Lieutenant, Then Sergeant

On Nov. 5, 1918, the War Department released another day’s casualty list. The Richmond Palladium in Wayne County summed it up: “Total army casualties issued for Tuesday show: Killed in action, 124; died of wounds, 75; died of disease, 108.” Then it picked out the Indiana names. Among the men “wounded in action” was “Lieut. Aaron Fisher, Lyles.”¹

The South Bend News-Times printed the same list in full, under the heading for men “wounded in action, degree undetermined.” He was the only lieutenant in that group, listed as “Aaron Fisher. Lyle. Ind.”² The Washington Times printed it by state: “Ind., Lyles, Aaron Fisher.”³

Nothing in those lists says that he was Black, that he served in an all-Black division, or that he had been wounded two months earlier holding a trench in France against a German raid. They give a rank, a name and a town.

The rank is the thread Hoosier First followed. “Lieutenant” was new for Aaron Fisher in 1918. He had joined the Army as a teenager and served for years as an enlisted man. By June 1919 he was enlisted again.⁴ The newspapers and War Department records that mention him over the next three decades show a man the Army had decorated as an officer, working his way back up through the ranks.

From Lyles to the Buffalo Soldiers

The Indiana Historical Bureau’s marker at the Lyles Station Historic School and Museum, installed in 2022, gives the outline. “Decorated soldier Aaron Fisher was born at Lyles Station and joined the U.S. Army at age 15,” it says. “He was assigned to the 9th Cavalry and later the 24th Infantry, both historic Buffalo Soldier units, and served in the Southwest and in the Mexican Expedition pursuing Pancho Villa.”⁵

The National Park Service’s biography adds detail. It says he was born in Lyles to Benjamin Fisher and Macy Octiva Barnhill Fisher. His father “was from Kentucky and served in the Sixth U.S. Colored Cavalry during the Civil War.” His mother died on March 30, 1902, “when he was 10 years old.” He went to school through his sophomore year of high school, then worked on the family farm.⁴

According to the Park Service, he enlisted on Feb. 28, 1911, at Jefferson Barracks near St. Louis. He was assigned to the 9th Cavalry and then the 24th Infantry, “both units were all-Black and known as Buffalo Soldiers.” He was promoted to corporal on Sept. 13, 1914, and went with the 24th Infantry into Mexico in 1916 on the Punitive Expedition under Gen. John J. Pershing.⁴

The sources do not agree on when he was born. The Historical Bureau’s marker gives his years as 1895 to 1985, and says he enlisted at 15.⁵ The Park Service gives his birth date as May 14, 1892, which would have made him 18 when he enlisted. The same Park Service page says he died in 1985 “at the age of 89,” which fits a birth in the mid-1890s, not 1892.⁴ A 1919 newspaper item said he had “been a member of the regular army six years,” which also does not match a 1911 enlistment.⁶ Hoosier First could not settle the question, and uses the Historical Bureau’s years.

The 366th

In January 1918, the Park Service says, Fisher was promoted to first sergeant and transferred to Company E, 366th Infantry Regiment, of the new 92nd Division. The Army had formed the 92nd and 93rd as “all-Black segregated divisions it would send to Europe in mostly support roles.” He was sent to officer training, graduated on May 19, 1918, and “on June 1, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 366th Infantry.”⁴

On June 15, 1918, the 366th sailed from Hoboken, N.J., for France.⁴

The Historical Bureau’s marker sums up what came next in one sentence: “In 1918, Fisher was wounded while successfully defending his command against German troops at Lesseux and received a Distinguished Service Cross and Croix de Guerre.”⁵

Lesseux

The War Department’s own record of the award is in a 1920 Government Printing Office volume, compiled in the Office of the Adjutant General, that lists every Distinguished Service Cross awarded from April 1917 through November 1919, arranged by state.⁷ Fisher’s entry is on page 197, under Indiana:

“Aaron R. Fisher, second lieutenant, 366th Infantry. For extraordinary heroism in action near Lesseux, France, September 3, 1918. He showed exceptional bravery in action when his position was raided by a superior force of the enemy by directing his men and refusing to leave his position, although he was severely wounded. He and his men continued to fight the enemy until the latter were beaten off by a counterattack.”⁷

The entry ends with an address: “Residence at appointment: General Delivery, Lyles, Ind.”⁷

The Park Service’s account of the night adds that Fisher’s unit “was greatly outnumbered but he refused to retreat and give up their position,” and held until other men of the 366th counterattacked. It says Fisher “was wounded and suffered the effects of poison gas during the attack” and was sent to Base Hospital No. 45.⁴

