DiCesnola,1st I-A CMoH winner,
and ALL I-A Veterans remembered on July 4
It is incumbent upon the Italian American Community to particularly "single out" for tribute, Italian American Military Veterans, who Disproportionately in numbers, served and died in WWI, WWII, Vietnam, Korea, etc.
Joseph Martorana, below, pays tribute to the FIRST Italian American Congressional Medal of Honor Awardee, as REPRESENTATIVE of ALL I-As who served from the Revolutionary War up to the present Day.
Deserving of Special Mention are the Following, from the NIAF Web Site:
During the American Revolution, three Italian regiments totaling 1,500 men assisted the colonists. Also, Italian names are found on the rolls of colonial American regiments.
An estimated 5,000 to 10,000 Italians fought in the American Civil War for both the North and the South. The exact number is not known since many names were Americanized.
Giuseppe Garibaldi, who led Italy to unification in 1861, was offered a command as Major General in the Union Army by President Lincoln. Garibaldi declined, but to honor him, the 39th New York Infantry was known as the Garibaldi Guard. About 150 of its 850 men were Italian. It fought in the Union Army from Bull Run to Appomattox.
More than 100 Italian Americans served as officers in the Union forces during the Civil War including 4 generals; 2 naval commanders; 11 naval officers; 9 colonels and lieutenant colonels; and 28 majors and captains. The exact number is unknown because of the Americanization of Italian surnames and mixed marriages.
Four Italian Americans became generals during or following their Civil War service: Luigi Palma di Cesnola; Enrico Fardella; Eduardo Ferrero; and Francis Spinola. Gen. Ferrero of the 51st N.Y. Regiment, was among the first Union officers to command black troops. Col. di Cesnola, commander of the 4th NY Cavalry, received the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor. It was awarded in 1897.
Among the handful of survivors of the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876 were four Italian Americans: Lieutenant Charles De Rudio, and enlisted men Augusto De Voto, Giovanni Casella (listed as "John James") and John Martin, (born "Martini").
Bancroft Gerardi was the first Italian American to attain the rank of U.S. Admiral. He and Louis Sartori were U.S. naval commodores during the U.S.-Mexican War.
Over 300,000 Italian Americans, including 87,000 Italian nationals, served in the U.S. military during World War I. Among them was Lieutenant Fiorello La Guardia, one of the first soldiers in the new U.S. Army Air Service, the forerunner of the Air Force.
Among the first U.S. casualties in World War I was John Eopolucci, an Navy guard, who perished after his steamer, "Aztec" was torpedoed near France on April 1, 1917.
The first Italian American to receive the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor was Luigi Palma di Cesnola, a Union general in the Civil War, who later became the first director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
At least 39 Italian Americans have received the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor, the highest military award given by the U.S. government for bravery "above and beyond the call of duty:" six in the Civil War; two in the Indian War; one for the Spanish-American War; one for the China Boxer Rebellion; one during peacetime service (1889-1911); one in World War I; fourteen for World War II; three for the Korean Conflict; and ten in the Vietnam War.
More than 1. 5 million Italian Americans served in World War II, according to the late Vice President Nelson Rockefeller. In a speech to the Italian American War Veterans of America August 25, 1961, Rockefeller said that Italian Americans constituted "more than 10 % of the might of the American forces in World War II.
John Basilone is the only enlisted Marine in U.S. history to receive the nation's two highest military honors: the Navy Cross for valor and the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor for his service in World War II. Basilone, an Italian American Marine sergeant from New Jersey, fought at the Battle of Guadalcanal (1942), raised millions of dollars in war bonds, and was killed in action during the Battle of Iwo Jima in 1945.
Captain Don Gentile of the U.S. Army Air Force, shot down over 30 Nazi planes during World War II. Eisenhower called the 24-year-old pilot a "one-man Air Force" and personally pinned the Distinguished Service Cross on him. The "Ace of Aces" was born in Ohio and bought his first plane when he was 15. He died in a training accident after the war in 1950 when he was only 30.
Four-star General Anthony Zinni, a veteran Marine and the son of Italian immigrants, commanded Operation Desert Fox, the U.S. bombing of Iraq in 1998. It was the largest U.S. offensive since the Gulf War in 1991. A highly decorated officer, he is Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Central Command.
General Carl Vuono was the first Italian American to be appointed Army chief of staff. He served from 1987-1991 and was appointed by President Ronald Reagan
I will add specifically the surnames of the Congressional Medal of Honor
Awardees:
I have been able to deterrmine only 34 of the at least 39 Awardees:
Basilone,Bertoldo,Bianchi,Capodanno,Casamento,Cavaiani,Cheli,Cicchetti,Colalillo,
Corahorgi,Costello,Crescenz,Cuthinha,Dalessondro,Damato,De Castro,
Defranzo, Desiderio,Di Cesnola,Dutko,Ferrari,Fratellenico,La Garza Jr.,Martini,Mendonca,Merli,
Petrarca, Rocco,Sova,Tallentine,Valente,Vantine,Versace,Vittori.
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The following is transmitted with thanks to Cathie DeNatale Harrington.
PATRIOTISM WEARS MANY HATS
By Diana Bellettieri and Khurrram Saeed
The Journal News
(Original publication: July 4, 2003)
Spurred by war with Iraq and continuing threats of terrorism, Americans are feeling especially patriotic this Fourth of July.
[Photo: Joseph Martorana, a veteran of World War II, places an American flag at the grave site of Louis Palma DiCesnola, a Civil War hero. Cesnola, a Union colonel and winner of the Medal of Honor, was an Italian immigrant who once resided in Mount Kisco. He died November 4, 1904, in New York City and is buried at Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla. (Matthew Brown)]
Send e-mail to Diana
Bellettieri
THE
JOURNAL NEWS: A Gannett Suburban Webpaper
http://rmarchan@thejournalnews.com./
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PREFACE: The FIRST Italian American to receive
the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor was Luigi Palma di Cesnola,
a Union general in the Civil War, who later became the first director of
the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
The New York Fourth Calvary
The second colonel of the regiment was Italian-born
Louis (Luigi) Palma diCesnola (pictured),who was commissioned Colonel on
September 11, 1861. DiCesnola was born on June 29, 1832, in Rivarola,
Piedmont, Italy. He had formerly commanded the brigade, but was demoted
to command of the regiment after Cavalry Corps commander Alfred Pleasonton's
reorganization of the corps.
The 4th, comprised of an ethnic diversity of Germans, Frenchmen, Italians, Brits, and Hungarians, was Pleasonton's least favorite unit. Pleasonton distrusted anyone not born in America, and CONSTANTLY DEMOTED OR ELIMINATEDC THEM ON THIS SOLE AND DISCRIMINTORY CRITERIA. (emphasis added)....
On June 17, 1863, in a skirmish with elements of Confederate Major General JEB Stuart's cavalry on the Snickersville Road at Aldie, diCesnola was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, for having rallied his men after they had been routed, and led them in a second charge unarmed.
Continuing at the head of his regiment, he was severely wounded, was surrounded and captured, and sent to Libby Prison where he would spend the next 10 months. He had been "shamefully abandoned" by the regiment.
With diCesnola fighting at their helm the following year the regiment made an impressive charge, routing two Confederate regiments and capturing 150 men and mounts.
Ironically, after the engagement diCesnola announced that he was resigning, saying, "I cannot depend upon them; they have covered me with glory to-day, they may disgrace me to-morrow." diCesnola would receive his discharge, effective September 4, 1864.
4th
New York Monument
http://www.bufordsboys.com/4thNYMon.htm
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