Charles Gifford, like many of our Nevada boys, was not born within the limits of the State, but came to us from one of our sister commonwealths. He was born at Bakersfield, California, on the 12th of April, 1891. He made his Nevada home in the County of Lyon, and his many friends in that community justly feel that it was one of their boys who went from among them to uphold their honor under our Country’s flag. As it happened, however, he had resided in the neighboring County of Churchill for a short time previous to his entry into the service, so that when the call to the colors came, he marched away with the Churchill boys and added his name to that county’s record of honor. The month of September, 1917, found him in the ranks at Camp Lewis, Washington. He was assigned to the “Wild West,” 91st Division, and a fit man he was, with his training on the open ranges of Nevada, to march in the ranks of than now famous division. By July, 1918, the command had landed on French soil in an advance that was to carry them through blood and glory to Germany’s very frontiers. Charles was serving in the Machine Gun Company of the 362d Infantry Regiment, a unit which will live always in the history of Nevada as one in which fell so many of her gallant sons.

It was soon after their debarkation that an accident which claimed the lives of twenty-nine men of the Machine Gun Company. Their Commanding Officer, Captain E.W. Morsham, who, later fell in battle, wrote in his description of this costly misfortune: “On the night of July 23d, 1918, at Bonniers, France, a small village about forty miles north of Paris, a troop train on which this company was riding was struck in a rear-end collision by a heavy freight train . . . Charles Gifford was among those who lost their lives in the wreck.”

The young Nevadan was buried with his comrades in a beautiful little French cemetery in the village of Freneuse. American, French, and Belgian troops paid tribute to their memory in the simple yet impressive services of the army. They had not reached their goal, but their crosses rise as mile stones on the highway to Victory and Peace. “He was a man in every sense of the word and a fine soldier,” wrote Captain Morsham. “He gave his life to his Country.” And this is the epitaph of Private Charles Gifford, the soldier, written by another soldier whose own life was offered and taken in the common cause. What nobler title could one ask in life than that? “He was a man and a soldier.” Two sisters and a brother remain to speak with pride of his eternal honor: Mrs. Estelle Waggoner, Mrs. Carrie West, and Roy Gifford, who also served his flag, of Yerington, Lyon County, Nevada.