Harry Cook

Harry Cook¹

• Birth*: 27 October 1891; Pottstown, Montgomery Co., Pennsylvania^1,2,3,4
• Death: 5 December 1918; France⁴
• Death*: 5 December 1918; France; Railroad accident.⁵

Parents:

Notes

• Note*: Memorial stone Edgewood Cemetery, Pottstown⁶
• Note: Death announcement - Redlands Facts, 15 Jan 1919
  
  Harry Cook Dies Over In France
  
  Official confirmation of the death of Lieut. Harry Cook of this city in France on December 5 was received today by his mother, Mrs. Edgar S. Cook, notification coming from the war department. Death was the result of a railroad wreck, five other officers and three enlisted men being killed in the same wreck. Whether Mr. Cook met death instantly or not is not known, as details have not been received. However, it is known that the decedent was en route from Paris to Tours at the time of the accident. A letter received here recently was dated December 4 and stated that on the following day he expected to leave Paris for Tours.
  
  Mrs. Cook, who is seriously ill at her home on Summit avenue, was told of her son's death this morning, following receipt of official information. Rumors of the accident and the death of Mr. Cook had been afloat here for several days, but Mrs. Cook was not told of them.
  
  Capt. Joseph Cook, another son of Mrs. Cook, is due to arrive in San Francisco tomorrow from Persia, where he has been on detail in connection with Persian relief. A medical missionary of experience among the Persians, he has been accomplishing a wonderful lot of good since being sent to that country by the United States Government.
  
  Harry Cook was 27 years of age. He was a native of Pottstown, Pa., and came to Redland about six years ago, engaging in the orange industry, the family purchasing a grove on Texas street, near the Santa Ana river. In September of last year he entered the service through the local exemption board, being sent to Camp Lewis. From there he was transferred to Camp Cody at Deming, New Mexico; thence he went to officers' training camp at Camp Stanley, near San Antonio. In April of this year he was sent overseas, soon arriving at the artillery school of fire at Samur in France, remaining for about three months. The opportunity offering he then went into aviation and was located at Tours and Bordeaux. A few days before the armistice was signed he was sent to the front as an aerial observer.
  
  Mr. Cook was a young man of fine character. He had a large circle of friends who will regret his passing and will give an abundance of sympathy to the members of the bereaved family. His father, Edgar Cook, died here about two years ago.⁷
• Note: Excerpts from book about Ambassador Frances Willis
  
  Frances first met Harry Cook after the Willis family settled in Redlands in 1916. Apparently it didn't take long for romance to develop, which soon became a most serious affair. Family lore has it that they became informally engaged (engaged but with no ring display) around 1917 while Frances was attending the University of Redlands...The war ended and...he was killed, much to the shock and sorrow both of the Cooks and a young lass of nineteen...
  in 1937...in a letter to [her mother]:
  "I did so want to go on to Saumur and other places Harry had been but had to content myself with spending Sunday in Tours, as he used to....I did at times...feel that Harry was very near and that meant a great deal. I trust that his influence will never go out of my life no matter how final and complete and physical the separation."⁸