. In subsequent correspondence with the War Department, Mrs. Carney mentions that Molyneaux’s father and mother had died in 1910 and 1912 respectively.

When Patrick Molyneaux was selected in February 1918 as a member of Genesee County’s fourth draft contingent, he was among seven who chose to apply for, and received, induction directly into the infantry at Camp Greene, in Charlotte, North Carolina, where the newly formed 4th Division was training. Of those seven who left Batavia for Camp Greene on March 4, 1918, three—Molyneaux, Albert Gelonek, and Charles Votrie—lost their lives fighting with the 4th Division’s 59th Infantry.

Although all other sources say that Private Molyneaux was killed in action on September 30, 1918, a searcher’s report in his Burial Case File gives contradictory testimony, stating first that he was killed in action on September 30 but also quoting a witness, Sgt. Thomas Drake of Molyneaux’s Company A, 59th Infantry, who gives the date as September 27. The report reads: “Killed in Action Sept. 30/18/Meuse-Argonne Offensive. ‘Killed about 8. P.M. Sept. 27th in edge of Bois de Brieulles by shell fire. Death was instantaneous. Buried in fox hole in an open field N.E. of Montfaucon.’”

Private Molyneaux could have been killed on either of those dates, as 4th Division troops advanced north from between Malancourt and Bethincourt against German positions during the first days of the Meuse-Argonne offensive. However, because all accounts agree that Molyneaux was killed near the Bois de Brieulles, September 30 seems the more likely date. On September 27, while the 4th Division’s 7th Brigade (39th and 47th Infantry) led an attack northward past Cuisy and Septsarges and into the Bois de Brieulles, most of the division’s 8th Brigade, including Molyneaux’s 59th Infantry, was in reserve positions in the rear, south of Cuisy. By September 30, however, the 8th Brigade had replaced the 7th Brigade at the leading assault positions, and the 59th Infantry, including Molyneaux’s Company A, was holding a line along the northern edge of the Bois de Brieulles against strong resistance from intense trench mortar, machine-gun, and artillery fire.

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November 20, 1918 LeRoy Gazette-News p1 c3

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November 20, 1918 Batavia Daily News p8 c3-4

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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: Burial Case Files, Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, Record Group 92, National Archives — St Louis, Missouri

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Source: Burial Case Files, Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, Record Group 92, National Archives — St Louis, Missouri

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Source: Burial Case Files, Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, Record Group 92, National Archives — St Louis, Missouri

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Patrick Molyneaux headstone, Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery, Plot A Row 29 Grave 3, Romagne, France

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Patrick Molyneaux Sources:

– All County Lists

– Mar 1, 1918 BD p1 c6

– Mar 4, 1918 BD p6 c6

– Mar 5, 1918 BD p1 c4

– Nov 20, 1918 BD p8 c3-4*

– Nov 20, 1918 LG p1 c3

– “United States Census, 1910.” Online index and images, HeritageQuest.com. Entry for Patrick Molyaneux [Molyneaux misspelled] (boarder, age 24), in household of William J Moyles, citing Census Records, LeRoy, Genesee, New York; sheet number 4, line number 28, microfilm series T624, Roll 951, page 202.

Farm Journal Illustrated Directory of Genesee County (1917), p 300

– NYSS

Roll of Honor (NY State), p 65

– WWI database, American Battle Monuments Commission website (www.abmc.gov/search/wwi.php)

World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918 (Ancestry.com)

4th Division, Summary of Operations in the World War, pp 54-59

The Fourth Division: Its Services and Achievements, pp 171-79, 337 (entry misspelled “McLyneaux”)

United States Army in the World War 1917-1919 (Vol. 9), pp 160-61, 175-85

– BCF

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Click for Key to Source Abbreviations. See the Bibliography for complete title, author, and publisher information, with links to online access when available.