"Battle of Cantigny," or "Cantigny: Where the Americans Won Their First Laurels"

"Battle of Cantigny," or "Cantigny: Where the Americans Won Their First Laurels"

In 1918, Frank Schoonover was one of thirteen studio artists commissioned to bring the scenes of World War I to the readership of The Ladies' Home Journal through a series called "Souvenir Pictures of the Great War." He painted fifteen of the 36 pictures published.  Sometimes they were painted only months after they actually occurred.  He did not travel to the battle areas but instead used photographs and newspaper articles for his research.

The first in the series was the "Battle of Cantigny," during which three batallions of the United States 28th Infantry, First Division, captured the strongly held village of Cantigny on May 28, 1918.  It was published in the November 1918 Ladies' Home Journal, the same issue with Bauer & Black's advertisement featuring John McCrae's poem "In Flanders Fields."

Schoonover worked a total of 202 documented days on the entire series.  Depending on where he was working, the artist hired his favorite models to pose for the figures he needed.

Cantigny was called America's "baptism by blood" in many publications of the day.  It was also the battle in which Willa Cather's cousin, G.P. Cather, was killed.

Frank Schoonover