A Bohemian, An American:
The Tragic Life of World War I Veteran
Anton Janyska
© 2024 Terry W. Loessin; All Rights Reserved.
INTRODUCTION
In the rear section of the Machu Cemetery in
Granger, Texas there is a section we refer to as Section 2 that, to my knowledge, had
never been properly recorded in this manner. I was moving a metal folding
chair from one headstone to the next and carefully recording the inscriptions
on each of them.
It was October and, as is our family custom, the Czech flag
was flying on the pole adjacent to the cemetery’s pavilion in honor of Czech
Heritage Month. I was here in my second
hour of Day 2 and had by now made my way to Row 7 of Section 2. The noonday sun was warming the day up
quickly on an otherwise blustery autumn-like day, the north wind sending the
leaves of our maple and oaks dancing across the cemetery grounds. As I lifted my metal chair once again and
moved along Row 7 to the next headstone, Plot 5, I found myself immediately surprised.
“In English?”
by clicking on a plot in our Section 2
Czech utilizes diacritics, often referred to as accent marks, to modify the pronunciation of letters. They are vitally important to arrive at an accurate translation. Every letter's tiny accent mark had to be hunted on, in most cases, very deteriorated stones. I had to use a small pick and cleanser to get the collected moss and grime away and it was a challenge:
"Oh, wait, is that an accent there?
or, is it just a discoloration in the marble? Sigh…”
The majority of the occupants buried here are
from the eastern Zlín region of the Czech province of Moravia. Many are from a town named Vsetín and its surrounding villages where my own
maternal great-great-great grandparents came from.
 |
| Pavel and Rozina (Trlica) Machu have a 6 ft. tall dual-columned monument located in the front, Section 1 of the Machu family’s cemetery. machu-cemetery.org |
Sadly, here in this older Section 2 is interred nearly 20
infants and young children, reflecting the high infant mortality rate of this
period.
At least three of the children were born in Moravia, but died here in Texas.
Among the infants interred here
are our two little lambs,
the Krapola twins,
who died separately at
4 months and 5 months.
In total, I recorded 64 monuments of identified individuals' plots along with 11 markers of Unknown individuals that are scattered
throughout the 20 rows in this section, each row hosting 20 plots.
Meaning, if interested, we have over 300 plots available
here for you to choose from! We’d love to have you!
What led initially to my surprise and great interest in Anton’s
headstone?
Already mentioned was my surprise at finding English amid so many Czech monuments I'd thus far recorded.
But also, I was struck by the fact that this century-old burial has a marble headstone that was still so pristine.
 |
| Anton Janyska’s military marker, Machu Cemetery; Sec. 2, Row 7, Plot 5 Pic taken by author, October 2024. |
In fact, this
headstone is identical to the style found in those mass military sites lined
with rows and rows of these white marble slabs, each with the symbol of the
dead soldier's particular faith centered at the top of the stone - as is the
cross here on Anton's white slab.
I was ashamed
that this was a veteran I had annually missed!
Each year in the week before Memorial Day I go out to our family cemetery and
plant ground flags beside the headstone of every known veteran that my elders
have acquainted me with. How is it no one ever mentioned this World
War I veteran to me before, and how is it I’ve frequently mowed the lawn
in this section and never noticed. I was ashamed and I made a pledge
then and there to never again forget our WWI Veteran, Anton Janyska.
Could it be that this veteran's headstone does not date to
1920 but, instead, was erected by a veteran's organization (VFW or American
Legion) years later?
I recall my grandfather pointing to those sepia-tinted
photos of "the doughboys" (as the World War I soldiers were
known) that hung on a wall in Granger's old American Legion hall. He
would say "made it back" or "didn't make it."
Was one of those he pointed to Anton Janyska? I can't
recall.
He also taught me that one of the functions of a veteran's
organization was to make sure the graves of military veterans were
recognized.
Did the Granger American Legion members provide this pristine white
marble headstone for Anton some years following his death in 1920?
I’m thinking, yes. I reasoned also that it was unlikely a
monument purchased in 1920 by his Czech relatives or church would be fully in
English in a cemetery such as ours where most from this period were inscribed
in Czech.
Fold3®
provides convenient access to military records, including the stories, photos,
and personal documents of the men and women who served. It was here I found the answer to my queries
about Anton Janyska’s military marker:
Thirteen years after Anton Janyska died application was made
to the U.S. War Department by a Lad J. Kubala of Granger (likely on behalf of
the local American Legion lodge) for a headstone to be placed in the Bohemian
National Cemetery. My maternal family’s
Machu Cemetery was the sole cemetery for Granger’s Bohemian population up until
the time the Czech-Moravian Brethren Church acquired land for its own cemetery. The cemetery on the Machu family compound was
often referred to as the Bohemian Cemetery.
Right beside Anton’s military marker I began cleaning a 4
ft. pillar and discovered a 2-month-old
child named Vlasta Janyska. Vlasta was
my maternal grandmother’s name and, as with Anton’s marker, I was immediately
drawn to whatever story surrounded this child as well.
Was this Anton’s daughter?
Noticing the dates on both headstones – she died in 1916, her father, a war
veteran in 1920 – and, being familiar with the dates of The Great War, I then asked
myself
Isn’t
the timing of Anton's military service so soon after his infant child’s death a
thing worthy of remarking upon? Wouldn’t
that have been a difficult decision? Or, did he choose that path to escape the
pain of this personal loss?
And, why is there no wife buried beside Anton?
In fact, why would the mother of this child who, I learned later, died a
year after the loss of this child be buried in a different cemetery?
Already so many questions were churning.
Little did I know how many more questions were to
come! It was as if Anton was leading me, one question at a time he
was revealing his life to me, making certain I could never again forget the
name Anton Janyska.
__________
ANTON'S EARLY LIFE
Anton [Antonin] was born in the Austrian province of Moravia on April 20,
1893. (see map, top left in purple)
 |
| The Czech dream of having their own nation would be fulfilled following Austria's defeat in The Great War that Anton Janyska signed up to fight in. Following the war, the Treaty of Versailles led to the creation of Czechoslovakia in 1920. |
His father was also named Antonin Janyska, mother’s name
unknown. They lived in Moravia, the eastern province of today’s Czechia
(formerly Czechoslovakia). In Anton's time, Moravia and the western Czech province
of Bohemia were in the Austrian Empire.
In the “Where were you born?” section of his U.S. Army
military registration card in 1917 Anton provides us with:
“Town: Jaunka, State: Moravia,
Nation: Austria." This information should be
examined alongside the Petition for Naturalization Anton submitted in June 1918
in the course of his army training at Camp Travis, S.A. On this official document he states his place
of birth as Jablunka, Bohemia.
Bohemia? But I just stated that
Jablunka was in Moravia?
Indeed, Jablunka (the name means 'little apple tree' in Czech) is 4 miles north of Vsetín in the Czech region of Moravia. (see map below, Eastern Moravia region in red) However, Anton is recording for his American audience in terms they would understand: “Bohemia” or “Bohemian” was the all-inclusive term for a Czech, whether one was from the Moravian or Bohemian region.
