Home > World War I > Alvin C. York Biography

December 13, 1887
Pall Mall, Tennessee
September 2, 1964
Nashville, Tennessee

Farmer, mountain man, humanitarian

The story of Sergeant Alvin C. York embodies one of the great contradictions of war. If killing is wrong, how can society justify war? Further, how can nations convince good people to suspend the normal rules of civilization during wartime so that they can kill the enemy? A religious man who had sincerely tried to become a better person through devotion to his church, York had never been more than fifty miles from his home when he was sent to fight in France during World War I. Although he was a most unwilling soldier, York used the shooting skills he had developed in the mountains of Tennessee to become one of the most famous heroes of the war. However, York was not proud of his talent for killing, and he never wanted fame for it. He spent his life after the war...