Dorchester Illustration no. 2428 Arthur Wellington Gross
At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.
Our next biography features: Arthur Welling Gross.
Written by Donna Albino. Arthur is in the center of the photograph.
Arthur Wellington Gross was born on December 26, 1891 in Milton, Massachusetts, to Sylvester Gross and Ellen (Pelrine) Gross; Arthur was their first child. The family moved several times between Milton and Dorchester’s Lower Mills for a few years. By 1900, the family had settled in a rented house at 22 Baker Court in Lower Mills, and Sylvester was working as a coachman. Three more children had been born to the family: two sons named Henry and William, and a daughter named Mary. In 1908, Arthur graduated from the Gilbert Stuart School in Lower Mills.
In 1910, the family was renting a home at 12 Millers Lane in the Lower Mills neighborhood of Dorchester. Sylvester was working as a teamster for a chocolate factory, most likely the Walter Baker Chocolate Factory, and Arthur, now 19 years old, was working as a teamster for an express company.
On June 5, 1917, Arthur registered for the draft. He was 26 years old and self-employed in the express business. He was living with his parents at 1234 Morton Street in Lower Mills. A few months later, on September 23, 1917, Arthur was inducted into the war effort. He served with Company F, 301st Infantry, known as “Boston’s Own,” until November 12, 1917.
Arthur was then transferred to Company F, 326th Infantry until April 10, 1918. The 326th Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment of the United States Army. It was initially composed of large numbers of conscripts, or “draftees,” who had been called up for service, most of whom had no previous military experience whatsoever. In April 1918, the regiment received orders to move to Camp Upton in New York in preparation for embarkation to France.
At Camp Upton, Arthur was assigned to the 157th Depot Brigade, which received and organized recruits, provided them with uniforms, equipment, and initial military training before sending them to France to fight on the front lines. On August 31, 1918, Arthur headed to France on the SS Leviathan, an ocean liner painted in British-type “dazzle” camouflage to mislead the enemy about the ship’s course and make it more likely to evade attack. On September 18, 1918, Arthur was assigned to the HQ Company of the 161st Infantry until September 28, 1918. The 161st was not committed to combat; the personnel of the 161st were used as replacements for other units. For its service, the regiment was awarded the WWI campaign streamer without inscription.
Arthur left Brest, France with the St. Aignan Casual Company #1491 on the USS Pueblo on March 16, 1919. The American army was centered on the town of Saint-Aignan toward the close of the war, and a lot of organizational changes occurred here. A casual company was an army group composed for specific duties, drawing personnel from other types of units, for tasks like driving ambulances or ammunition trucks. Arthur’s experiences as a teamster before the war probably made him a good candidate for this type of work, and it kept him out of the trenches. Arthur arrived at Hoboken, NJ on March 27, 1919. Arthur was discharged on April 5, 1919 from Camp Devens in Ayer, Massachusetts.
After the war, Arthur returned to his parents’ home. In the 1920 census, he was living at 1234 Morton Street in Lower Mills, working as a house painter. In 1922, Arthur lived at 343 Codman Street in the Ashmont section of Dorchester for several years, still working as a painter. He returned to his parents’ home for several years in 1926, and then moved to 21 Magdala Street, also in the Ashmont section in Dorchester in 1928. He was still at this address in 1930 when the next census was taken.
In the 1940 census, Arthur was living with his sister Mary and her husband at 36 Old Morton Street, back in Lower Mills. The census did not list employment for Arthur, but in 1942 when Arthur registered for the WWII draft, he was working in Milton, and still living with his sister Mary and her husband at 36 Old Morton Street.
After 1942, Arthur’s path was difficult to trace. Up until 1942, when he waslisted in the Boston city directory, he was listed as Arthur W. Gross. There is an Arthur Gross (without a middle initial) living at several addresses in Dorchester throughout the 1950s, but he might not have been Arthur Wellington Gross.
Arthur Wellington Gross passed away on March 2, 1962, and was interred at Mount Hope Cemetery in Mattapan. An upright marble, military veteran headstone engraved with a Latin cross was requested from the U.S. War Department by the cemetery several weeks after his death, and was shipped to the cemetery in May of 1962.
Sources:
-Fold3, Boston City Directories, 1891-1897
-The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts) 23 Jun 1908, Tue Page 7
-Year: 1900; Census Place: Boston Ward 24, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Page: 2; -Enumeration District: 1531; FHL microfilm: 1240688
-Year: 1910; Census Place: Boston Ward 24, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Roll: T624_625; Page: 15A; Enumeration District: 1633; FHL microfilm: 1374638
-Year: 1920; Census Place: Boston Ward 21, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Roll: T625_739; Page: 11B; Enumeration District: 524
-Ancestry.com. U.S. City Directories, 1822-1995 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
-Year: 1940; Census Place: Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Roll: m-t0627-01676; Page: 3A; Enumeration District: 15-610
-Registration State: Massachusetts; Registration County: Suffolk; Roll: 1685013; Draft Board: 21
-US Army WWI Transport Service, Passenger Lists, Ship: Pueblo, Entry Number: NM-81 2060
-US Army WWI Transport Service, Passenger Lists, Ship: Leviathan, Entry Number: NM-81 2061
-worldwar1letters.wordpress.com: Camp Devens; Home of New England’s Own
Wikipedia, 326th Infantry Regiment (United States)
-army.togetherweserved.com, 157th Depot Brigade
Wikipedia, 161st Infantry Regiment (United States)
-Rootdig, Michael John Neill’s Genealogy Website
-Wikipedia, USS Leviathan
-The National Archives at St. Louis; St. Louis, Missouri; World War II Draft Cards (Fourth Registration) for the State of Massachusetts; Record Group Title: Records of the Selective Service System, 1926-1975; Record Group Number: 147; Series Number: M2090
-The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts) 05 Mar 1962, Mon Page 29
-Ancestry.com. U.S., Headstone Applications for Military Veterans, 1925-1963 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.
-Ancestry.com, Thayer/Baird Family Tree by JamesCallahan