No doubt young Anton Janyska grew up in this church. After the church was destroyed by the devastating
1903 fire that destroyed much of the village center, it was restored in 1904
when Anton turned 11 y.o., eight years before Anton would decide to leave Jablunka
for America.
To begin that journey he would have first made the 80-mile
trip from Jablunka in the Zlin region of Moravia to Moravia’s provincial
capital – the city of Brno.
From Brno's railway station Anton Janyska would have departed by train for Breman, Germany to board a ship to America.
What do we know about headline news
in Anton’s homeland at this time?
It is possible that Anton was bi-lingual, speaking both
German and Czech. And it is quite probable that as a teenager he was
both learned in and affected by the politics of this turbulent region at this
particular time.
Brno in 1900 had a predominantly German-speaking
population (63%), as opposed to the suburbs, which were predominantly
Czech-speaking. [Interestingly, immediately after WWI and the creation of
Czechoslovakia, the city of Brno moved to annex all of these suburbs to ensure
the Czech population of the city proper would outnumber the German
population.] Life in Brno in
Anton’s time was therefore bilingual, and what was called in German
"Brünnerisch" was a mixed idiom containing elements from both languages.
Brno in the 1880s and 1890s was known for its intellectual
and academic centers. Gregor Mendel, an Austrian-Czech biologist, meteorologist, mathematician, Augustinian
friar and abbot of St. Thomas' Abbey in Brno was conducting his groundbreaking
experiments in genetics and publishing his findings in the 1880s to great
acclaim.
The city center
was predominantly Catholic and there was a Jewish ghetto (much like that of
Prague’s renowned Jewish ghetto), but in the rural suburbs and countryside, despite Austrian repression, a Protestant faith that had evolved from the 15th century
Hussite movement was prevalent.
1900-1905 saw
the Austrian Hapsburg monarchy on the defensive, fighting against the stubborn
actions of the ethnic Czechs and the persistent Slavic people’s drive for
political and national equality.
Austrian Prime Minister Taaffe was growing increasingly frustrated with the Czechs within the empire and Czechs increasingly angered by the suppression of their language and culture. Taaffe thought he had made progress by including more Slavic representation in the parliament.
Taaffe's great achievement was that he persuaded the
Czechs to abandon their long policy of abstention from civic participation
(their abstention rooted in their anger over their culture's suppression by the
Hapsburg rulers) and to finally begin taking part in the parliament. It was on
the support of them and the minority Poles that his majority rule and
political power depended.
His avowed intention was to unite the multiple nationalities
of Austria: "Germans and Slavs were," as he said,
"equally integral parts of Austria.” An idea that did not sit well
with conservative Germans set on maintaining the purity of German blood!
However, the new Slavic orientation of the Taaffe cabinet
did not satisfy the Czechs, but rather encouraged a mood of belligerence;
because the more moderate Old Czechs failed to live up to radical
demands of the nationalistic Young Czechs who were able to gain
support from the Bohemian and Moravian electorate.
In 1890 Taaffe tried to negotiate an agreement between the
Old Czechs and the German liberals, whereby Bohemia would be divided for
administrative and judicial purposes along lines of nationality, he was
attacked by the more chauvinistic Young Czechs and German nationalists, and his
authoritarian efforts to implement the administrative divisions led to violent riots in Prague in 1893 and again in 1899.
Prague's famous picturesque Charles Bridge, 1900.
As the only means of crossing the river Vltava
until 1841, the medieval structure, Karlov Most [Charles
Bridge] was the most important connection between Prague Castle (seen
above in forefront of St. Vitus Cathedral) and the city's Old
Town. A year before this photo was taken the bridge was the scene of
great bloodshed in the Prague Riots.
________________
It was in the midst of this political turmoil within his own
countrymen and these violent riots that Anton Janyska was born into the Czech
world in April of 1893.
What was happening in Anton’s world as he was growing
up?
- There
were intense divisions within the Czech provinces between left-leaning
Christian Socialists and the moderates and conservatives regarding the
future of the Czech ethnic population living in the oppressive Austrian
empire;
- Anton’s
Protestant upbringing would find him in a protestant Evangelical church
where religious leaders were denouncing “the State” (the Hapsburg
dynasty's Austrian Empire) for being a puppet of the Catholic Papacy, a
“modern Babylon” that was suppressing Czechs into submission and he would
be listening to sermons about a hoped for future liberation and escape
from this oppression;
- There
were escalating tensions in the Balkans stoking rumors of impending war;
- Despair
in Russia that would culminate in the Russian Revolution of 1905;
- and
extreme drought conditions and economic hardship in the rural Czech
regions where Anton lived also defined the 1900-1905 period.
Out of this world departed a teenager named Anton Janyska
on a ship heading for Galveston Texas –
a foreign destination in the United States of America.
__________
ARRIVAL IN
GALVESTON,
then Granger in 1906
The Port of Galveston, Texas was a major point of entry for immigrants to the United States from the 1840s to the 1920s. Before Ellis Island opened in 1892, hundreds of thousands of immigrants passed through Galveston. Between 1906 and 1914, nearly 50,000 immigrants arrived at Galveston, including people from many countries, including: Bohemians, Moravians, Galicians, Australians, Romanians, Swiss, English, Poles, Italians, and Dutch.
The first
major Czech immigration wave first occurred in 1848 when the Bohemian
"Forty Eighters" fled to the United States to escape political
persecution by the Hapsburgs. By the late 1850s there were an estimated 10,000
Bohemians living in the United States. Chicago, tied to the West by rail and
more readily accessible to immigrants, became the most populous Bohemian
settlement. By 1870, other cities with Bohemian concentrations included St.
Louis, Cleveland, New York, and Milwaukee.
Another large
wave of Bohemian migration to America occurred in the late 1800s and early
1900s when Midwestern farmland was widely available at low prices – this
time they would pour into the Port of Galveston. While in reality they were
coming from both the provinces of Bohemia and Moravia located in the Austrian
Empire, these people of Czech ethnicity were collectively called
"Bohemians" (or many derogatory derivatives of, such as "bohonky,"
etc.) in the early part of the 20th century.
Most Bohemian
immigrants made the journey to the United States with their families. This
marks a contrast with the immigration patterns of other ethnic groups, such as
the Germans, English, Poles, and Slovaks, who tended to come over individually.
Moreover, it was not uncommon in large families for the head of the household
to make more than one trip to the United States, bringing along one or more
children each time. Many of those who immigrated in the late nineteenth century
were of Moravian ancestry.
It was also
common to split a family's "coming over" for another reason. The
youngest children would come first along with the parents and the plan would be
to settle, acquire livelihood and the necessary funds to then bring the older
children over.
Granted,
he will state his father still resides in the old country, but could other
family members, younger siblings have come over earlier?
I could find no evidence of other Janyska households in the
Granger area.
the Port of Galveston and held on ship until families with children had been processed.
When did Anton arrive?
On his Petition for Naturalization that he submitted in 1918 following his
entry into the army he cites his voyage on the SS Breslau.
Anton notes in the Petition that he departed Bremen on April 1, 1912 and
arrived at the Port of Galveston April 22, 1912.
