South Milwaukee Legion post honors namesake
Everhart Van Eimeren was killed when the artillery gun he was operating exploded, probably from a defective shell.
Maurice O’Brien, 17, was lying in woods when German shells started falling on his position, killing him instantly.
John Libecki, 24, died in a gas attack.
Three Wisconsin soldiers who fell far from their South Milwaukee homes were buried near their battlefields and eventually came home to be laid to rest in the same cemetery.
The South Milwaukee American Legion Post named after Van Eimeren has scheduled a remembrance ceremony on Wednesday exactly 100 years after the 19-year-old soldier’s death.
The American Legion was founded in 1919, a year after World War I ended. In August 1919, World War I veterans from South Milwaukee gathered to start their own post. How Van Eimeren
was chosen as the post’s namesake has been lost over the years.
“We had 16 men from South Milwaukee who died during the war both in battles and from illnesses like the Spanish flu,” said post member Tom Ludka. “I don’t know if they pulled names from the hat but they picked Everhart Van Eimeren.”
The mothers of South Milwaukee’s fallen, including Van Eimeren, joined the Legion Auxiliary.
Of the 16 South Milwaukee men who died in the war, only three are buried at Holy Sepulcher Cemetery in Cudahy — Van Eimeren, O’Brien and Libecki. During Wednesday’s ceremony, wreaths featuring pictures of each soldier will be laid at their graves.
Legion officials are hoping to find family members of the three men to attend the remembrance.
Libecki fought in the 47th Infantry Division as a wagoner, which was the equivalent to a truck driver as horses were widely used to tow wagons. O’Brien served in the 127th Infantry and Van Eimeren in the 120th Field Artillery, both in Wisconsin’s 32nd Division which earned its “Red Arrow” nickname for slicing through enemy lines.
All three were hastily buried near where they fell, the custom during World War I. A year or so after the Nov. 11, 1918, armistice, the Allies began opening cemeteries in France and reinterring their dead, said Ludka, who was the Waukesha County veteran service officer for many years.
“As things were progressing during the war, they didn’t have time to build cemeteries,” Ludka said. “Then they were able to go back and build American cemeteries.
“They took their dog tags and placed one on the body and one on whatever marker they used, whether it was a cross or a piece of wood. Then when they were disinterred, they were matched by using the dog tags.”
In 1920, the War Department began notifying families of casualties buried overseas that the U.S. government would bring bodies home if the next of kin wanted that done.
Ludka was able to find the letters written by the mothers of Van Eimeren, Libecki and O’Brien requesting their sons’ remains.