William Taylor was born in Rowland in Elko County, Nevada, April 17th, 1890. His father was a rancher and stock raiser, and the boy worked on his parents’ ranch until he had passed the age of twenty. Then he took up a homestead of his own which he farmed and improved up to the time of the war with the Central Empires. On November 5th, 1917, he entered the service in the 9th Battalion, 166th Depot Brigade, at Camp Lewis, Washington. He remained with this brigade until April 26th, 1918, when he was transferred to Company F, 362d Infantry, 91st (Wild West) Division. With this latter unit he went over-seas on July 6th of the same year. The 91st served in reserve at St. Mihiel (September 12-13) but took no part in the action. On the 26th of September, however, it went into the Meuse-Argonne Offensive as a combat division of the line, with its position almost in the center of the American Army and just south of the Bois de Cheppy. The divisional artillery was still in southern France in training but its place had been filled by the 58th Field Artillery Brigade and units of the158th Field Artillery Brigade and 65th Coast Artillery Regiment. With this artillery backing them, the two infantry brigades, the 181st composed of the 361st and 362d Infantry Regiments, on the right and touching the 37th Division, and the 182d, composed of the 363d and 364th Infantry Regiments, on the left and touching the 35th Division, jumped off with the line on the morning of the 26th.

No minute description can be given here of the gallant advance of the 91st save to say that they fought northward against great obstacles, both natural and artificial, clearing the Bois de Cheppy and Bois de Very, crossing the Buanthe, Chambronne, Baronvaux and Gesnes Streams, and capturing roads, farms, fortified points and woods, and the towns of Epinonville, Eclisfontaine and Gesnes. With the fall of Gesnes on the 29th, the division found itself in a precarious position. In the four days of fighting it had lost 133 officers and 3,000 men, and its advance had been so rapid that the divisions to left and right were still so far in the rear that the line of the 91st was almost in the shape of a horseshoe, with Gesnes at the toe and the ends bent back to form junction with the 35th and 37th Divisions. As a result, the 91st was ordered to fall back and hold its position until the divisions on its flanks could bring up their lines. The 91st therefore dropped back and dug in, where it remained until October 4th, holding on grimly in the face of a furious fire, until relieved on that date.

In the meantime the 1st Division had relieved the 35th, and the 32d Division had replaced the 37th, so when fresh divisions smashed their lines north to the line of the 91st, the 32d was able to extend its line to the westward, relieving a part of the 91st. On October 7-8, the 181st Infantry Brigade again went into the line of advance and progressed northward between the 1st and 32d Divisions, attached part of the time to one of them and part to the other. During the night of October 11-12, the brigade was withdrawn from the battle after the line had been advanced far to the northward of Gesnes. The 91st had suffered a loss during the entire engagement of 1,109 killed and 3,916 wounded, a total of 5025 casualties or almost a fourth of its strength when it entered the fight.

It is not known at just what phase of the battle Private Taylor was wounded, but on October 18th, 1918, six days after the withdrawal of his regiment from the battle, he died of his wounds received in action. He left his parents, Joseph Albert and Maggy Taylor, of Bruneau, Idaho; four brothers, George W. Taylor, of Bruneau; John Taylor of Jarbidge, Nevada, Albert D., and Joseph Taylor, of Rowland, Nevada; and three sisters, Mrs. Annie Arendt, Tindall, Idaho; Mrs. Susie Strickland of Hot Springs, and Mrs. Edity Perjue of Brueneau, Idaho. He gave to the nation his best and his all as a noble American Patriot.