The SS Breslau was built as an emigrant carrier for the
Baltimore-Gulf route. Launched on 8-14-1901, she left Bremen on her maiden
voyage to New York on 11-23-1901. On 4-3-1902, she made her first voyage on the
Bremen - Baltimore service and on 9-10-1903, she went on to the Bremen -
Baltimore - Galveston run. On 3-24-1910, transferred to Bremen - Philadelphia
run.
She arrived
at Boston Navy Yard on June 30, 1924; went out of commission in reserve on
November 3, 1924. In 1943 she was converted to the US Army Hospital
ship Larkspur (as shown in photo).
(this date and the 10-day earlier date he recorded on his Petition for Naturalization may be simply a matter of processing time at Galveston’s Immigration and Quarantine Center)
[Antonin Janyska in the Texas,
U.S., Arriving and
Departing Passenger and Crew Lists,
1893-1963; Ancestry.com]
and we learn that 20 y.o. Antonin Janyska (here his Date of Birth is given as
1892) of the Bohemian race was 5 ft, 6 in. tall with blond hair, fair
complexion and brown eyes. His last residence was Jablunka
Moravia. He identified a friend in the U.S. named Jan (John) Rafaj
and a relation in the Old Country, a parent, also named Antonin
Janyska. He arrived with $29 and his destination is the city
of Granger Tex.
This photograph is part of the collection entitled Are We There Yet? Transportation in Central Texas and was provided by the Williamson Museum to The Portal to Texas History, a digital repository hosted by the UNT Libraries
_______________
WORK & SOCIAL LIFE FOR CZECHS
LIVING IN GRANGER
Anton soon
became a part of the Czech institutions in Granger: the social activities
sponsored by a Czech fraternal lodge and the Czech protestant church. And he secured employment in the meat market on “the Czech side of
Granger.”
For those not
familiar, the Czech (or, Bohemian) side of Granger in Anton's day was
the west side of the railroad tracks, the Amerikany were on
the east side.
Each side had
its own churches: the Czech-Moravian Brethren [a Protestant denomination that
traced its origins to the 15th/16th century Hussites that I mentioned earlier]
and the Catholic church [this particular parish named after the two 10th
century Slavic saints Cyril & Methodius] were on the Czech side, the
Baptists and Methodists were located on the Amerikany side;
Granger
National Bank was on the Czech side, another bank served the Amerikany
side. The Amerikany side had an impressive Opera House, the Czechs
had their boisterous fraternal lodge.
Czech Protestant immigrants had begun settling in the Williamson County area in
the early 1880s. Many of them established family farms in the rich farmland
surrounding Granger, including my own maternal patriarch and matriarch, Pavel
and Rozina (Trlica) Machu, who began a family cemetery on their farm. Yes,
the cemetery in which I now find myself researching Anton Janyska’s
headstone.
The Czech
Protestant’s first organized worship service was held in a schoolhouse east of
town in the early 1880s. That “Moravian School” was Pavel
Machu’s gift to his Czech community. He raised the funds, provided 3 acres of
his own land for its construction, and defended its purpose as a place of
learning for “Czech children who found small welcome in the city school’s
classrooms.” A justification for a Czech school not too dissimilar to the
original justification for the Slovanska Podporujici Jednota Statu Texas [SPJST],
a Czech fraternal insurance company intended for Czech-Americans who found
small welcome (and oftentimes higher premiums) with the large American
insurance companies.
Moravia School opened in 1884 near the Machu family compound east of Granger
Texas. My maternal Machu family’s compound was once so well-known it was even
cited as a locale on some early Williamson County maps.
In the final appendices of her book on early
Williamson County history, “Land of Good Water,” Clara Stearns Scarborough provides
Notes on the Places of Williamson County.
Among those places she describes is my ancestor’s Machu family compound
and some of the contributions made by my great-great-great grandfather Pavel
Machu:
"Machu,
or Moravia, named for Pavel Machu (my great-great-great grandfather), the first
Czech who came with his family to this place north of the San Gabriel and Hoxie
Crossing. Machu gave land for a school and a community cemetery for the "Bohemians."
The school was
called Moravia, and its one room held as many as seventy-five pupils. It
consolidated with Granger schools in 1949...
Moravia School (pic)
became Texas Common School District
No. 83
in 1903.
It served the dispersed farming settlement of Czechs in Granger and was a
focal point for social and religious gatherings. In 1922, trustees enlarged the schoolhouse
to two rooms, providing space for grades one through eight.
Many of my ancestors are pictured in this
photo,
including Vitek, Machu, Rozacky, Lindeman,
who today are buried in the
Machu Cemetery.
A Texas Historical
Marker was erected near the original site of the school and tells the story of
my great-great-great grandfather's contribution to the school's origins.
View Marker
Inscription
________________________
Historian Clara Stearns Scarborough continued:
"...Pavel Machu also ran a syrup press at his home, processing sugar cane from about 1900 to 1925. The community that formed around the Machu family's farm had a "beef club" which met regularly on the Franck Cervenka place; and a large covered platform or pavilion was built by Machu at which Czech families met for social events including picnics, band concerts, beer parties and dances,
some of them sponsored by a mutual aid insurance company (that Machu and other Czech locals helped to organize).”
(which still exists today).
Could 20 y.o. Anton Janyska be present in this photo taken in 1912, the year of his arrival?
The Czech Protestants in Granger held their early worship services in the Moravia School sporadically whenever a traveling Czech minister was available to preach. The Rev. Adolph Chlumsky, a Czech Brethren minister from Brenham, encouraged the people here to organize a church. On July 10, 1892, they officially founded a congregation and elected Chlumsky pastor. The congregation built its first church structure on the west side of Granger in 1901. On December 29, 1903, the Evangelical Unity of the Czech-Moravian Brethren in North America (Unity of the Brethren) denomination officially was organized at the new Granger Brethren Church.
 |
| Rev Joseph Barton |
In 1910 the Rev. Joseph Barton became the first resident pastor. Barton would play a significant role in Janyska’s life – officiating at both the services of joy and services of sorrow that were about to come Anton’s way, and faithfully corresponding with Anton during his military service.
Anton soon found work in a meat market. Apparently, he performed well here. In the space provided for the question “What is your trade, occupation?” on the military service registration card that he filled out in 1917 he states “Butcher.”
And on that
same U.S. Military registration card in 1917 his answer to the question “By
whom employed?” he states that he is half-owner of the City Meat Market in
Granger, Texas. Impressive elevation for a lad who'd only arrived in this
country a few years earlier.
on the "Czech side" of Granger.
Beside the grocery store, visible through tree limbs, is the Meat Market where Anton Janyska would find employment upon arrival and, at some point, become half owner.
MARRIAGE
& my connection to Anton Janyska
Upon his
arrival in 1906 Janyska found among his Czech brethren in this church familiar
surnames from his home country as well as a familiar menu of smoked sausages,
kolaches and, of course, pivo (beer). Among those surnames here he
would have recognized from his previous home would be the name Vitek.
