1LT George Vaughn Seibold Our Doughboy MIA [...]

The so-called 'tragic' photo, as it shows four American pilots, each of whom died for France before America entered the War. From left to right, James McConnell, Kiffin Rockwell, their French captain Georges Thénault, Norman Prince and Victor Chapman. 

A Destiny of Undying Greatness: Kiffin Rockwell and the Boys Who Remembered Lafayette 

By Mark M. Trapp
Special to the doughboy.org web site 

Most Americans with a passing knowledge of history know of General Pershing’s July 4, 1917, march through Paris with the newly arrived American troops to the tomb of Lafayette where, on behalf of America, Pershing’s aide Colonel Charles Stanton uttered the famous words “Lafayette, we are here.” But too many are unaware of the actions and sacrifices of Kiffin Rockwell and other American boys dating back to the outset of the Great War more than two and a half years before Pershing’s arrival.

Mark M. TrappMy own knowledge came about more by happenstance than anything else when, in the Fall of 1997, I began law school at Washington and Lee University School of Law in Lexington, Virginia. On my first day, I took a walk around campus to familiarize myself with my new surroundings. Upon entering Lee Chapel, I came across a small plaque honoring a W&L alumnus by the name of “Kiffin Yates Rockwell” who, the plaque indicated, had been “killed in aerial combat” in France in September 1916. Because my wife was eight and a half months pregnant with our first child, baby names were at the front of our minds, and I believed I had just come across the coolest name ever. But what was the bearer of that name doing in France in 1916, in aerial combat, no less? Like many Americans, I knew next to nothing about World War One, but I knew that we had not entered the war until 1917.

During the next few years, I tried to learn more about this boy named Kiffin, and of how he came to be fighting and dying in France during the time that the United States was officially neutral and President Woodrow Wilson was campaigning for re-election using the slogan “he kept us out of war.” Through sporadic research over the years, I learned the basic outlines of a remarkable story: long before their own country entered the conflict that would redefine the world, a handful of young American men ignored President Wilson’s declared neutrality and risked their lives fighting on the side of France and, as they saw it, civilization itself.

Initially fighting in the trenches, many of these idealistic volunteers eventually took to the skies as part of the first generation of fighter pilots. A good number of these boys, many from some of the wealthiest and most privileged families in America, willingly sacrificed everything to repay what they saw as a debt owed by their nation based on the heroic actions and support of the Marquis de Lafayette and France when America was engaged in its struggle for independence from Britain. Kiffin Rockwell was one of these boys, and with his brother Paul in early August of 1914, he was likely the very first volunteer to leave America’s shores to defend France.

While many history buffs are familiar with the broad outlines of the story of the Lafayette Escadrille, as the all-American flying squadron fighting for France would eventually be called, I was amazed to learn of the noble sacrifices made by these boys who had everything to lose. But as a practicing attorney with young children and a very busy life, my interest in the story never advanced beyond a general desire to know more.

That all changed when, in 2014, my son was born on the exact 100-year anniversary of the day that Kiffin and Paul Rockwell enlisted in the French Foreign Legion in Paris. We named our little boy Kiffin and, my interest in the story rekindled, I began five years of research and writing that truly changed my life. Working at nights, on weekends, and during my daily commute to downtown Chicago where I still practice as an attorney, I began to uncover the details of the remarkable story of “the boys who remembered Lafayette,” as I began to think of them.