Sgt. Alvin York and Pfc. John Lewis Barkley had a lot in common. Both were born on farms in rural areas, York in Tennessee and Barkley in Henry County, Missouri. Both spent their youth in the woods, hunting and tracking game, and learning to camouflage themselves and remain still for long periods of time.
Both fought in the infantry in the Argonne-Meuse Offensive in France in World War I and received the Medal of Honor, the Croix de Guerre and other medals.
But unlike Sgt.York, considered the most decorated soldier of WWI, there is no movie about John Barkley.
Last Saturday, which was Veterans Day, Bill Simmons brought Barkley’s story to the Windsor Historical Society meeting.
Simmons, who is from Windsor, said he has always been fascinated with Medal of Honor winners. When he read Barkley’s combat memoir, he thought “Wow, this is better than Sgt. York.”
York, who was 29, is known for leading an assault on a German machine nest, killing 25 enemy soldiers, collecting 35 machine guns and with seven other soldiers, bringing in 132 prisoners.
John Barkley, age 23, used his own initiative to single-handedly stop two advances of the German army, killing an estimated 200 enemy soldiers.
The story: John was acting as an observer a third of a mile from the German line. There was a lull in hostilities. His radio line being cut, John had no way to report, so had a choice of returning to his unit or taking the initiative.
Going to an abandoned German machine gun nest, John found a machine gun that the Germans had rendered useless by removing the breech block. Knowing that German soldiers did this, John always carried an extra breech block in his pocket, and repaired the machine gun. Then he noticed a disabled French tank nearby, with a hole where the tank’s gun had been blown out, leaving an aperture. John snuck out to the tank, mounted the machine gun in the aperture and gathered up ammunition that had been left outside the tank, stacking it where he could reach it.
Then he sat in the tank and waited for the German soldiers to come out from the line of trees and into the open, like he had sat in a blind waiting for deer.
He held his fire until the enemy soldiers came level with the tank, then opened up, killing at least 200. They retreated, but advanced again. Figuring out where the machine gun fire was coming from, they started firing a 77-millimeter gun at the tank. A shell hit the tank’s wheel drive, and the explosion knocked John unconscious.
When he came to, John thought he had been shot, but it was just blood from his nose and his jaw. He remained calm, cooling the overheated machine gun with oil, which created a terrible smell, and also using his canteen water.
Despite the acrid smoke, exhaustion, a broken nose, hunger and thirst, John stayed in the tank and kept firing, breaking up a second attack. According to the Medal of Honor citation, John’s efforts enabled U.S. forces to gain and hold Hill 25.
“When the Americans went out on the field, they found 4,000 shell casings around the tank,” Bill said.
Pfc. John Barkley and Sgt. Alvin York both received their Medals of Honor from General John J. Pershing, plus medals from the French Republic, Italy and Montenegro. Both also received medals from Britain, but Barkley gave his away, Bill said, not having a very good opinion of the British or the French.
Before the United States entered the war and turned the tide, Simmons said, the British and French armies were retreating before the German army, which was heading towards Paris, Bill said.
“The Americans were not having that,” he said.
After the explosion in the tank, John no longer had the stutter that he had been born with, and which originally prevented him from enlisting. The middle of eight children of Frank and Leona Barkley, John was 12 when his family moved from Blairstown to the Holden area in 1907. When the United States entered the war ten years later, John went to the Holden postmaster to enlist, but was told the Army didn’t want men who couldn’t talk.
So John went home, got his brother’s draft notice and went to the Warrensburg recruitment office. Passing himself off as his brother, he kept this mouth shut or answered questions in monosyllables, and was accepted. After training at Fort Funstun and Fort Riley in Kansas, where he excelled as an observer, sniper and scout. He was shipped out to France in April of 1918, where the war was to last six more months.
“He was in a lot of battles,” Bill said.
John Barkley returned to Missouri in 1919, joined the Army Reserves, and accepting a promotion, which he had avoided before, taught marksmanship at Tarleton University in Texas. During the last 30 years of his life, he lived in the Kansas City area. He died in 1966 at the age of 70, and was buried in Forest Hill Cemetery with full military honors.
The April 21, 1966 “Clinton Eye” reported that Mr. and Mrs. Paul Van Ormer of Clinton attended funeral services at Overland Park Presbyterian Church for Barkley, who was Mrs. Ormer’s uncle.
Barkley was also survived by his wife and only child, Joan. At last Saturday’s WHS meeting was Dan Henry of Calhoun, whose mother, nee Brooks, was John Barkley’s first cousin. At one time, Dan said, he was related to everyone in Blairstown. A lot of his family served in the military, Dan said, and a Barkley had served in every American war.
Dan said he met the WWI hero several times, and remembers that Barkley once killed a large rattlesnake and made it into a belt.
Dan also recalled John Barkley wasn’t a big man.
Unlike Alvin York, who was a heavy drinker before he found religion, John didn’t drink, Bill said. Both Alvin and John liked a fight, however, and John was known as a person who never saw a rule he didn’t break.
“He was always in trouble,” Dan said, “and always had tall tales.”
Dan said he used to correspond with Barkley’s daughter, Joan, but doesn’t know if she’s still alive. Joan gave her father’s medals to the National WWI Museum and Memorial in Kansas City, Dan said. Barkley’s formal portrait is also at the National World War I Museum. It shows him in uniform, holding a ceremonial sword.
“It was the only weapon that Barkley never used,” Bill said.
Bill Simmons has donated his copy of “Scarlet Fields” to the Windsor Historical Society, where it can be borrowed. Barkley wrote another book that was never published. The manuscript is at the Henry County Library, Bill said.
Barkley was a self-effacing man who didn’t want to write his war memoirs, Bill said, but needed the money during the Depression. Royalty checks ranged from $130 down to 37 cents, despite being considered America’s response to “All Quiet on the Western Front.” It is one of the best military books Bill said he has ever read.
Nov. 11 was originally called Armistice Day, the date when the ceasefire was declared that ended World War 1. In 1954, it was changed to Veteran’s Day to honor all veterans.
Bill said that when Barkley was told an armistice had been declared, he didn’t know what the word meant.
“He didn’t understand why he couldn’t keep fighting,” Bill said. “He loved combat.”
