Alvan C. Read – Colonel, United States Army

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Alvan Chambliss Read was born 11 September 1873 at Valley Farm, Marshall County, Tennessee. He grew up in Louisiana and graduated from Louisiana State University in 1892 and earned a Master’s degree from the same school in 1893, while also teaching there. He then won an appointment to the 1898 class of the United States Military Academy.

Read was called “Ceedy” as a cadet and was remembered in C Company for always making it to formation just on time.

Read fought at San Juan Hill, winning the Silver Star Citation, but became ill with yellow fever while in Cuba. Recovering from his illness, he rejoined his regiment and fought in the Philippine Insurrection.

Read served as a Professor of Military Science and Tactics at Louisiana State University and served in the Inspector General Division as a member of the American Expeditionary Forces, receiving the Distinguished Service Medal. Read remained at Coblenz as the Inspector General of the Third Army and then the American forces in Germany until his death of pneumonia there on 19 January 1920 at age 46.

Information From Lawrence G. Kautz: December 2008

If you are interested, you might add information about Frances Kautz Read to your page for Alvan Chambliss Read.  She was the daughter of General August V. Kautz, born 11 April, 1875 at Fort Whipple, Arizona Territory, died 1962.  She was the author of several semi-successful stage plays and several books of poetry.

THE UNIVERSAL PLAN—By Frances Kautz Read

We cannot see the Universal Plan
Through this small peep-hole
That we call the world.

We are not fragments from the ether
Hurled by chance,
To flicker once and die,
Nor can we say we know the life of any man
Until we know the Pattern of the Whole,
The vestures of his migratory soul.
He is not made or marred in this one span.

What we consider inspiration here
Is not a gift, but fruit of labor earned,
And he who by an unjust fate is spurned,
—Or so we think
….upon another sphere has shirked.

For in our countless lives
It is the law! He only mounts who strives.

acread-usma-photo-01

READ, ALVAN C

  • COLONEL INF USA
  • DATE OF DEATH: 01/19/1920
  • BURIED AT: SECTION 3  SITE LOT 346
    ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY

READ, FRANCES K WIDOW OF ALVAN CHAMBLISS

  • DATE OF BIRTH: 04/11/1874
  • DATE OF DEATH: 12/13/1962
  • BURIED AT: SECTION 3  SITE 4346 EH
    ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY

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