John McNamara & photos from Cantigny Today marks the 95 th anniversary of America’s first major engagement of World War I --- the Battle of Cantigny. Although much smaller in scale than the epic battles of Verdun, Ypres, and the Somme, Cantigny’s importance should not be underestimated. It gave the Americans the confidence, not that they needed it, that they could handle the seasoned and battle-tested German Army. My grandfather, John McNamara, a member of the 1 st Engineers, Company D, was assigned to accompany the 28 th Infantry Division in the initial attack. In a sense, my grandfather was part of the first group of American soldiers to go “over the top” and race across the crater dotted landscape known as No Man’s Land. Their objective was to build several strong-points for the infantry to use as machine gun nests. They were successful in their mission, but it was not without cost. The 1 st Engineers would sustain 30 casualties, including my grandfathe...