Herbert Hammond Renshaw was a United States Navy sailor, Seaman, 1st Class, who became the first World War I American serviceman to become Missing in Action on May 22, 1917.
Life[]
Herbert Renshaw was born on July 7, 1897 to George and Mary Renshaw in Baltimore, Maryland. The family eventually moved to Salisbury, Maryland where he grew up. In February of 1914, he enlisted in the United States Navy, just before months World War I began in Europe. The United States of America would join the war when declaring war on Germany on April 6, 1917.
Weeks after the US entered the war, the USS Ozark, which Renshaw was a quartermaster of, was doing a navy patrol outside of Charleston, South Carolina when it hit bad weather. During the storm, he lost his footing and fell overboard. Despite his shipmates throwing him life belts and ropes and him being a good swimmer, the rough ocean prevented the launching of a lifeboat and Renshaw was lost at sea. His father was informed of what happened to his son the next day.
Aftermath[]
Not only was Renshaw declared the first WWI American serviceman to be declared MIA, he was also the first American from Maryland to die in World War I.
Due to a clerical error, Renshaw's name was not initially memorialized at the Brookwood American Cemetery in Brookwood, England. The error was discovered by Stephen Gehnrich, an amateur historian and Biology Professor at Salisbury University. With the help of Robert Laplander, a Wisconsin songwriter-turned-historian who founded the Doughboy MIA Project, they informed the American Battle Monuments Commission of the error a hundred years after Renshaw's death.
Herbert Hammond Renshaw remains part of the 4,223 Americans who remain unaccounted for during World War I. Their cases are not under investigation by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.