 George
Ganninger, aged 26, youngest son of Mrs. Theresa
Ganninger of Maple street, died November 1 of
wounds received in battle somewhere in Belgium,
according to a telegram received from the war
department by Mrs. Ganninger last Friday. When or
how Ganninger received his injuries is not known
here, but letters received from him by relatives
here would indicate that he was injured only a
few days before his death. A letter has been
received dated October 26 which made no mention
of any mishap.Ganninger, who was a meat cutter
employed at the Star Meat Market on Vandalia
street, was drafted to Camp Dix on April 30.
After six weeks training he was picked as one of
a few from his squad to go across with a group of
New York men, and they sailed on June 22. He
landed in France on August 16. He was made member
of a bombing squad in a company of “shock
troops” who were called upon to go in the
very advance in each engagement.
Ganninger wrote
frequently of having been in heavy engagements.
He told in one letter of having been in the last
Verdun drive, and of being one of the only two
who came back alive at the end of the conflict,
though there were twenty-six of his squad when
the fighting began. His rifle and mess kit were
both shot away, and he wrote that he considered
it a miracle that he escaped.
In another he told
of being on No-Man’s Land when it became
necessary to dig in. He said just as they
completed this work a German shell fell among
them killing three of the party outright, and the
body of one of his companions falling directly
upon him after it had been hurled in the air.
The official
telegram did not say that the young Ganninger
died in Belgium and members of the family here
infer this only from the fact that his last two
letters were dated “ somewhere in
Belgium.” He wrote that Belgium had been a
beautiful country before the war but was now
mainly mud and shell holes.
 Ganninger
was born in Marine in this county on Sept. 14,
1892. He was the son of John and Theresa
Ganninger, the former being dead. He is survived
by three brothers and five sisters. These are
Frank of St. Louis, John of Troy, Joe of
Marshalltown, Iowa, Mrs. Kate Liebler of Troy,
Mrs. Mary Ryan of St. Louis, Mrs. Emma Harvie of
Winchester, Kan., Mrs. Minnie Roedger of
Collinsville and Miss Josephine at home.
Ganninger’s
father was a civil war veteran.
Ganninger wrote in
one of his recent letters that the members of his
division were to be decorated for their work. He
was a member of Company L, 148th Infantry. Owing
to the fact that most of the regiment were
eastern men, little has appeared to the
mid-western papers about them.
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