When my
paternal grandfather, Oscar E. Loessin, passed away in 1969 I was six and a
half years old. A year after his passing my grandmother would marry her
elementary school sweetheart – not surprising any of us at all by her disdain
for social protocol or the private suggestions that she should endure a bit of a
longer term in widowhood. After all, this was the woman who had told her mother-in-law that her suggestion to her that “nursing
was akin to prostitutin’ because no woman should be bathing a naked man who
twern’t her own husband” was “pure royal bullshit” and went on to get her
nursing certification despite her husband’s displeasure. She then proceeded to
head up Red Cross blood drives in the local area during World War II and,
after nursing that same husband through his battle with cancer, announced in
the fellowship hall kitchen following his funeral, “a new chapter begins for me
now, and finally it will be all about me!”
The elementary
school sweetheart was Alfred Vitek. Into adulthood Alfred had remained a
confirmed bachelor, annually bringing his cotton trailers into the yard of my paternal
family’s 50-year enterprise, the Loessin Cotton Gin in Circleville. While my
grandfather and his son (my future Dad) would labor in the gin, Alfred sat in
the nearby family home drinking coffee with my grandmother, his former
Circleville School sweetheart. The recounting of this bit of family history is
always told with a smile, a wink, and with tongue in cheek.
Alfred
Vitek’s aunt was Frantiska (Frances) Vitek. Frantiska Vitek was born on July 11, 1893 in
Granger. Her father, Martin Vitek, was 28 and her mother, Johanna Krupala, was
37 at the time of her birth. Their eldest child, son August, was the
father of my paternal grand-mother’s second husband, Alfred Vitek.
Two months before her 21st birthday, Frantiska Vitek married Anton Janyska on May 5, 1914
in a service
officiated by the Rev. Joseph Barton, who the Marriage License identifies as a pastor
of the “Evangelical Union of the Bohemian and Moravian Brethren of North
America at Granger Tex.”
Two months after their marriage, on July 28, 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia and The Great War in Europe began.
Serving in the Austrian-Hungarian Empire’s Reichsrat (Parliament) was a former Professor of Philosophy at Prague’s Charles University,
Tomas Masaryk
,
who led the Czech Progressive Party he had founded in 1900. When war was declared in 1914, Masaryk decided the best course was to seek independence for Czechs and Slovaks from Austria-Hungary.
Masaryk went into exile in December 1914 with his daughter, Olga, staying in several places in Western Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States and Japan. Masaryk began organizing Czechs and Slovaks outside Austria-Hungary during his exile, establishing contacts which would be crucial to Czechoslovak independence.
Masaryk delivered lectures in all the places he traveled and wrote articles and
memoranda supporting the Czechoslovak cause that were published in the
newspapers of Allied countries. Czech-Americans rallied around Masaryk and this
cause. Czech newspapers published his essays, including the Texas Czech publication Našinec (translates to "Fellow Countryman”) that
published its first issue in 1914. Given
what Masaryk launched in 1914, the masthead chosen for this Texas Czech
newspaper launched in that same year is certainly significant.
Without a
doubt, Anton Janyska, having left his Czech homeland in the Austrian-Hungarian
Empire only a couple of years earlier, would have been influenced by Masaryk’s
writings and, like most Czech-Americans, an eager supporter of this nationalist
push. Nationalism was a principal cause
of The Great War. Whether the Serb
Nationalism that contributed to the war’s catalyst (the assassination of the
Austrian Archduke by a Serb Nationalist); the Pan-Germanism of Prussia’s Bismark
that fueled the militarism of the German Empire’s Wilhelm II; or the
decades-old internal instability in the Ottoman and Austrian-Hungarian Empires due
to nationalist movements among minority groups, such as Serbs, Armenians, and
even Czechs who sought their own independence or greater autonomy – this
confluence of nationalist movements defined that “powder-keg of Europe” that had
been, for some time, ready to explode.
At what point while
reading about these world events did Antonin Janyska begin considering a return
to Europe and engaging in that struggle that could potentially bring nationhood
for his own Czech people?
_________
CHILDREN
A year and
seven months after their marriage, Anton and Frantiska had their first
child.
November 25, 1915 is the date of birth provided in the headstone inscription
for
Vlasta Bozena,
ditka (daughter) z (of)
Anton A Frantiska Janyska.
January 28, 1916, two months later,
is the date the headstone
tells us the child died.
We know not why.
From the family archives of Mr. Larry Butts,
grandson of Anton & Frantiska Janyska,
son of their second daughter Hermine Eliska Janyska
and her husband William
Butts.
Positioned on the right-hand side of
Anton’s military marker is the
4 ft. white marble
pillar monument
for his daughter,
2 m.o. Vlasta Janyska
The top of the child’s white marble pillar
is missing an oval image
and below it is inscribed in Czech,
“Zde odpociva nas milocek”
[Our sweetheart rests here].
Czech Inscription on base,
“Nechte ditek jiti Kem ne,
u nebrante jsm nebo takvycht
jest kralovstvi Bozi.
Marek 10:14”
[Let the children come,
for the kingdom of God belongs to them.
Mark 10:14]
A year later,
January 12, 1917, 23 y. o. Frantiska (Frances) gave birth to her and Anton’s
second daughter, Hermine Eliska Janyska.
That same January,
1917, newspapers in the United States published the “Masaryk
Memorandum,” an official memorandum from Tomas Masaryk to President
Woodrow Wilson concerning the need for the creation of an independent
Czechoslovak state. In it, Masaryk cites
the many ways the Czech ethnic group was aiding on the side of the Allies
against Austria-Hungary, including in France and Russia, and he implored
the United States to join in that struggle in Europe in that goal of
independence for all.
Poster promoting American
support
for an independent Czech state
following the end of the Great War.
Tomas Masaryk and Woodrow Wilson
flank the American & Czech flags.
In the center wreath is the double-tailed lion
found on the Bohemian coat-of-arms.
While visiting the United States,
Masaryk negotiated Czechoslovak independence
as part of the peace negotiations for World War I.
The quote from President Masaryk reads:
“We will
always be united with the American people,
united by the spirit of freedom and democracy.”
On
April 6, 1917, the U.S. President Woodrow Wilson announced the United States
would be entering the war
in Europe on the side of the Allies (France, England, and Russia) fighting
against the Axis Powers of Germany and the Austrian-Hungarian Empire.
After welcoming a second daughter five months earlier, Anton Janyska on
June 5, 1917 completes a Military Service
registration card.
Here he notes
in Row 9 that he is married and is parent of the one surviving child.
Interestingly
as well, in Row 10 for Race he writes, "Bohemian"!
Row 4 is also
noteworthy. Regarding Anton’s citizenship, he indicates presumably that he has
begun that process as defined in the Naturalization Act of 1906, in
which prospective citizens were generally required to file a "declaration
of intention" (or "first papers") after residing in the U.S. for
two years. Anton indicates he is a “Declarant.”
TRAGEDY STRIKES AGAIN
Six months after giving birth to her second daughter, one month
after her husband has registered for army enlistment, on her birthday July 11,
1917, 24 y.o. Frantiska Vitek commits suicide.
