Question about Sgt. York's actions

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This gives Sargent(then corporal)York's version of what happened but doesn't identify his rifle <http://freepages.military.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~worldwarone/WWI/Heroes/SergeantAlvinCYork.html>.
 
Uh oh. Anybody care to do a seance ? :D
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Already contacted him on my ouija board. Said he was too busy to talk right now. Got his hands full shooting at "fellers in bathrobes with 70 girlfriends". Not sure what that means.

:rolleyes:
 
He did use a 1911. The 1941 movie showed him using a captured Luger but this was a mistake in the film. The Germans were making a bayonet charge and he shot them back to front so that they wouldn't realize he was dropping them and start shooting.

He did use a 1917 Enfield rifle. Again the movie had it wrong when he was depicted using a 1903 Springfield.
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I like others have wondered about the firearms he used. When I talked to his son about this he did tell Sgt. York personally approved everything in the movie. If he did use a 1911 he apparently approved them using a Luger in the movie which seems out of character for him. His son also mentioned that he did not care for a peep sight on a rifle. His father did not like the peep because he could not hit moving objects{Germans} with the peep. He thought for that reason that his rifle was an 03.
 
used luger instead of 1911 in film due to lack of 45 blanks. I also read interview with female relative who insisted alvin used 1903 because he preferred the open sights on it.
 
Back to York's own words. They took his 03 at LeHavre and gave him a "British gun" (an Enfield).

http://acacia.pair.com/Acacia.Vignettes/The.Diary.of.Alvin.York.html

MAY 21, 1918 LeHavre, France: So we got to France at Le Havre. There we turned in our guns and got British guns. Well, we went out from Le Havre to a little inland camp. I had taken a liking to my gun by this time. I had taken it apart and cleaned it enough to learn every piece and I could almost put it back together with my eyes shut. The Greeks and Italians were improving. They had stayed continuously on the rifle range for a month or two and got so they could shoot well. They were fairly good pals, too. But I missed the Tennesseans. I was the only mountaineer in the platoon. I didn't like the British guns so well. I don't think they were as accurate as our American rifles. Ho ho.
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...we turned in our guns and got British guns.
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Just so I get my turn at muddying up the waters, the US '17 looked a lot like the British service rifle, and I've seem them referred to as "British rifles" more than once.

I'm willing to go with York's assertion that his rifle was an '03. If he had wanted one badly enough, I think he could have found an '03 to replace his "lost, damaged or otherwise unserviceable" '17.
 
Just so I get my turn at muddying up the waters, the US '17 looked a lot like the British service rifle
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The Enfields were originally produced under contract to Great Britain in .303 caliber as the P14. When the war started, we needed rifles in a hurry so rather than retooling we just produced the same rifle in 30.06. They were in fact British pattern P14 rifles, which were barreled for the American 30.06.
 
I really don't know why there is still confusion on this. Alvin York himself said he used a 1903 Springfield, and that he preferred the 1903 to the "British gun", and that he liked the sights on the 1903 better. He was a technical advisor to the movie and in the movie Gary Cooper used a 1903. Reportedly, York was upset that Cooper had to use a 9mm Luger because they couldn't get blanks to work in the 1911. I mean, really? We are suppposed to believe York doesn't know the difference between a 1903 and a 1917?
 
I really don't know why there is still confusion on this. Alvin York himself said he used a 1903 Springfield, and that he preferred the 1903 to the "British gun", and that he liked the sights on the 1903 better.
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Yet, in his diary he says he carried a 1917 Enfield...
 
York's Division originally trained with the Brit's when they first arrived in France and WERE issued Enfields - SMLE's that is. They turned those in for 1917s before going into the line during the Meuse Argonne. Whether York had picked up an '03 at some point and used it or a '17 will never be known for sure unless forensic evidence can somehow verify what rifle those .30-'06 cartridges that were found on the battlefield a couple years ago were fired in. Not likely. He DID use a 1911. It really doesn't matter what rifle the man (and the rest of his squad) used. They knew how to fight and handle their weapons.
 
Mr. York was indeed a great shooter and calm thinker. However, I believe he owes a lot to luck. I mean, ~30 dug-in machine gun nests opening up on your crew at that range with no real cover. Survival of such an event would be nothing less than a miracle.
 
I don't know how true this actually is, but my father had an uncle who actually served with York in the battle in question. The word was that the Germans who York was shooting at were facing the troops York was with and York had circled around BEHIND the Germans. When he started to shoot, he remembered his hunting days and the way game reacted when shot at. The Germans had their backs to York so he shot the man farthest away so as not to alert the other Germans. Apparently from York's angle if he shot the farthest man, the others would not see the dead man go down. This according to my great uncle was how York explained it to his own men. I never met my great uncle, he died before I was born, but my dad explained what he had been told by his uncle while we were watching the movie one evening.

But we all know how old family legends go...Who really knows how and why he did what he did?
 
The Germans had their backs to York so he shot the man farthest away so as not to alert the other Germans.
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I would think shooting the furtherst man first would have the opposite effect under these circumstances. Everyone would be looking away from you, and the furthest man would be seen by all the men, as he was shot. Shooting the closest man first would be best under these circumstances, if you were using York's reasoning.
I do not doubt your Great Uncle's participation, but this seems to go against all that I've heard, and wouldn't seem to go along with York's reasoning for his shooting method.
 
I would think shooting the furtherst man first would have the opposite effect under these circumstances. Everyone would be looking away from you, and the furthest man would be seen by all the men, as he was shot. Shooting the closest man first would be best under these circumstances, if you were using York's reasoning.
I do not doubt your Great Uncle's participation, but this seems to go against all that I've heard, and wouldn't seem to go along with York's reasoning for his shooting method.
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Supposedly it was all about the angle from York's perspective and the way the Germans were lined up. But like I said, I never met my great uncle and I too have some questions about how it could have happened like that. As I said, We all know how family legends go...They seem to grow and if you were to ask 3 different family members, you'd get 3 different tales of what actually happened.

I drew up a few simple stick man pictures of how this could be the way it went down and it is possible for York to be shooting from behind and the Germans be facing away from him, and also in a direction (facing at a certain angle) which they wouldn't see the man farthest away going down. Other than the noise of battle though I can't explain how they didn't hear York's gun firing.

My grandmother had an actual letter from York to my great uncle talking about their service together, but I never saw that either. So I don't know for sure when and where they served together.
 
I vaguely recall an article which recounted a similar shooting style used by Winston Churchill during his military service in either Africa or India. The article recounted a situation where Winston Churchill engaged some charging natives and dispatched them in a similar manner by firing at the ones furthest back and working his way forward to the front most man. I wish I had more details, but I think the article was in an American Rifleman magazine about 15 years or so back.
 
I walked that battlefield in 1987 and by moving a short distance, SGT York could have indeed flanked the bad guys. It's a series of low, close and steep small hills on the edge of a valley. I thought the movie was pretty accurate about the terrain he faced.
 
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