Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biographies: John Frederick Martin and Irving Martin
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: John Frederick Martin and Irving Martin.
Written by Camille Arbogast.
Brothers John Frederick and Irving Martin were sons of Martha (Farnum) and John Robinson Martin. Both parents had been born in Dorchester and were married in 1883. John F. was born on July 26, 1885, in Milton and Irving was born on November 30, 1898, in Dorchester. John F. and Irving had nine siblings who lived beyond early childhood: Harry born in 1883, William in 1887, Charles in 1889, Ralph in 1891, Eunice in 1894, Marion Lillian in 1895, Ethel in 1900, Ernest in 1902 and Bertram in 1908. Martha had seven other pregnancies; at least five infants died at under a year, most died of digestive troubles or bronchitis, and at least one was stillborn.
At the time of his marriage, their father John Robinson was a blacksmith. On John F.’s birth record, his father’s occupation was reported as quarryman, while the Milton directory for that year listed John Robinson as an employee of H.P. Kidder, an investment banker and resident of the town. By 1898, John Robinson worked for Walter Baker Chocolate, his employer for many years. He generally worked as a mill hand or chocolate maker, and also worked for a time as a night watchman at the factory.
In 1885, the family lived on Pierce Street in East Milton. By 1897, they resided off Squantum Street in East Milton. In 1900, the family rented 1057 Washington Street in Lower Mills. They moved to 90 Butler Street, near the Neponset River, by 1903, and remained there for at least 40 years. Their brother, Charles, died of tuberculosis in 1910, when he was 21.
In May 1916, Irving ran away from home with a few friends: Bert Foster, John Driscoll, and Everett Kellaway. They skipped school, telling their friends they were headed for Florida, and set out with very little money. Their mothers missed them when they did not come home for lunch, and began to worry when they did not return from dinner. The boys, meanwhile, made it as far as Buzzards Bay. From there, they sent postcards to their mothers. “Don’t worry,” they wrote, “we will write when we get a job.” They returned home after about a week.
Less than a year after this adventure, on January 24, 1917, Irving enlisted in the Coast Artillery Corps (CAC). This was before the United States declared war on Germany in April 1917. The CAC provided coastal defense, manning coastal and harbor fixed artillery installations and minefields. Many thought the coast would be the first active front in the United States and joined the CAC hoping for immediate action. When the 55th Artillery was organized from eight existing Coast Defense companies in December 1917, Irving’s CAC company became Battery B, 55th Artillery, Coast Artillery Corps, 31st Heavy Artillery Brigade. Battery B was stationed at Fort Andrews on Peddocks Island in Boston Harbor.
The 55th sailed for France on March 25, 1918, leaving from New York on the ocean liner RMS Mauretania. In France, they trained in Clermont Ferrand in the Auvergne region. On the battlefield, the CAC was responsible for manned heavy artillery. Battery B named their artillery guns “Madeline,” “Lt. Reed,” “Roaring Bertha,” and “Boston Baby,” christening them with champagne. In August, they participated in the Aisne-Marne offensive, attached to the Sixth French Army. In September, they were part of the Meuse-Argonne offensive, operating as part of the U.S. First Army and in action for all 47 continuous days of the engagement. When the Armistice was signed, Battery B found they had fired 7,170 rounds, the most of any battalion in the 55th. CAC Artillery units were prioritized for early return to the United States, so they could resume defending the coast. After almost a month in the overcrowded Camp Pontazen in Brest, France, they sailed on January 10, 1919, travelling on the HMS Cretic. They arrived in New York on January 22. From there, the 55th went to Camp Mills, Mineola, Long Island for delousing, then performed a short stint as Coast Defense on Long Island Sound around New London, Connecticut. On February 11, 1919, Irving was discharged. The 55th was strongly identified with Boston, and when the soldiers returned to the city, a band received them at South Station and a reception was held for them on the Common.