Leaving her 6 m.o. daughter Hermine with a neighbor, Frantiska walked back
across the street into the Janyska home, shut the door, and a gunshot was
heard.
Granger
News; July 12, 1917
PROMINENT LADY ON WEST SIDE
ENDS LIFE BY SHOOTING HERSELF
One of the most
tragic deaths
to occur in Granger in some time
was when Mrs. Antone Janyska,
in a despondent mood, shot and
killed herself Wednesday even-
ing about 7:30 o’clock. At the
time of the tragedy no one was
at home but Mrs. Janyska, and
little is known about what oc-
curred prior to the tragic ending
and what prompted her to end
her life in such a manner. A
few minutes before the shot was
heard she hurried across the
street with her baby to the house
of a neighbor and left it in their
care, telling them that she would
return soon. Upon hearing the
report of the pistol, neighbors
rushed in only to find Mrs. Jany-
ska cold in death. The ball pene-
trated her breast and entered the
heart, going entirely through her
body. Death was instantaneous.
Thus ended the life of a good
woman whose troubles, known
only to herself, were more than
she could bear. Her death came
as an awful shock to her parents
and other relatives, and all of
them are bowed down in grief
over the loss of one they loved.
Mrs. Janyska, before her mar-
riage, was Miss Francis Vitek
and was popular with all who
knew her. She died on her birth-
day and was 21 years of age.
She leaves to mourn her par-
ents, Martin Vitek and wife; a
brother, August Vitek; a sister,
Mrs. Joe Batla, besides a hus-
band and child.
Services were conducted at the
family residence today at 2 p.m.
by Rev. Jos. Barton. Interment
was in the new Evangelist Ceme-
tery. The News extends con-
dolence.
She would be
buried in the Granger Brethren Church cemetery, not in our
family’s Machu Cemetery where her 2 m.o. daughter had been buried a mere one
year and six months prior.
The top inscription reads, "Zde v Panu odpociva," a Czech phrase to
be found on many headstones of this period meaning she "rests here in the
Lord."
The bottom Czech inscription was difficult to read and decipher. I am grateful to my great-uncle, Darwin L. Machu, for his assistance:
"V
le loznici skrovne
Nic mue
nevzbudi
Az Angel zalroubi,
--- ---- probudi."
"In this humble bed,
Nothing can wake me.
I will lay in this bed
til the Angel
blows his horn."
Why was Frantiska not buried
alongside her 2 m.o. child she and her family had buried only a year ago?
I believe the
last paragraph in the newspaper article reporting Frantiska’s suicide may
provide some clue. There was no Brethren
Church cemetery as of yet when 2 month-old Vlasta Janyska died in 1916.
The church in Granger had only formally organized itself in 1906 and perhaps no
land had been set aside yet for purposes of congregant's burials. Perhaps
Frantiska then became one of the first church members to be buried in the new
church cemetery. As the newspaper article’s final paragraph notes, “Interment was in the new Evangelist Cemetery.”
F
or the first time there was a place in town for the protestant
Bohemians to be buried, rather than in that Machu Cemetery some distance east
of Granger where, until this point in time, the majority had been laid to rest.
Noteworthy as
well in the article is the way in which Anton, the husband, is given small
treatment. There is no mention of
Anton’s whereabouts - at 7:30 in the
evening - when his wife took her own life in their home after leaving their
newborn with a neighbor.
Noteworthy
that one of Granger’s Bohemian citizens, Frantiska Vitek Janyska, is referred
to as a “Prominent Lady” in the headline. We are told she was in a despondent
mood, reason unknown. “Her death came as an awful shock to her parents and
other relatives, and all of them are bowed down in grief over the loss of one
they loved.” What about her
husband’s reaction? “She leaves to mourn her parents, Martin
Vitek and wife; a brother, August Vitek; a sister, Mrs. Joe Batla,” and then, almost
as an afterthought, “besides a husband and child.”
It is clear Frantiska’s Vitek family moved on from this tragic event bearing great
resentment toward Anton. There was the
loss of the first child, Vlasta, and now, barely a year later, comes the sad
and desperate act that is suicide.
The
surviving child, Hermine, would be raised by the Vitek family on their farm
east of Granger. Hermine would marry a
man her same age named William Butts. She died in 1999 at 82 and is
buried in Cook Walden Cemetery in Austin TX. Butts lived another 14
years before joining her there.
I am so
grateful to her son, Larry Butts, for filling in these gaps for me:
“My
mother was Anton's daughter Hermine (she used Hermina). In those long passed times I did not know my
mother was adopted. I am the oldest of her three sons; myself plus Gary and
Clinton. You correctly identified my father as William Butts (WA). They were
the most wonderful parents to the three of us.
I don't think I heard the name "Anton" ever spoken by my
mother or any of our Czech relatives who we often visited on their farms in the
Granger area. They spoke mostly Czech, but English to us kids and my dad, … but
I did get a sense that someone they talked about was not well liked. I now suspect the person was Anton.”
[Recollection of Larry Butts, grandson of Anton & Frantiska Janyska, son of their second daughter Hermine Eliska Janyska and her husband William Butts.]
_________
MILITARY
SERVICE
Anton Janyska's entry into The Great War’s military service was immediate,
leaving for army training at Camp Travis in San Antonio, Texas only 1
month after his wife Frances died.
Had
the loss of his first child been behind his decision to sign up?
Or was his own Czech nationalist spirit, inspired by the Calls To Action
penned by the Czech leader Masaryk, his motivation?
What mental state was Anton in as he
left for his military training, having buried both a child and his wife within
the past year?
It is hard
for me to imagine that these traumas did not plague his mind as he arrived at
Camp Travis that summer, or as he boarded the ship in the Fall headed to the
notorious trenches in France.
Would
the intensely challenging, physically grueling training as well as this
overseas adventure serve as his “escape” from his own grief and his painful
ostracization he had experienced in the Granger community following his wife’s
suicide?
Anton Janyska, front
row, fourth from the right
where an “X” has been drawn.
From the family archies of Mr. Larry Butts, grandson of Anton &
Frantiska Janyska,
son of their second daughter Hermine Eliska Janyska and her husband William
Butts.
A Cook in the 360 INF. 90 DIV.
The 90th Infantry Division ("Tough 'Ombres") was a unit of the United States Army that served in World War I and World War II. Its lineage is carried on by the 90th Sustainment Brigade. The Division’s 360th Infantry was one of those regiments formed in the Fall of 1917 in answer to President Woodrow Wilson’s call for a greater army.
WWI U.S. Army 90th Division -
the Texas "Tough Ombres" - shoulder patch
The training
site was Camp Travis, San Antonio, Texas. Because the men for the 90th Division
were to be drawn from two states – Texas and Oklahoma – it was decided to have
a Texas brigade and an Oklahoma brigade. The 180th became the Texas
organization and thousands of the best youths in the Lone Star state were soon
on its rolls.
