Salt Lake Tribune | 1919-07-09 | Page 22 | Utahn Gives up Mask to Wounded Soldier

' QEHGEANT ALONZO P. IEVIN'E, l ' O vrh-j fought with the famous j j Third tiiviaica in France ami vras , j i ! wounded and traced. He lias re- jjj ; turned to lus borne in Ml:. I-.iXe. j. I ' ' a v I -xS;;;o.v.s .... : -..n .-X... v ! .vx: rw.'' jtw ci..ww(a 1 v SSjSi .'-v- s.-i-..--'-.'fi'-"-'-''"--'': V t i !i UTAHN CIS DP MASK TO WOUNDED SOLDIER Letter Written to Parents Here by Officer Reveals Act of Heroism. Incidents of heroism on the battlefield are numerous, and the men who per4 formed the greatest acts of self-sacrifice are.- oftencst the last to tell of them. A Salt Lake man, Sergeant Alonzo H. Irvine, son of Mr. and Mrs. William J-Irvine, J-Irvine, who returned yesterday, had written writ-ten to his familv from a hospital that he had a broken "ankle, that and nothing more. His lieutenant, however, wrote another an-other letter, telling the whole truth of how the sergean t had stripped off his own gas mask to put it over the face of a wounded man during a heavy bombardment bom-bardment of fume-laden shells and thus suffered hurts that put him in the hospital. hos-pital. Sergeant Irvine was one of the nineteen nine-teen survivors of G company, Thlrty-eighth Thlrty-eighth infantry, of the Third division, one of the few units which was decorated aa a whole with the French Croix de Guerre for valorous conduct during the second battle of the Marne. Lieutenant Robinson Murray of the Thirty-eighth wrote Sergeant Irvine's story In part as follows: "We were returning from a patrol, carrying a wounded American, when the German guns started a general bombardment bombard-ment and shells were falling around pretty thick, among them gaa shells. 1 was about 150 yards behind. I put on my mask and hurried up the road to see that all the men had put on theirs. Suddenly Sud-denly I saw Sergeant Irvine coming back without a mask. I stopped him and asked him, in no Aery pleasant voice, 'Where is your mask?' 'I gave it to the wounded man,' he replied. Ry .donating his own mask to the wounded man he had unhesitatingly unhes-itatingly exposed himself to the gas. It was indeed fortunate that his unselfishness unselfish-ness did not result more seriously. J le probably saved the life of the man we were carrying." Sergeant Irvine- fought at Chateau Thierry and at other of the Important engagements en-gagements In which the Americans took part. He was wounded as well as gassed, and spent several months in hospitals.