Canastota resident returns home from annual training
Some 330 Soldiers of the New York Army National Guard return home from training at Fort Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania following two weeks of training conducted August 2-26.
The Soldiers, assigned to the 369th Sustainment Brigade, the 727th Military Police Law and Order Detachment and the 14th Finance Detachment, conducted individual combat tasks such as weapons qualification, casualty treatment and evacuation, obstacle course training, hand grenade training and other Soldier tasks.
Captain Jonathan Pettit from Canastota completed annual training August 24 with the 369th Sustainment Brigade Headquarters.
The Soldiers of the 369th Sustainment Brigade, the largest contingent of troops, are trained to oversee the operations of logistics and transportation units to provide support for American and allied troops. The 727th Law and Order is a military police unit based at Camp Smith and the 14th Finance, based in Whitestone provides fiscal services to deployed units.
The 369th Sustainment Brigade is expected to mobilize in the coming weeks for overseas service and a number of these Soldiers will join their unit in preparing for a ten-month deployment later this year.
The unit has deployed troops to Mali and Cameroon in support of the United States Africa Command in training exercises with African militaries. Soldiers of the 369th also played a key role in providing logistics support during the New York National Guard’s response to Super Storm Sandy in 2012.
The 369th Sustainment Brigade is headquartered at the historic 5th Avenue Armory in Harlem, New York City, but is currently operating out of Camp Smith while the armory is being renovated.
The 369th was originally organized as the 15th New York Infantry in 1916 in Harlem and was an African-American unit in the segregated Army of the time.
When the United States entered World War I in 1917, the unit was federalized and renamed the 369th Infantry.
The Soldiers served in combat under French command and earned a regimental Croix de Guerre and many individual awards for heroism while serving under fire for 191 days in 1918. They were reportedly dubbed the Hell Fighters by their German opponents.
Sgt. Henry Johnson of Albany was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor in 2015 for his World War I heroism while serving in the 369th.