The 360th Infantry Band
They came
from the shops and offices of the larger cities, from the colleges and
universities of the state’s quieter centers – including Texas A&M, and from
the farm and cattle country – including many rural Texas Czechs (like Charles
Janicek of Ennis and Anton Janyska of Granger) wanting to join the fight in
Europe that the Czech people there had joined with the Allies in order to
defeat their long-oppressor, the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. They answered the
call with a single mind, “to fight in the great cause of human liberty until
that cause should be succored” as the military stated it. But for
the Texas Czechs another reason, fulfilling the nationalist dream of Czechs to
acquire their own nation following this war.
Once they had
arrived for training at Camp Travis these Czech immigrants were likely
persuaded to take advantage of a recent act of the U.S. Congress. The Naturalization Act of May 9, 1918,
significantly altered the provisions for Petition for
Naturalization during World War I, particularly for individuals serving in
the U.S. military.
This Act, also referred to as the Alien Naturalization Act of May 9, 1918, aimed to encourage immigrant enlistment and streamline the naturalization process for foreign-born military personnel.
- Under the
Naturalization Act of 1906, prospective citizens were generally required to
file a "declaration of intention" (or "first papers") after
residing in the U.S. for two years. The 1918 Act exempted service members
during WWI from this requirement.
- Waiver of
Residency Requirement: The standard requirement of a five-year U.S.
residency period was also waived for those in the armed forces during the war.
- The law exempted service members from the requirement to speak English and pass citizenship exams.
Anton wasted no time in filing his own Petition for Naturalization.
 |
| From the family archies of Mr. Larry Butts, grandson of Anton & Frantiska Janyska, son of their second daughter Hermine Eliska Janyska and her husband William Butts. |
- I’ve already
mentioned his choice to list his place of origin Jablunka, Bohemia, despite the
fact that his hometown of Jablunka is in Moravia.
- But perhaps
the most interesting bit of revisionism here is what he states about his
marriage status, writing in the word “not” before the word married; making a point to scratch through the words
“My wife’s name is”; and then announcing
that he is “Divorced”!
Is this a reflection of that era in which he lived where a suicide in one’s family history was a taboo subject?
According to one source I came across, it was quite common for widowed husbands whose previous spouse had taken her life to proceed in this manner, admitting to a previous marriage and stating they had been divorced rather than be forced into discussing the more accurate, tragic truth. - Interesting to note that at the bottom of the form he proceeded to date it May 27, 1918 but the powers-that-be who notarized the bottom section altered and stamped the date of June 1, 1918.
Having thus submitted his Petition, our Anton became an American citizen just
as he was being shipped overseas to fight in
– America’s war? the war of his Czech
people?
– in Europe.
_______________
As stated in
the official U.S. Army narrative about the 360th Infantry
Brigade,
“the training was no more nor no less than nearly every other organization which came overseas underwent while in the States. The days were long and the discipline stiff.”
The great
word to start for France came late in May 1918. The oldest enlisted men in the
regiment had barely completed their first nine months in the army when the
movement eastward started. The regiment reached Camp Mills, New York, June 12.
Two days later, as this U.S. Army Embarkation roster for the 360th Inf, 90th Div, Company 1 indicates, Anton would find himself on the Olympic crossing the Atlantic once again back to Europe on June 14, 1918.
Six years had passed since his journey to America in May 1912; 2 years since the death of his little Vlasta; only a year since Frantiska’s suicide.
When he arrived in the Port of Galveston six years earlier he lists as his family contact his father back home in Moravia. But now, as he departs the Port of New York to head back across the Atlantic, he lists as his Emergency Contact his father-in-law, Martin
Vitek.
What does this say about the nature of his relationship with his in-laws following Frantiska's death?
After all, Anton has left his only surviving child in their care. If he was to lose his life in this war it is understandable he'd want those caring for Hermine to be first informed.
Were letters - perhaps, even photos of Hermine - exchanged between the family and Anton while he was at Camp Travis or stationed overseas?
And would he be able to spend time with the child upon his return to Granger?
Speaking of Granger,
doughboys from Granger traveling on the Olympic with Cook Anton Janyska (wounded Sept 12,
1918) included Mechanic Frank Kopecky, Sgt Louis Hosek (gassed Sept 12, 1918)),
Sgt Griffin Brown (killed Nov 2, 1918), Pvt Emzie Farr (wounded Nov 2, 1918),
Pvt Fred Stanley (M.I.A. Sept 15, 1918), Pvt Gordon Puckett, and Corp Cap
Moore;
from Granger’s northern neighbor Taylor were Corp John Kohutek, Pvt William
Ladewig, Corp Alfred Peiser, Pvt Charles Lee, Pvt William Kautz, Pvt Clarence
Liedberg (killed Nov. 2, 1918), Pvt Edward Obenshein;
from Jarrell there was Pvt John Chovanec, Pvt Thomas Morea; Pvt Alfred Kerlin
(killed Nov 2, 1918), Corp Ernest Vorwerk (wounded Nov 2, 1918), and Pvt Henry
Beyer Jr. (wounded Sept 18, 1918) from Coupland, and Sgt Rudolph Schwausch from
Walburg.
Landing was
made at Southampton, England, June 21, and the next night the channel was
bridged by transports carrying the 360th to France. By easy stages the
organization moved to the area near Rouvres sur Aube, where intensive training
was started behind the bulging battleline. This training was completed on
August 20, 1918, and the regiment pronounced fit and ready for its portion of
field service.
In late August, Anton Janyska’s 90th Division, Company 1 entered the front lines, participating in the Battle of St. Mihiel in September, 1918.
The attack at the Saint-Mihiel salient* was part of a plan by
General John Pershing
(Commander of the A.E.F., or
American Expeditionary Forces)
in which he hoped that the Americans would break through the German lines and capture the fortified city of Metz.
* A salient is sometimes referred to as a bulge, (as in World War II’s Battle of the Bulge). It is a battlefield feature that projects into enemy territory. The salient is surrounded by the enemy on multiple sides, making the troops occupying the salient vulnerable.
It was the
first large offensive launched mainly by the United States Army in
World War I, and the attack caught the Germans in the process of
retreating. This meant that their artillery was out of place and the
American attack, coming up against disorganized German forces, proved more
successful than expected. The Saint-Mihiel attack established the stature of
the U.S. Army in the eyes of the French and British forces.
The day the order came to begin the offensive, the Army’s weather corps stated:
"Visibility: Heavy driving wind and rain during parts of day and night.
Roads: Very muddy." This would pose
a challenge to the Americans when the order to advance was given. In some parts
of the road, the men were almost knee-deep in mud and water.
A Renault
FT tank ploughing its way
through a trench and starting
toward the German line
near Saint Mihiel, France.
After five days of rain, the ground was nearly impassable to both the American tanks and infantry. Many of the tanks were wrecked by water leaking into their engines, while others got stuck in the mud flows.
Still new on the military stage, 28 U.S. air squadrons participated in the battle, along with French, British, and Italians contributing additional units to bring the total force numbers to 701 pursuit planes, 366 observation planes, 323 day bombers, and 91 night bombers. The 1,481 total aircraft made it the largest air operation of the war.
