1st Army: "The Army's First" 1960 US Army; The Big Picture TV-465

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'It was in 1917 that the American Expeditionary Force under General John J. Pershing poured ashore in France, expecting to fight as a separate Army. However, it was not until July, 1918, that Pershing was able to create the First United States Army under his command. On film this episode becomes a chronological history of the First Army from World War I to 1960. It is an extraordinary documentary of the First Army's 23rd Division that wrote a chapter of history unexcelled in accomplishment, unsurpassed in courage. Many men and many outfits captured the imagination of the American people. There was Sergeant Alvin York of the 83rd Division, Wild Bill Donovan's Fighting 69th, Major Charles Whittlesey's Lost Battalion, General Douglas MacArthur of the 42nd Division, and the glamorous "Hat in the Ring" Flying Squadron of Major Eddie Rickenbacker. Inactivated in 1919, First Army seemed for a few years a part of the past. But the complacency of the twenties soon gave way to European unrest and in 1933, Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur recreated First Army as part of a broad Army reorganization.'

Originally a public domain film from the National Archives, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.

The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_United_States_Army

Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

The First Army is the oldest and longest established field army of the United States Army. It now serves as a theater army having seen service in both World War I and World War II, under some of the most famous and distinguished officers of the U.S. Army. It now serves as a mobilization, readiness and training command...

History

Establishment and World War I

First Army was established on 10 August 1918 as a field army when sufficient American military manpower had arrived in France during World War I. As an element of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) in the latter stages of World War I it was the first of three field armies established under the AEF. Serving in its ranks were many figures who later played important roles in World War II. First Army was inactivated in April 1919...

World War II

First Army's entry into World War II began in October 1943 as Bradley returned to Washington, D.C. to receive his command and began to assemble a staff and headquarters to prepare for Operation Overlord, the codename assigned to the establishment of a large-scale lodgement on the European Continent following Operation Neptune, which was the invasion of Normandy. The headquarters were activated in January 1944 at Bristol, England.

Upon going ashore on 6 June 1944, D-Day, First Army came under General Bernard Montgomery's 21st Army Group (alongside the British Second Army) which commanded all American ground forces during the invasion... First Army captured much of the early gains of the Allied forces in Normandy. Once the beachheads were linked together, its troops struck west and isolated the Cotentin Peninsula, and then captured Cherbourg...

After the capture of Cherbourg, First Army struck south. In Operation Cobra...

With the arrival of more US troops in France, the Army then passed from the control of 21st Army Group to the newly arrived 12th Army Group... General Bradley assumed command of the 12th Army Group and Lieutenant General Courtney Hodges was placed in command of the First Army. First Army followed Third Army, the American armies forming the southern part of the encirclement of Germans at the Falaise pocket.

After capturing Paris (the Wehrmachtbefehlshaber von Groß-Paris, Dietrich von Choltitz, capitulated 25 August, ignoring Hitler's Trümmerfeldbefehl), First Army headed towards the south of the Netherlands...

Following the Battle of the Bulge, the Rhineland Campaign began, and First Army was transferred back to 12th Army Group. In Operation Lumberjack, First Army closed up to the lower Rhine by 5 March, and the higher parts of the river five days later.

On 7 March, in a stroke of luck, Company A, 27th Armored Infantry Battalion, part of Combat Command B, found the Ludendorff Bridge across the Rhine at Remagen still standing. It quickly captured the bridge and established a secure bridgehead. in the next 15 days, over 25,000 troops and their equipment crossed the river... First Army reached the Elbe by 18 April. There the advance halted, as that was the agreed demarcation zone between the American and Soviet forces. First Army and Soviet forces met on 25 April...