On June 2nd, the President of the United States Barack Obama* will award the Congressional Medal of Honor to William Shemin posthumously, for his service to this country during World War I.
Mr. Shemin, who died in 1973, and his family were longtime summer residents of Chazy Landing. He bought a camp there in the late 1930s, and his wife, Bertha, and daughters, Elsie and Ina, came for the summers from then on. Mr. and Mrs. Shemin were life-long friends of my mother and father, Tom and Mary Conroy of Beekmantown, where my mother gave riding lessons to their young daughters. Elsie, now Elsie Shemin-Roth, will accept the medal on her father's behalf.
Mr. Shemin joined the U.S. Army on
Oct. 2, 1917, after graduating from the New York State Ranger School. He was
sent to Fort Greene, N.C., for basic training.
Upon graduation, his unit, G Company, 2nd Battalion, 47th Infantry, 4th
Division of the American Expeditionary Forces, was sent to the trenches in
France.
 |
| Sgt. William Shemin (second from left) in France during WWI. |
A sergeant, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions in France during early August of 1918. His citation reads as follows:
"The
President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress ...
takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross to Sergeant
William Shemin (ASN: 558173), United States Army, for extraordinary heroism ...
on the Vesle River, near Bazoches, France, 7, 8, and 9 August 1918.
"Sergeant
Shemin, upon three different occasions, left cover and crossed an open space
(of) 150 yards, exposed to heavy machine-gun and rifle fire, to rescue
wounded.
"After
officers and senior non-commissioned officers had become casualties, Sergeant
Shemin took command of the platoon and displayed great initiative under fire
until wounded on 9 August."
According to Capt. Rupert Purdon, a
superior officer who recommended Sgt. Shemin for the Medal of Honor at that
time, "he sprang from his position in the trench and dashed out in full
sight of the Germans, who opened and maintained a furious burst of machine-gun
and rifle fire all the while Sgt. Shemin was rescuing the wounded.”
He took over the command of his
platoon for the next three days, leading it until shrapnel wounds and a bullet
to the back of his head forced him from the field. After a hospital stay of three months, he was
discharged, partially deaf and lame.
Upon returning home, he finished his
schooling and established a successful landscaping and greenhouse business in
the Bronx.
I knew Mr. Shemin all of my life,
until his death in 1973, and he was always horribly lame. The shrapnel left him vulnerable to a
crippling form of arthritis that he endured without complaint. He could not walk without the use of a
cane. My brothers and I, throughout our
youth, were his hands in planting his property along Lake Champlain with every
kind of tree, shrub and flower, which he shipped up from his business in the
Bronx.
“He was the best man I ever worked
for,” said Tom Conroy recently. “Back on the farm, we were making $4 a month,
and Mr. Shemin immediately started my brother Will and myself at $2 per
hour. On our first payday, he drove us
to the bank and helped us open a bank account so we’d learn how to handle
money. He was a thoughtful, caring,
exacting person."
Elsie Shemin-Roth campaigned long
and hard to have the government take a second look at her father's war
decorations after reading that Jewish soldiers, along with African American,
Asian and Native American military members, were sometimes denied full merit in
the awarding of service medals. She was
the driving force behind a provision in the National Defense Authorization Act
of December 2011, called the William Shemin World War 1 Veterans Act, that
provides for a Pentagon review of Jewish soldiers and sailors who may have been
overlooked for the Medal of Honor simply because of their faith.
 |
| Ina and Elsie Shemin with President Obama at the White House ceremony awarding their father William Shemin the Medal of Honor posthumously May 26, 2015. |
Mr. Shemin had been awarded the
Purple Heart for his wounds, along with the Distinguished Service Cross, but his actions in those days under fire in
France were in the same league with Sgt. Alvin York, who was the most famous
hero of World War I and a recipient of the Medal of Honor. Mr. Shemin was not portrayed in a movie by
Gary Cooper, however, in our family any soldier who survived the trenches of
World War I, much less went over the top to rescue the wounded, deserved a medal. Mr. Shemin did it all.
In the late 1950s, the Shemins
retired to their property in Chazy, where they had built a new house on the lake
shore. It was during those later years
that we saw the most of Mr. Shemin. He
and his wife spent the remainder of their lives living happily there surrounded
by the trees and flowers that he had planted.
He was always "Mr. Shemin"
to the members of my family, old and young. His presence and dignity commanded that kind
of respect.
For a time, the late Clinton County
Judge Robert Feinberg and his wife lived in the Shemin house on Lake Shore
Road. It is now owned by Jim Carter.
At the same White House ceremony
that posthumously recognizes Mr. Shemin, Pvt. William Henry Johnson will be
honored, as well. An African-American
World War I veteran, he will also have the Distinguished Service medal that he
received for bravery under fire in France upgraded to the Medal of Honor.
*A version of this article was published by the Press Republican on May 24, 2015.
*I received a White House pass from their press office to attend the ceremony for Mr. Shemin but wasn't notified early enough to obtain a ticket to DC in time for the event.