The same 1920 volume shows that Fisher’s stand was not the only one near Lesseux. It records Distinguished Service Crosses for six men of Company E, 366th Infantry, for “extraordinary heroism in action” near Lesseux on Sept. 4, 1918, the day after Fisher’s date. (Three of the entries spell the village “Lesseau.”) Five of the six gave addresses in Alabama, and one in Illinois.⁷

One was Cpl. Van Horton of Athens, Ala. His citation says that during “a hostile attack, preceded by a heavy minnenwerfer barrage, involving the entire front of the battalion, the combat group to which this courageous soldier belonged was attacked by about 20 of the enemy, using liquid fire.” The sergeant in charge “and 4 other men having been killed, he fearlessly rushed to receive the attack.”⁷

Sgt. Roy A. Brown of Decatur, Ala., and Pvt. Joe Williams of Uniontown, Ala., were in a combat group “attacked by 20 of an enemy raiding party advancing under a heavy barrage.” The sergeant in charge was killed and both men were wounded, but each, “with three others,” held on until the enemy “were driven off.”⁷ Three privates, George Bell of Athens, Ala., Alex Hammond of Harvest, Ala., and Ed Merrifield of Greenville, Ill., were cited in nearly identical words: although severely wounded, each “remained at his post and continued to fight a superior enemy force which had attempted to enter our lines.”⁷

The volume’s list of awards by division shows how rare those crosses were. It lists 22 Distinguished Service Crosses for the 92nd Division through November 1919. Nine went to men of the 366th Infantry. Only one of the nine went to an officer: “Fisher, Aaron R., 2d lt., 366th Inf.”⁷

The citations do not say whether these men fought in the same raid as Fisher, and Hoosier First does not claim they did. They do show what the 366th was facing in the trenches near Lesseux in the first days of September 1918: raids in force, a mortar barrage and flamethrowers.

“Our World War Heroes”

The casualty lists named Fisher as a wounded lieutenant. Other papers told readers what he had done.

In January 1919, an item headed “Won Croix de Guerres! Individual Mention of a Few of Our World War Heroes” ran in the Cleveland Gazette.⁶ A nearly identical version appeared a week later in the Monitor of Omaha, Neb., under “Some of Our Heroes Who Have the Croix de Guerre.”⁸

The Gazette’s item read: “Princeton, Ind.—Second Lieutenant Aaron R. Fisher, 366th Infantry, cited for bravery by the War Department, is the son of Benjamin Fisher of Lyles, four miles west of Princeton. He has been a member of the regular army six years. His citation reads as follows: ‘For extraordinary heroism in action near Lesseux, France, Sept. 3, ‘18.’”⁶

The Monitor printed the same paragraph but called his regiment the “386th Infantry,” an error.⁸

In both papers, his name sat beside those of other decorated soldiers: a corporal from Shelbyville, Ind., who had received the Croix de Guerre, and a former Hampton Institute student in the 368th Infantry who had received the Distinguished Service Cross.^6,8 The 368th, like Fisher’s 366th, was a regiment of the 92nd Division.⁷

“Lieut. Aaron R. Fisher, Lyles”

Indiana kept its own list. On July 8, 1921, the Indiana Daily Times reported that the War Department had sent Adjutant General Harry B. Smith the names of Indiana men decorated by foreign governments during the war. “The list of men who were decorated was turned over to the historical commission and will become a part of the war records of the State,” the paper said.⁹

Under the heading for the French Croix de Guerre, between “Fred C. Fischer, Shelbourn” and “Forest Foster, Columbus,” was “Lieut. Aaron R. Fisher, Lyles.”⁹

By the time that list was printed, Fisher was no longer a lieutenant.

Sergeant again

The Park Service gives the dates. “On March 17, 1919, Fisher was honorably discharged as a captain in the Army reserve. He reenlisted in the regular Army on June 12, 1919. This time he was a sergeant in Company F, Twenty-Fourth U.S. Infantry.”⁴

The Distinguished Service Cross had been awarded to him as a second lieutenant.⁷ Less than four months after he came home, he was back in the enlisted ranks of the same Buffalo Soldier regiment he had served in before the war.

Hoosier First did not find a document that explains why Fisher reenlisted as a sergeant rather than staying on as an officer. It does not guess. The records show only that a man decorated for directing his men under fire in 1918 was taking orders as a non-commissioned officer in 1919.

