Author: Jessica A. Bandel
Kenansville native Owen Hill Kenan boarded the Lusitania in May 1915 bound for Europe. His voyage was thwarted, however, when a German u-boat fired a torpedo into the ship’s hull, sending her to the bottom of the Irish Sea. Kenan survived the ordeal and was compelled by the attack to join the Allied war effort. Since the United States had not yet entered the fray, Kenan--a physician by training--joined the American Ambulance Field Service, an organization of American volunteers tasked with transporting wounded from the battlefield to hospital facilities.
Kenan’s selfless service and courage under fire earned him a Croix de Guerre. Upon America’s formal commitment to the war in 1917, Kenan transferred to the Medical Corps and returned to Europe, where he served from December 1917 to October 1919. He left the service with the rank of colonel and returned to the civilian world to once again take up his medical practice.
This dispatch bag was used by Kenan while in the Field Service and is one of many Kenan-related artifacts held by the North Carolina Museum of History. Visitors to the museum’s World War I exhibit (opening in April) will be able to view his pocket watch--on loan from the Liberty Hall Museum-- that survived the Lusitania sinking with him, its hands frozen at the exact time the attack occurred.