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1917 – 1920
Buried here, but not Mishawaka's: Two men of the Gold Star roll rest in Mishawaka ground without being of Mishawaka's twelve. Harry R. Pomeranz settled in South Bend and worked in a South Bend shoe store when he enlisted; he died at El Paso, Texas, on April 30, 1917, from accidental causes, and was buried in the Jewish Cemetery at Mishawaka — South Bend's man, buried here, and counted in South Bend's roll. Charles William Roderick moved to St. Joseph County in 1900, the roll not saying to which town; he enlisted at South Bend, served in the aviation service, and died on January 25, 1920, of wounds, at Garden City, Long Island; he too was buried in Mishawaka. His residence is not stated as Mishawaka in the roll, and he is not claimed for the town's twelve; both men are printed here at exactly the strength the roll gives them, because the town's soil holds them.
How many served: No published figure for Mishawaka's total service in the First World War exists in the record — the same gap South Bend carries. The settling source is named: the Indiana Archives' statement-of-service cards, some 135,800 for the state, from which a county pull can be made; whether those cards can be divided by town, the county histories' draft and registration figures do not say. Until that pull is made, this record prints the twelve dead against an unnamed denominator, and says so.
One more name the town already carries: The rector of St. Paul's Episcopal Church, John Addams Linn, was killed in France in the First World War while serving as a chaplain; a plaque in his church keeps his name. His story stands in the Religion section's own telling of St. Paul's, and is cross-referenced here rather than retold — he is not among the Gold Star twelve as the roll prints them, and no addition is made to the roll on his account; the plaque and the roll are both allowed to stand.
Sources:
- Indiana Historical Commission, Gold Star Honor Roll, State of Indiana (1921), entries for Pomeranz and Roderick, St. Joseph County section.
- Mishawaka Religion section file, St. Paul's Episcopal Church and the Linn plaque; Indiana Archives and Records Administration, World War I statement-of-service cards, named as the settling source for the served total.