The Syracuse Polish-American Veterans Documentation Project

This project is made up of volunteers who seek to pay tribute to the ethnic Polish veterans from Syracuse, New York. In most cases, the veterans had belonged to one of the three major faith communities founded by Polish immigrants to Syracuse.  These were either the two Roman Catholic parishes of Sacred Heart Church on Syracuse's West End, or Transfiguration Church on the East Side, or Holy Cross Polish National Catholic Church, originally on the West End before relocating to the suburb of Warners.

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Polish-Americans from Syracuse had served in every war since the First World War.  Some of them came to the United States from partitioned Poland in the late 1800s or early 1900s as children or young adults.  They might not even have been citizens when they enlisted or were inducted (drafted) into the military.  Some were born in the United States. They served in the Army, the Navy, and the Marine Corps.  Many men heeded the call to serve in General Haller's "Blue Army" by volunteering in 1917 to serve alongside the allied forces in France. After fighting on the Western Front during World War I, the army was transferred to Poland where it joined other Polish military units fighting in the east for the return of Poland's independence. Of those that served in the U.S. military, some had found themselves in Army regiments that trained at "Camp Syracuse," no doubt considering themselves fortunate to be near a familiar place as they trained and prepared for the fighting.  Many went overseas and saw fighting in some of the toughest battles wearing the shoulder patches of combat divisions.

Those that returned to or relocated to Syracuse came together to form veterans organizations. Those that fought for Poland formed the "Polish Veterans" Post 124.  Those that served in the U.S. Army, later expanded to include the Navy and Marine Corps, formed a post under what was to eventually to become known as the Polish Legion of American Veterans (PLAV or PLAV-USA). Their post, Post 14, was named for Pvt. Eugeniusz Jablonowski, a 21-year-old immigrant known to many returning veterans, some of whom had served in the same unit, Company F of the 9th Infantry Regiment and was killed in action near Soisson on July 18, 1918. The veterans of Post 14 erected a memorial on "Decoration Day" in 1935 to honor ten men who were killed in action during that war. They added their names, the names of 118 members of the post who were veterans of that war. Interestingly, not all of the men who were members of the Post were of Polish descent. One example is John Dobbs, who had been a founder and had served the post in many key leadership positions, to include  Post Commander and a founder and leader of the post's drum and bugle corps (which went on to become the Syracuse Brigadiers Drum and Bugle Corps). The post also had an active Ladies Auxiliary that included not only spouses, but many women in the community. .  As a result of  the research involving this project, it was discovered that as many as ten more Polish-Americans from Syracuse were killed in action or died as the result of the Spanish Influenza pandemic.  Most of them are buried overseas.  

During World War II a second generation of Polish-American Syracusans, one that lived through the Great Depression,  answered the call to fight Fascism when the U.S. entered the war after Pearl Harbor was attacked.  Some were the children of veterans of the "Great War."  They might have watched their own fathers suffer from ailments caused by physical wounds from the weapons of modern warfare such as machine guns, artillery, or poison gasses. They most certainly saw them suffer from the "invisible wounds" they received by witnessing and living through the horrors of this type of warfare.  In spite of this, the young men from the community either enlisted for or registered for the draft.  Even World War I veterans were required to submit draft registrations and they did so.  Many young women joined  the Women's Army Corps (WAC).  Those that could not serve in the military did what they could, many working in critical wartime industries in and around Syracuse.