MacMonagle, Douglas

Born February 19, 1892, in San Francisco, California. Son of Beverly and Minnie C. MacMonagle. Educated Hackley School, Tarrytown, New York; Berkeley School, California, Switzerland and Germany; and University of California, one and one-half years, Class of 1917. Joined American Field Service, December 30, 19 1915 ; attached Section Three to May 20, 1916; Section Eight, June 20 to September 20, 1916. Croix de Guerre. Enlisted French Aviation, October 3, 1916. Trained Avord and Pau. Attached Escadrille NY. 124 (Lafayette). Killed in combat, September 24, 1917, near Verdun. Croix de Guerre with palm, Buried Triaucourt, Meuse. Body transferred to American Cemetery, Romagne-sous-Montfaucon Meuse.

"I KNEW that Douglas MacMonagle would be among the first to get into the war on the French side." The speaker was a Californian inquiring early in 1916 at the Headquarters of the Field Service about the San Franciscans at the front.

"Mac," as his friends in the Field Service called him from the very first, had just been sent to join Section Three at the front in Alsace. It was in the dead of winter and there was some fear lest the new and inexperienced men might not be able to cope in the beginning with the hardships and difficulties of the work.

"MacMonagle," reported one of the directors of the Service, "wants to get to the front at once and refuses to give one thought to the idea that he will have any trouble doing the work. He says that he has been at sea and takes to rough weather like a duck to water, that he knows a Ford from the ground up, and that nothing the Germans can do to him matters at all."

In every particular his self-confidence was justified. From the first he was able to face every hardship, whether of weather, bad and bombarded roads, or long hours. And above all, from the day he first came within sound of the guns to the moment he fell in gallant aerial combat against heavy odds, nothing that the Germans did or threatened to do to him "mattered at all."

After serving for some months with Section Three MacMonagle was transferred to Section Eight. Austin Mason, his new chef, wrote in his diary at that time:

"MacMonagle joined us on the eve of the hardest and most dangerous work the Section has had to face. That he had had some previous experience was a great help and he lived up to all our expectations. He was fearless and energetic and did his job well. There were four of us at Fort de Tavannes when the Germans began to demolish it with sixteen inch shells, and he was unquestionably the calmest. Rogers left amid such a rain of shells that it did not seem possible that he could get through. Then 'Mac' pulled out cool as could be . . . . "

A month later MacMonagle was the first man in Section Eight to be awarded the Croix de Guerre. "All the doctors at our post " came back a report to Paris, "are loud in their praise of MacMonagle. With iron self-possession, he loaded his car during a bombardment that destroyed the building used as a dressing station."

In September, 1916, he left the Field Service to enlist in the French Aviation Corps. He was trained at Avord and Pau, where he quickly came to be admired by his new comrades for the same qualities which had distinguished him in the Field Service. When he finished his training, in May, 1917, he was considered a good enough pursuit pilot to be attached at once to the famous Lafayette Squadron.

He flew steadily and with increasing success from the time he reached the front until he was brought down September 24, 1917, while on an early-morning patrol, in a fierce fight with eight German planes. He fell behind the French lines and was buried at Triaucourt, the entire Lafayette Squadron and many French officers as well attending the funeral, a company of American engineers firing the last salute over his grave.

Douglas MacMonagle was loved for his warm-heartedness. He was admired for his fearlessness. He came early to the great struggle and he did good work; but the value of his services to the cause in which he gave his life is to be measured by the courage which he so often inspired in others as well as by his own achievements.

• Tribute from Memorial Volume of the American Field Service, 1921