At five in the morning on November 11, 1918, an armistice with Germany was signed in a railroad carriage at Compiègne, France. At 11 a.m., “the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month”—a ceasefire would be put in effect.
Henry Gunther grew up in a German-American family in Baltimore and wasn’t over-zealous about fighting his former kinfolk. He didn’t enlist in the army as many others did when war was declared in April 1917, but by September of that year he had gotten drafted and found himself assigned to the 313th Regiment, better known as “Baltimore’s Own”.
The regiment was part of the larger 157th Brigade of the 79th Infantry Division. Promoted to supply sergeant, Gunther was responsible for the clothing for his military unit. Arriving in France in July 1918, Henry found he wasn’t very happy with his circumstances. Writing home to a friend he complained of “miserable conditions” at the front and advised his friend to do anything to avoid being drafted. Unfortunately, the letter was intercepted by the Army postal censor, and as a result, Gunther was busted back down to a private.
Gunther’s unit, Company ‘A’, arrived at the Western Front on September 12, 1918. Like all Allied units on the front of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, it was still embroiled in fighting on the morning of November 11. But then, the long awaited news spread rapidly through the lines; the armistice with Germany would come into force at 11:00 a.m.
A little before eleven, Gunther’s squad approached a roadblock of two German machine guns in the village of Chaumont-devant-Damvillers near Meuse, in Lorraine. At 10:59 AM Private Gunther got up, against the orders of his close friend and sergeant, Ernest Powell. As his comrades shouted at him, Gunther took off, and charged with his bayonet.
The German soldiers, also aware that the Armistice would take effect in one minute, tried to wave Gunther off, but he kept charging, and fired a shot.
As he closed in on the astonished Germans, a machine gun broke out in a short burst of automatic fire.
James M. Cain, a reporter back then for “The Sun”, interviewed Gunther’s comrades shortly afterward. He wrote that “Gunther brooded a great deal over his recent reduction in rank, and became obsessed with a determination to make good before his officers and fellow soldiers.”
On November 12th, General John J. Pershing’s “Order of The Day” specified Henry Gunther as the last American killed in the “War to End All Wars”.
The Army posthumously restored his rank of sergeant and awarded him a Divisional Citation for Gallantry in Action and the “Distinguished Service Cross”.
Post 1858 of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Baltimore bears his name to this day.