Star Tribune April 27, 2006
Minnesota's Old Guard
The Minnesota National Guard turned 150 years old last week. Its origins trace to the Minnesota Territory's Pioneer Guard in 1856.
The National Guard is called to protect America from reckless attack by loosely organized foreign foes. Troops are forced to buy their own equipment. Weary citizen soldiers fret about jobs and homes during back-to-back deployments.
Sound familiar? It's nothing new.
It wasn't body armor soldiers were buying for themselves in 1856, it was uniforms for the fledgling territorial militia, the Pioneer Guard.
Minnesota National Guard members were protecting the U.S.-Mexican border against Mexican rebel Pancho Villa in 1916, nine decades before they started serving on various fronts in a war on terror.
In April 1917, less than a year after state Guard members returned from Camp Llano Grande in Texas, they were dispatched to training as the United States entered World War I.
The Minnesota National Guard turned 150 last week. From the jungles of the Philippines to controversial missions to quell labor unrest at home, the Guard has played a dramatic part in the state's history -- often heroically, occasionally not.
At a critical moment in the Battle of Gettysburg, 290 soldiers of the First Minnesota Infantry joined a charge to repulse a Confederate attack on the Union position on Cemetery Ridge. About 170 were killed or wounded, a 60 percent casualty rate. On the next day the remaining Minnesotans helped repel Pickett's Charge, considered the turning point of the battle.
On a different occasion, in 1872, a Brainerd mob lynched two American Indians. The act precipitated the "Blueberry War," during which the National Guard was called to calm what was thought to be an Indian retaliatory raid.
The Indians actually had just picked blueberries and were coming to sell them to the locals.
MARK BRUNSWICK
Four Ages of the Minnesota Guard
Sources: Minnesota National Guard, Minnesota Historical Society, GlobalSecurity.org.
1. Beginnings and the Civil War
In 1856, when the Pioneer Guard was established, every man in Minnesota of military age was automatically included. But the early militia rarely met except for socializing.
The First Minnesota Infantry regiment was among the first militia units in the nation to respond to President Lincoln's call for troops in April 1861. During three years of volunteer service, the regiment fought at Bull Run, Antietam, Gettysburg and Fredericksburg.
The Minnesota National Guard was the first to volunteer for service in the Philippines and Cuba during the Spanish-American War of 1898. One of three Minnesota regiments, the 13th Volunteer, suffered more casualties than all other regiments combined during a key confrontation to free the Philippines.
"The 13th was right in the middle of it in the Philippines," said Stephen Osman, a senior researcher for the Minnesota Historical Society and former site manager for Historic Fort Snelling. "You see pictures and it looks like Vietnam, the way these guys are dressed for the jungle; bearded, rugged and tough, and all carrying knives and handguns."
2. World wars and labor strife
The Minnesota National Guard was mobilized for World War I. Many Guard members saw action in France. The 109th Observation Squadron of the Minnesota National Guard became the first Air National Guard unit in the country in 1921.
Back home, Minnesota National Guard units were called to break up picket lines of striking packing plant workers in South St. Paul in 1921, and again, in the 1934 Minneapolis truck drivers' strike -- the largest in state history.
As World War II loomed, a tank company of the Minnesota Guard from Brainerd was ordered to the Philippines in 1941 to shore up American defenses against Japan. They were pushed into the Bataan Peninsula and ultimately endured the Bataan Death March.
The Guard's 175th Field Artillery, as part of the 34th "Red Bull Division," were among the first American troops deployed to Europe in January of 1942 and were credited with more combat days than any other division in Europe.
3. Strikes and campus unrest
Many Guard members, seasoned World War II veterans, were called up for Korea and served in the occupation of Germany.
In 1959, DFL Gov. Orville Freeman sent Guard troops to Albert Lea to quell violence in a meat-packing labor dispute. The Guard kept the doors closed when management tried to hire replacement workers.
While the Minnesota Guard was never officially mobilized during Vietnam, the Air Guard flew supply and transport missions to Southeast Asia. The Minnesota National Guard was mobilized to deal with civil unrest during antiwar demonstrations at the University of Minnesota in the early 1970s and the Hormel strike in Austin, Minn., in the mid-1980s.
4. Floods, blizzards and post-9/11
Minnesota National Guard troops have served in peacekeeping roles in the former Yugoslavia, including 1,100 troops who served in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo.
After Sept. 11, 2001, the Guard provided airport security and the Duluth-based 148th Fighter Wing's F-16s flew patrols for a longer period than any other air defense unit.
More than 11,000 members of the Minnesota National Guard have been called up for full-time service since Sept. 11, including service in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and Iraq.
More than 2,600 members of the Minnesota National Guard, serving in the 1st Brigade Combat Team of the 34th Infantry Division, are now part of the state's largest troop deployment since World War II.
Meanwhile , the Guard has performed its traditional domestic functions, including mobilization for Red River flooding in 1997, providing security after a natural-gas explosion in St. Cloud in 1998 and assisting in the search for missing University of North Dakota student Dru Sjodin in 2003.
As recently as November 2005, as much of western Minnesota dug out from snowstorm, the Guard was activated to help provide relief. In April, Gov. Tim Pawlenty authorized the mobilization of 135 National Guard soldiers to help in Clay and Norman counties, where some small towns were experiencing record flood crests.
© Copyright 2006, Star Tribune
