Men of the 1st Battalion of the 77th Division during an NYC homecoming parade in May 1919. They’re marching north up Fifth Avenue; the temporary triumphal arch in the background spanned Fifth at 25th Street, next to Madison Square. The parade merited three pages of photos, with gushing coverage, in the New York Times of Sunday, May 11.
Most of the 77th came from the New York area. Portions of the 1st Battalion, (as well as portions of the 2nd and 3rd, and portions of the 306th Machine Gun Battalion) became known as the “Lost Battalion” after becoming separated from the main body of the Allied army during fighting in the Argonne Forest in October 1918. There are few stories about World War I fighting that are not horrific, but this portion of the 77th suffered extremely high casualties under terrible conditions. The Times caption for this photo was “The 1st Battalion, 308th Infantry, the Famous So-Called ‘Lost Battalion,’ Marching Up Fifth Avenue Immediately After Having Passed Under the Arch of Victory.”
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