John entered the Army on September 5, 1917. He had been working for about ten years by that time, first as a boilermaker, and later as a painter for Shay Brothers of 86 Warren Street, Boston. In the Army, he was sent to the 151st Depot Brigade for training at Camp Devens in Ayer, Massachusetts, before serving as a Private in Company D, 60th Infantry, 9th Infantry Brigade, 5th Division. On April 16, 1918, he sailed for Europe on the USS Calamares, leaving from Hoboken, New Jersey. The 5th Division participated in the engagements at Saint-Mihiel and the Meuse-Argonne. After the Armistice, the division was part of the Army of Occupation in Belgium and Luxembourg. John returned home earlier than most of the 60th Infantry, traveling to the United States with a casual company which sailed from Bordeaux on December 25, 1918, on the S.S. Pastores. He was discharged on March 12, 1919.
After the war, John and Irving returned to 90 Butler Street. On January 16, 1922, John married Mary A. (Cavanagh) Monynihan, a widow with two children who lived in Mattapan. Before her first marriage in 1911, she had worked as a housekeeper. She had two children, John J. born in 1913 and Marguerite in 1914. Her first husband died in 1915. John and Mary were married by Reverend Francis J. Ryan, of St. Angela’s Church on Blue Hill Avenue in Mattapan. John and Mary would go on to have two children together: John A. and Joseph Martin.
At the time of his marriage, John was a student. Later, he resumed work as a painter. In 1923, John and Mary purchased 40 Dyer Avenue in Milton, where John lived for the rest of his life. He began working as a custodian at the Massachusetts School of Art, then located at 364 Brookline Avenue in the Fenway, in 1937. In 1940, he earned $1150. John died on August 2, 1954, of kidney and heart disease. A Mass of High Requiem was held for him at Milton’s St. Mary of the Hills Church and he was buried in Milton. John was a member of the Milton Post, Number 114 American Legion.
Irving was married on November 5, 1925, wedding Violet Augusta Bickerton, a Canadian immigrant living at 47 Sturbridge Street in Dorchester. Born in Joggins Mines, Nova Scotia, Violet came to the United States in 1909. They were married by Reverend Eugene Dinsmore Dolloff of the Blaney Memorial Baptist Church in Dorchester. They had one son, Irving E. Martin born in 1927.
In the 1920s and 1930s, Irving worked as a roofer and house painter. The 1930 census reported he was unemployed and no occupation was listed for him in the Boston directory during the 1930s. By 1926, Irving and Violet lived at 1256 Morton Street. In 1929, they moved to 902 Adams Street. The 1930 census reported they lived at 866 North Main Street, in Randolph. By 1934, they were back in Dorchester, at 14 River Street. By 1935, they moved to at 47 Cook Terrace (later renamed Cookson Terrace) in Mattapan. Early on New Year’s Day 1940, Irving was hit by a car in Quincy. His car had run out of gas and he was headed to a gas station, walking along Willard Street in West Quincy, when Boston University graduate student John B. York struck him. Another driver took Irving to the Quincy City Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Irving was buried in the Milton Cemetery.
Sources
Birth & Death Records, Massachusetts Vital Records, 1840–1911. New England Historic Genealogical Society, Boston, Massachusetts; Ancestry.com
Births Registered in the City of Boston 1898, Massachusetts, Town Clerk, Vital and Town Records, 1626-2001; FamilySearch.org
Boston & Milton directories, various years, Ancestry.com
US Federal Census, 1900, 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940; Ancestry.com
“Warm Welcome from Their Fathers on Return,” Boston Globe, 3 May 1916: 20; Newspapers.com
“Dorchester District,” Boston Globe, 9 May 1916: 4; Newspapers.com
Applications for Headstones for U.S. Military Veterans, 1925-1941. Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, National Archives at Washington, D.C.; Ancestry.com
Cutler, Frederick Morse. The 55th Artillery (CAC) in the American Expeditionary Forces, France, 1918. Worcester, MA: Commonwealth Press, 1920; Archive.org
Lists of Outgoing & Incoming Passengers, 1917-1938, Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, 1774-1985, The National Archives at College Park, Maryland; Ancestry.com
World War I Selective Service System Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration; Ancestry.com
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The Official History of the Fifth Division, U. S. A. Washington, DC: Society of the Fifth Division, 1919; Archive.org
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Service Registration Cards, World War II: Fourth Registration. Records of the Selective Service System, National Archives and Records Administration; Ancestry.com
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