Hometown: Piedmont, TN
Branch: U.S. Army 
Unit: Medical Corps., 119th Infantry Regiment, 30th Infantry Division
Date of Sacrifice: August 31, 1918 - KIA in the Ypres sector, Belgium-France border
Age: 21
Conflict: World War I, 1914-1918

William P. “Paul” Hickman was one of five children born to Peter F. and “America” (Burchfield) Hickman. Along with siblings Alec, Janie, Bea, and Norie, Paul lived in Piedmont, Tennessee—a small community in Jefferson County nestled between Knoxville to the west and the Great Smoky Mountains to the east.

Hickman family members recount that Paul’s parents ran the first telephone switchboard in the small community of Piedmont, out of the Piedmont General Store. “Great-grandfather Hickman also supplemented his income by hiring himself out to local farmers. He would walk their land and tell them how much lumber they had growing on their property, how much planking could be milled from their trees, as well as the different types of trees they had growing on their property, what it was worth, etc.”

As a young man, Paul worked as a hired farm laborer around Piedmont. With Europe engulfed in war and the United States joining the cause of the Allied Powers on April 2, 1917, two months later Hickman traveled 7 miles north to New Market and enlisted in the United States Army on June 24, 1917.

He was sent for training at Camp Sevier in Greenville, South Carolina, and assigned to the Medical Corps, 119th Infantry Regiment, 30 Infantry Division.

On May 15, 1918, Pvt. Hickman’s 119th Regiment assembled in the harbor at Halifax, Nova Scotia. In a convoy including three British transport ships—Ascania, Haverford, and Laomedon—the 119th sailed for England the following day.

Five days of rough seas and heavy winds gave way to a quiet calm on May 22, 1918. In addition to battling the treacherous weather of the North Atlantic crossing, the threat of German submarine attacks was ever-present.

On the morning of May 27, 1918, the convoy safely reached the port of Liverpool, England, and the troops loaded onto trains bound for Dover. By May 29, the Regiment had crossed the English Channel and assembled in a camp near the French port city of Calais.

In his History: 119th Infantry, 60th Brigade, 30th Division U.S.A. (p. 6), Charles Rogers recounts the journey of Hickman’s regiment:

The Regiment remained in this camp [near Calais] for three days being equipped with gas respirators and ammunition. Here the United States rifles were exchanged for British rifles, as the 30th Division had been designated to serve with the British.

The night of arrival in this camp the Regiment experienced their first attack by the enemy in the form of an “air raid”. In spite of the heaviness and nearness of the explosions, and the whining of the bomb fragments, the behavior of the troops in their first actual contact with the enemy was most excellent.

On the western front of “The Great War,” the city of Ypres, Belgium, held strategic importance for both the Allied Powers and Germany. Near Belgium’s western border with France, the Ypres sector was the site of three major battles that ultimately leveled the city and resulted in more than 850,000 Allied and German casualties.

It was in this battle-torn Ypres sector that Pvt. Hickman was risking his life, tending to the wounded. Carrying a litter with a squadron of four men on August 31, 1918, Hickman was struck by enemy shrapnel.

Ralph A. Cates, a soldier from New Market, Tennessee and a good friend of Paul Hickman’s, wrote about him in a letter home:

He was in No Man’s Land, carrying patients and a shell struck close by…killing him instantly. I hadn’t gotten to see Paul since being over here, although he wasn’t too far from us. You can tell his people that he had the best reputation as a soldier and that he was a great favorite with all the boys who knew him. Am sure he hasn’t an enemy among the boys.

Clifton Latimer, a soldier who served with Pvt. Hickman since they trained together at Camp Sevier, wrote a letter to Hickman’s father:

Of course you already heard of Paul’s death and I write not to remind you of that sad fact but rather to cheer you by telling you what a dear friend he was to me and not only to me but to the entire hospital corps. He was especially liked by all of the officers. Not only was he liked, or better stated loved, by the Hospital Corps and officers but he had many friends throughout the regiment.

Private William P. “Paul” Hickman was temporarily buried in Nine Elms British Military Cemetery near the city of Poperinge, in the Belgian province of West Flanders. His remains were later returned to his family, and he was laid to rest in Piedmont Cemetery, Jefferson County, Tennessee. His family engraved “God bless our Boy” on Pvt. Hickman’s headstone.

Sources
Details submitted by Mr. Monty Sharp, Pvt. Hickman’s great-nephew.
Tennessee State Library & Archives, Tennessee Virtual Archive: Hickman, William Paul
East Tennessee Veterans Memorial Association: William P. Hickman
North Carolina Digital Collections: History: 119th Infantry, 60th Brigade, 30th Division by Charles Rogers
Burial Site: Find a Grave