James Price

As December wore on, mixing with the dreary recitations of the names of sick people in the local social columns, happier news began to trickle in: the names of men discharged from military service. The Gazette of December 20 reported that in the past week Charles Kisela, Roy Cook, Ed Severance, Evan Roper, Charles Frame, Otto Larson, Ernest Sonntag, Walter Bender, Emil Kossow, Elmer Hideen and Harry Carlson, among others, had all come home to stay.

Amidst those happy homecomings, Fremont and Carrie Price learned that their son, James, would never come home. On December 18 they finally received official confirmation of the earlier report. James had died in France on November 16, at the age of 23. Nephritis was given as the cause of death, but later reports added, "[w]hether death resulted from wounds or exposure has not yet been learned," and according to information at the Merrillville-Ross Township Historical Society museum, the exact cause was never determined.


(Click on image to enlarge)


(Image from Gold Star Honor Roll)


Sources:
♦ "Another Lake County Hero." Hobart Gazette 27 Dec. 1918.
♦ Indiana Historical Commission. Gold Star Honor Roll. A Record of Indiana Men and Women Who Died in the Service of the United States and the Allied Nations in the World War. 1914 – 1918. Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Commission, 1921.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 26 Dec. 1918.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 20 Dec. 1918.
♦ "Tribute to a Ross Township Soldier Boy." Hobart News 2 Jan. 1919.