05/18/2026
It has been a while since we last shared a family story, and I thought this one was especially worth telling. It illustrates not only one family’s sacrifices, but also many realities of life in the United States during the era of the First World War.
Private First Class Howard H. Morrow was born on 6 April 1900, likely in Baltimore, Maryland, to William Joseph and Grace Ann (Marshall) Morrow. His parents had married when William was twenty-one and Grace only fifteen. Howard was the fifth of their seven children.
Howard’s father worked as an electrician for the Potomac Power Company but died in 1914 at the age of forty-three. Soon afterward, Grace remarried Harry Skirven Payne, a man twelve years her junior and only twelve years older than Howard himself. Harry already had a young son and took in Grace’s minor children as part of the household. By then, Howard’s older siblings had either already married and left home or soon would.
The family had already experienced tragedy before the war. In 1916, Howard’s older sister, Florence Lillian (Morrow) Krowe, died of pulmonary tuberculosis at the age of twenty-one, leaving behind her husband and a one-year-old son.
Too young to be accepted into the District of Columbia National Guard, Howard instead enlisted in the Maryland National Guard in 1917, likely with a parent’s consent, as he was still underage. He joined his unit when it was reorganized as Company H, 115th Infantry Regiment, at Camp McClellan, Alabama, before departing for France aboard the transport George Washington in June 1918.
By the time of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, Private Morrow had almost certainly already experienced combat. During that campaign, he was wounded in action. Evacuated to a hospital near Verdun—likely Glorieux Hospital—he died of his wounds on 11 October 1918.
Howard was posthumously promoted to the rank of Private First Class and awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for extraordinary heroism. His citation reads:
“The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 9, 1918, takes pride in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross (Posthumously) to Private First Class Howard H. Morrow (ASN: 1285169), United States Army, for extraordinary heroism in action while serving with Company F, 115th Infantry Regiment, 29th Division, A.E.F., near Bois-de-Consenvoye, France, 8 October 1918. Going forward from his own lines through terrific machine-gun and artillery fire, Private Morrow rescued and brought to safety a wounded comrade. In the action of the next few days he was so severely wounded that he died shortly afterwards.”
Today, PFC Morrow rests in an unmarked grave near his father in Bethel Cemetery in Alexandria, Virginia.
As noted in the accompanying death notice, Howard was believed to have been the youngest Maryland National Guardsman to die in service. In reality, several younger Guardsmen also lost their lives, and likely many more survived the war. At the time, it was not uncommon for eager young men—and women—to conceal or adjust their ages in order to enlist.
Howard’s own sister, Theresa Martha Morrow, born in May 1901, apparently “fudged” her birth year by one year to enter service with the U.S. Navy Reserve. She served on active duty during the war as a Yeoman First Class. Howard’s older brother, Private William Joseph Morrow, also served, assigned to the 104th Engineer Train of the 29th Division. Although both brothers served in France, it is unknown whether they ever had the opportunity to see one another overseas.
Grace Morrow Payne would endure still more loss. After Howard’s death in 1918, she outlived two additional children: Earl, who died at nineteen in 1925, and Theresa, who died at fifty-three in 1954. Grace herself passed away in 1955 at the age of seventy-nine.
The photo accompanying the death notice is likely the only surviving image of Howard if, indeed, there was ever any other. The poor quality was simply unavoidable.