Anton was
wounded on the day his 90th Div, Company 1 took part in a threefold assault on
the salient. The main attack was made against the south face by two American
corps. On the right was the I Corps (that included the 90th Div.) covering
a front from Pont-à-Mousson on the Moselle west toward Limey; on the left, the
IV Corps (that included the 89th and 1st Divisions) extending along a
front from Limey west toward Marvoisin. A secondary thrust was carried out
against the west face along the heights of the Meuse, from Mouilly north to
Haudimont, by the V Corps (included the 26th Division and French 15th Colonial
Division, and the 8th Brigade). A holding attack against the apex, to keep the
enemy in the salient, was made by the French II Colonial Corps.
General Pershing's intent was obvious; to envelop the salient by using the main
enveloping thrusts of the attack by the I Corps against the weak vertices. The
remaining forces would then advance on a broad front toward Metz. This pincer
action, by the IV and V Corps, was to drive the attack into the salient and to
link the friendly forces at the French village of Vigneulles.
The American I Corps (that included Anton’s (90th Div, Company 1)
reached its first day's objective before noon, and the second day's objective
by late afternoon.
Columns of
German prisoners taken by the Americans' 90th Division in the first day of the
assault on the St. Mihiel salient, marching in the rain toward the prison pens
prepared for them at nearby Ansauville, France.
It is here at St. Mihiel that Anton Janyska is “slightly wounded” on September 12, 1918.
The attack went so well on 12 September that Pershing ordered a speedup in the
offensive. By the morning of 13 September, the 1st Division, advancing from the
east, joined up with the 26th Division, moving in from the west, and before
evening all objectives in the salient had been captured.
At this
point, Pershing halted further advances so that American units could be
withdrawn for the coming Meuse-Argonne Offensive.
Would Anton be hospitalized following his wounds, separated from Company 1?
Or, removed
from the Front and routed to a Transport ship bound for home?
Or, would a wounded Janyska move forward now with his Company to the worst
battle in the history of the U.S. Army, the Meuse-Argonne Offensive?
The Meuse-Argonne battle is still disputed today as to
whether it was a military disaster for the U.S. Army, led by foolish military
leadership, or, whether it was a necessary step toward arriving at the signing
of the Armistice two months later in November.
The Meuse–Argonne offensive was a major part of the final Allied offensive of World War I that stretched along the entire Western Front. It was fought from September 26, 1918, until the signing of the Armistice on November 11, 1918, a total of 47 days of endless, horrifying conflict. The Meuse–Argonne offensive was the largest in United States military history, involving 1.2 million French, Siamese, and American soldiers, sailors and marines. It is also the deadliest campaign in the history of the United States Army.
Was Anton at this
second major battle that his Company fought in?
Regardless, he is certainly among those being thanked in this letter from Commander Pershing six months later:
A letter from A.E.F. Commander John Pershing
to Major General Martin, commander of the 90th Division. April 26, 1919.
“It gives me much pleasure to congratulate you, and through you the officers and men of your division on the splendid appearance that it made at its inspection and review on April 24 at Wengerohr. The smart appearance of personnel and the good condition in which I found the horse transportation and artillery are sure signs of the high morale that permeates all ranks. This is only what one could expect of a division which has such a fine fighting record.
Arriving in France towards the end of June, 1918, the 90th Division underwent, until the end of August, the usual course of training behind the line. It was then placed in the Villers-en-Hays sector and there took part in the St. Mihiel offensive, where it attacked the strong positions on the Hindenburg line immediately to the west of the Moselle River. In these operations it was entirely successful, mopping up the Bois-des-Rappes, occupying the town of Vilcey-sur-Trey, the Bois-de-Pretre and the Foret-de-Venchers, and advancing to a depth of 6½ kilometers.
On the night of October 21 the division entered the Meuse-Argonne offensive, taking the town of Bantheville and the high ground north and northwest of that town. In the tremendous attack of November 1 it continued its splendid record, piercing the Freya Stellung, crossing the Meuse and taking fourteen villages in its very rapid advance. The Carriere Farm, the Bois-de-Raux, Hill 243 (the capture of which was vital to the advance of the division on the left) and Hill 321 were the scenes of desperate fighting on the opening day of the attack. On November 2, Villes-deTailly, Bois-de-Mont, Bois-de-Sassey and the town of Montigny-devant-Sassey were taken, a very deep and rapid advance being made. On the 4th Halles was occupied. By November 10 the infantry had crossed the Meuse and the town of Mouzay was taken. The division was pressing the enemy hard at the time of the signing of the armistice. As part of the Third Army the division participated in the march into Germany and the subsequent occupation of enemy territory.
I am pleased to mention the excellent conduct of the men under these difficult circumstances as well as for their services in battle. They are to the credit of the American people. I wish to express to each man my own appreciation of the splendid work that has been done and the assurance of my continued interest in is welfare.
In total, in
its four months of combat in France, the 90th Division suffered 7,549
casualties (1,091 killed in action and 6,458 wounded in action).
A day after the Armistice was signed and all of America was in celebration, the
Washington Post provided this list of American casualties on the French
Front and Anton Janyska is listed:
Source: Fold3®
These reports were generally slow in arriving back home as we can see. While he wounded on September 12, 1918, and listed as such in the Washington Post in December, it was not until after the holiday season and Armistice celebrations that Texas newspapers reported his condition.
In its weekly report of Texas Casualties,
the Monday,
January 27, 1919 edition of the Austin American newspaper
listed the Cook Anton Janyska as "Wounded, Degree
Undetermined."
After the Armistice was signed on November 11, from December 1918 to May 1919, the 90th Division was stationed near Trier, Germany, as part of the Army of Occupation.
Was Anton in
communication with anyone back home during this period?
In fact, we know now of at least one individual he was in communication with: his pastor, Rev. Barton. Two days before he was to leave the French port of St. Nazaire aboard the U.S.S. Mongolia, ...
Source: Fold3®
... Anton Janyska picks up a pen and the stationary customarily provided to America’s doughboys by the Knights of Columbus.
On June 10, 2025 I visited this research center with much excitement to
procure a copy of this letter.
May 25, 1919
Most
Reverend Father,
Please accept my
warmest greetings, I have received a letter from you, for which I thank you
very much. I am glad that our church is
flourishing, God willing and I will get to see it again, so I will use all my
strength in order to thank all of you for all things, including your prayers for us so that God would
save us at the front and at sea.
I was tried
a lot in seeing what kind of soldier I was. I thought it was impossible for a person
to avoid the bullets on the front line when I was in that place. But I prayed, and someone heard my prayer and
took care of me. I was wounded but he
saved me. It appeared to me there were 4
people who were killed near me and so I surrendered to the Lord God and waited for
my fate to be decided with me as well.
I'm
leaving for home now, we're already in France.
We left Germany on May 17th and are here in Saint-Nazaire, We are
setting to the water on May 28th. I'm
also supposed to do the parade in Houston for the 360 Inf. I'm going to Camp Travis next.
As we were driving from Germany, we saw the
front line that we had been fighting against and the graves of our many heroic
soldiers, it was sad to see. We are
going home and they must stay here. There were 255 of us when we left New
York for France in 1918. And now our
company is 82. Some are wounded and
more than half went down. [Nine of] those from Granger and Taylor, who were
only with our company, are killed. And
there were 18 of us, that's half.