The Park Service says he “continued to be promoted in the Twenty-Fourth Infantry.” From September 1923 to June 1924 he attended the Quartermaster School in Philadelphia. He was then stationed at Camp Little and Fort Huachuca in Arizona, and in the early 1930s in New Mexico and Louisiana, followed by a two-year tour in the Philippines.⁴

One War Department order from that period appears in a newspaper. On Aug. 16, 1932, the Washington Evening Star’s column of Army orders included this line: “Warrant Officer Aaron R. Fisher, from Barksdale Field, Shreveport, La., to Philippine Department, sailing August 26, from New York.”¹⁰

The order called him a warrant officer, not a lieutenant or a captain. Fourteen years after he had directed his men at Lesseux, he did not hold the commission he had held then.

Wilberforce

In 1936 Fisher was sent to Wilberforce University in Ohio.⁴ The Park Service says that “on June 29, 1936, Fisher was assigned to Wilberforce University as professor of military science,” and oversaw its Reserve Officers’ Training Corps program, which it says Charles Young had established in 1894.⁴ The Historical Bureau’s marker says he “taught ROTC cadets at Wilberforce University from 1936-1947, influencing a generation of Black soldiers.”⁵

A newspaper item from 1946 shows his rank and title near the end of that assignment. On July 18, 1946, the California Eagle in Los Angeles reported: “Chief Warrant Officer Aaron R. Fisher, assistant professor of military science and tactics at Wilberforce university was cited for the army commendation ribbon in a communication received from Major Gen. Robert S. Beightler, commanding general of the fifth service command of the army service forces.”¹¹

The two sources differ on his title. The Park Service calls him “professor of military science.”⁴ The Eagle, in 1946, called him “assistant professor.”¹¹ Hoosier First could not check which title he held in which years.

What the sources agree on is the work: training ROTC cadets, whom the marker calls “a generation of Black soldiers.”^4,5 The man doing it was, by the Eagle’s account, a chief warrant officer. He was preparing cadets for commissions that he did not hold himself.¹¹

The Park Service names one of his students. “The most famous student Fisher trained was Lieutenant John R. Fox, who was eventually awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions in Sommocolonia, Italy in 1944.”⁴ Hoosier First did not find a contemporary record of Fox’s time in Fisher’s program and reports the connection as the Park Service states it.

The Park Service says Fisher taught at Wilberforce until Dec. 31, 1947, “when he retired from the Army.”⁴

After the Army

Fisher stayed near Wilberforce. The Park Service says that in 1948 “he worked as a civilian employee at Wright Patterson Air Force Base,” and that the Greene County, Ohio, commissioners appointed him to coordinate the county’s work relief program.⁴ The Historical Bureau’s marker says, “He retired from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in 1965.”⁵

He died on Nov. 22, 1985, in Xenia, Ohio, and was buried at Valley View Memorial Gardens in Xenia.⁴

The Historical Bureau’s marker went up at Lyles Station 37 years later, in 2022. It was sponsored by the Historical Bureau, American Legion Post 25 and two private sponsors.⁵

What the record shows

The record of Aaron Fisher’s rank reads like a staircase.

He was a corporal in 1914 and a first sergeant in January 1918.⁴ He was commissioned a second lieutenant in June 1918, and decorated for holding his position at Lesseux that September “although he was severely wounded.”^4,7 In the casualty lists of November 1918 and the Gazette’s item of January 1919 he was a lieutenant.^1,6 Indiana’s 1921 list still called him “Lieut.”⁹ But by June 1919 he was a sergeant again.⁴ He was a warrant officer in 1932, and a chief warrant officer in 1946, teaching the cadets who would become the officers he had briefly been.^10,11

Hoosier First found no record of Fisher complaining about any of it. It also did not find the paperwork that would show why he went back to the ranks. What the documents do show is that the Army kept him teaching ROTC cadets at Wilberforce for more than a decade,^4,5 and that the state of Indiana, in its own official list, kept calling him “Lieut.”⁹

Hoosier First corrected obvious OCR errors in newspaper quotations, for example “comnjanding” to “commanding” and “amry” to “army,” without changing their meaning.

How he died

The National Park Service gives Aaron Fisher’s date and place of death as Nov. 22, 1985, in Xenia, Ohio, and says he died “at the age of 89.”⁴ Neither the Park Service biography nor the Historical Bureau’s marker says how he died, and Hoosier First did not find an obituary or death record that states a cause.^4,5 The records it read do not say, so this story does not.