He Charged Alone

Frank Gaffney was a 33-year-old papermaker from Western New York when America entered the Great War in 1917. While his age exempted him from serving in the military, Gaffney ran to the colors anyway. He fought bravely on Belgian and French battlefields as a U.S. Army soldier with the 27th Division's 108th Infantry Regiment. On September 29, 1918, Gaffney singlehandedly breached a section of Germany's Hindenburg Line, coming away with 80 prisoners. Six grateful nations recognized his bravery, including his own. In June 1919, the United States awarded him the Medal of Honor. Years later, the 27th Division's commanding general, Maj. Gen. John F. O'Ryan, wrote of Gaffney, "...no one man had performed more daring exploits and had exercised a bigger influence upon those about him by the gallantry of his conduct."

In He Charged Alone, John Strasburg chronicles the life of a First World War American soldier whose bravery was once compared to that of the legendary Sergeant Alvin York. To tell the story, the author weaves together Gaffney's personal correspondence with military/government records, newspaper accounts, and published unit histories. Nearly fifty illustrations-photographs and maps-augment the narrative.

Much of the book focuses on Gaffney's military service, heroism on the battlefield, and subsequent rehabilitation from a combat injury he received in the war's closing days, but not overlooked are Gaffney's upbringing and how he managed the burden that comes with being a Medal of Honor recipient. At its core, this book memorializes a true American hero from New York State who in life was admired by people across the country but in death has been nearly forgotten. In He Charged Alone, Frank Gaffney's legacy returns to the fore, where it belongs.