So
I'll leave it at that. Thank you again for the letter and thank you for the
picture.
In the Lord,
Anton Janyska
C/O 360 Inf. A.P.O. Arm. Exp. F.
Note his final words, "...and thank you for the picture."
I wonder if Rev. Barton had sent Anton a photo of his baby girl, Hermine? Perhaps her infant baptism photo?
The letter makes clear that Anton was not separated from his Company 1 following his being wounded. He has been with them this whole time, even at the Battle of Meuse-Argonne and during their patrol duties in Germany.
As Anton explained to his pastor in the letter, The 90th Division would arrive back at the port of Boston, Massachusetts, aboard the SS Magnolia on 7 June 1919 after 12 months of overseas service and was demobilized, was then transported to the Port of Galveston. It would be his second visit here within seven7 years and, wow, so much had happened to him in those seven years!
They then passed through Houston on June 15
before arriving on 17 June 1919 at Camp Bowie, Texas where a grand parade was
given in their honor.
“The Houston parade ended at the city auditorium, where the entire regiment was seated for brief ceremonies arranged by the 360th Infantry Homecoming Association. From the genuineness of the welcome that was there extended every member of the organization was assured of the place of honor and esteem that he held in the hearts of those present.
At the conclusion of the exercises at the Auditorium the men ware dismissed with instructions to assemble at their respective trains at midnight. For the remainder of the day everything in Houston was open and free for the soldiers. And at the Auditorium that night there was staged for the regiment the biggest dance that was ever staged in the city of Houston. Promptly at 12 o’clock every man was in his place on his proper train.
The last train of the regiment arrived at the Southern Pacific station, San Antonio, at 3 p. m., June 17. The regiment was immediately formed for parade in the same order as on the day before. San Antonio, accustomed to military parades for years, felt in this a new interest, and the biggest crowd that every witnessed a parade in the city thronged the streets and cheered the marching doughboys. A big arch had been constructed on the plaza in front of the Alamo, and through this arch the regiment marched at the conclusion of the parade. The line of march on each side approaching the arch was lined with pretty girls who threw flowers beneath the feet of the marching troops.
At 6 o’clock the trains left the Southern Pacific station for Camp Travis, and at 7 o’clock the troops were in barracks in the demobilization area. On the morning of Jane 18 the demobilization started, and on the morning of the 19th the first men received their discharges and left for their homes. The demobilization was completed and the regiment ceased to exist June 21, 1919.”
https://www.90thdivisionassoc.org/90thDivisionFolders/mervinbooks/WWI360/WWI36001.pdf
Was
Anton able to march in the Welcome Home parade in San Antonio, Texas?
Or, was he unable due to his wound(s)?
_______________
Anton’s Return to Granger
is Short-Lived
After
enduring the horrors of war on the European front in France, 8 months later,
back home in Granger, Anton Janyska was dead.
It appears he
was shot by someone in Granger named Albin Gistinger!
I found it
odd what a Judge Jno. F. Black; Justice of the Peace, wrote for Cause of Death:
“caused by a shot from a pistol in the hands of Albin Gistinger.” Initially, to me at least, it seemed stated in
a manner meant to alleviate full culpability on the part of Gistinger.
Why did Albin Gistinger shoot Anton so soon after Anton returned from The Great War?
Was it an accidental shooting?
Or, did Anton ask Albin to fire the
pistol?
In other words, was it a mercy killing of a man suffering from severe physical
wounds, the pain of which he could no longer bear? or “shell shock” [as they termed PTSD back
then]?
Or,
was it murder?
Again I am
very grateful to Anton’s grandson Larry Butts who recounted:
“The
unnamed person [the Vitek family would speak about] I now know was Anton and
they claimed that he was shot at a domino or card game. The family must
have harbored a huge resentment toward him for the pain he had caused with the
loss of Frantiska.”
[Recollection of Larry Butts, grandson of Anton & Frantiska Janyska, son of their second daughter Hermine Eliska Janyska and her husband William Butts.]
It lists the deaths of Anton Janyska and Albin Gistinger, both men’s deaths on February 29, 1920 and,
interestingly, both of their burials in Granger were on the 27th
(hopefully not at the same time of day, unless no one was expected to attend
both men’s funerals!) We learn that Gistinger
was the son of Vincene & Anna (Vrabel) Gistinger. Like 27 y.o. Anton, Albin was born in 1893 and
was a mere 8 days younger than Anton.
And from Anton’s grandson, Larry Butts, this family history is shared:
"...after shooting Anton who sat across from him at a game table, Albin Gistinger turned the gun on himself and pulled the trigger."
The cause for Gistinger’s actions is unknown. Was it a new argument between him and Anton Janyska, perhaps an overreaction to a bit of cheating at the game table?
Or, was this
related to the enduring resentment in the community for the tragedies
surrounding Anton three years earlier, before he had left for war?
The story of
Anton Janyska is certainly a tragedy.
Consider his
short life:
he
traveled from Europe to America in a search of prosperity, happiness, and
freedom from oppression;
instead, he experiences the great losses of a wife and a child, followed by
scorn and ostracization in the community he had settled in;
he sails back to Europe to fight in a war for his countrymen and while there
witnesses the carnage in one of the worst battles in the history of the U.S.
Army;
yet, surviving that episode,
he returns to the small town in Texas where family and residents had shunned
him
only to meet a mysterious end at 10 p.m. on February 25th, 1920 at
age 27.
I tell the
story of Anton Janyska on this All Soul’s Day because I’ve made a silent
promise to him, to remember him. Whatever
the circumstances surrounding the tragedies in his life, Anton Janyska was one
of the many 19th-century Czech immigrants to the United States of America; a proud Bohemian, yes, who chose citizenship here and proudly served in America’s armed forces.
And for that, Anton Janyska deserves every American’s gratitude.
Terry W. Loessin;
Memorial Day
May 26, 2025
“Your superb
comportment everywhere in France, as well as your unsurpassed battle exploits
have won for you designation in the Army of Occupation;
your wonderful fighting ability and your superior manhood have won for you a
place in my heart that will remain with me for all time.
The fathers and mothers who have produced men such as you, who know not
‘battle straggling’ nor ‘no retreat under any circumstances’,
must be thrilled when they learn your
stories. The many states in America
to which you and they belong possess the prime essentials of prosperity and
greatness.
The soul of the 90th Division will remain a sacred inspiration to me wherever I
may be.”
– Excerpt from the farewell
letter written by Major General Henry T. Allen,
commanding the division November 21, 1918.
(General Allen commanded the 90th throughout its training and all of its time
in France.)
Terry's Portfolio at terrys-library.blogspot.com will result in immediate legal action.
View more of Terry's Meditations
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| I love reading either mysteries or historical fiction. I also love writing poetry and working on my novels - hope you enjoy the excerpts! |
Enjoy looking through my Library
Terry’s “Good Living” Guide:
Avoid the 3 PsBsSs
Processed Foods, Phthalates, Plastics;
Beef, Butter, Breads;
you’ll be feeling better in no time!
Avoid the 3 F’s
misinformation, fear, anger and hate!
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