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On Veterans Day: Remembering America’s Multilingual Soldiers

Posted November 11, 2010 by Patrick Young, Esq.

I am reading a book, To Conquer Hell: The Meuse-Argonne, 1918, by Edward G. Lengel, about America’s participation in World War I. As with today’s United States Army, many of the soldiers back then were born in other countries, although there was a bit of a difference. Back then, the Army was officially multilingual. With one in six soldiers born somewhere else, the army employed translators, not to talk to the locals in France, but so officers could communicate with their own soldiers. One unit had to designate several different translators since it was a veritable Hapsburg Empire of languages.

When an Italian-speaking battalion was moved to the battle front in 1918, the Germans became so confused by the American unit that they concluded that the Italian Army had suddenly appeared opposite them in northern France!

Modern Americans dishonor our country when they claim that enforced monoligualism is central to our history and identity. Unless they came from the British Isles or Ontario, our immigrant ancestors did not know English until long after they arrived here.

The communication divide did not stop them from working: Labor gangs were organized by language, with foremen who spoke the language of their workers. It did not stop them from voting: Even Lincoln hired German secretaries to translate his speeches into a language spoken by one-in-ten of his constituents. And it did not stop them from fighting – and dying – for their country.

We can all agree that everyone who comes here to live should (and, in my experience, does) learn English. But banning the use of other languages in governmental communications with immigrants doesn’t increase English-language acquisition, it just marginalizes newcomers.

English-Only is a modern cause that ignores the wise decision of the Founders not to ban other languages. And it is not what those Italian-Americans died for in 1918.


“WWI: Soldiers in Merville, France” image courtesy of the National Archive via Flickr.

Tags : bilingual, books, english only, multilingualism, veterans day, wwi

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