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LTC Juan Rodriguez
to remember
Adkinson, Joseph Bernard, SGT.
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Contact Info
Home Town Egypt
Date of Passing May 23, 1965
Location of Interment Salem Associate Reformed Presbyterian Cemetery - Salem, Tennessee
Wall/Plot Coordinates Plot: Section B, Row 10, Lot 20A
Sgt Joseph Bernard Adkinson. Rank and organization: Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company C, 119th Infantry, 30th Division. Place and date: Near Bellicourt, France, September 29, 1918. Entered service at: Memphis, Tenn. Born: January 4, 1892, Egypt, Tenn. G.O. No.: 59, W.D., 1919.
Medal of Honor Citation: "When murderous machinegun fire at a range of 50 yards had made it impossible for his platoon to advance, and had caused the platoon to take cover Sergeant. Adkinson alone, with the greatest intrepidity, rushed across the 50 yards of open ground directly into the face of the hostile machinegun kicked the gun from the parapet into the enemy trench, and at the point of the bayonet captured the 3 men manning the gun. The gallantry and quick decision of this soldier enabled the platoon to resume its advance."
Adkinson was born in Egypt, Tennessee, and entered the army in 1917 in Memphis. By mid-1918, Adkinson and his division were involved in combat in France. On September 29, 1918, near Bellicourt, France, Adkinson, by then a Sergeant, found he and his platoon pinned down by heavy German machine gun fire located fifty yards to their front.
Adkinson, acting alone, charged the machine gun nest, kicked it over into the enemy trench, and using the bayonet fixed on his rifle captured the three man machine gun crew, allowing his platoon to advance forward. He was awarded the Medal of Honor in 1919 and was one of six soldiers from Tennessee to receive that medal for their service during the First World War. Another of the six was Alvin York, subject of the film Sergeant York starring actor Gary Cooper.
Adkinson died in 1965, and he is buried in the Salem Associated Reformed Presbyterian Church in Atoka, Tennessee.
His Medal of Honor is on display at the Tipton County Museum, Veterans Memorial, and Nature Center.
Description Aisne 27 May - 5 June 1918. The next major German attack fell on 27 May on the thinly held but formidable terrain along the Aisne River known as the Chemin des Dames. The original objective of this new offensive was to draw southward the Allied reserves accumulated back of the British sector, in preparation for a final German attempt to destroy the British Army in Flanders. The French and British defenders were taken completely by surprise, and their positions were overrun rapidly on a forty-mile front. German progress on the first day was so rapid (advances up to 13 miles were made at some points) that Ludendorff altered his plans and decided to make the diversionary attack a main effort. Most of the Aisne bridges were captured intact. The thrust toward Rheims failed but Soissons was taken, and by 31 May the Germans had reached the outskirts of Chateau-Thierry on the Marne, less than 40 miles from Paris.
In the next few days the Germans sought to exploit and expand the deep and exposed salient which they had established. But by 4 June they had been stopped everywhere. Some 27,500 American troops took part in the check of the German advance. The 3d Division foiled enemy attempts in the period 1-4 June to secure a firm bridgehead across the Marne at Chateau-Thierry. West of the town the 2d Division, which included a Marine brigade, defended the road to Paris, and on 6 June successfully counterattacked in Belleau Wood.
