151st Field Artillery Regiment

The 151st Field Artillery is one of the oldest, most decorated units in the Minnesota National Guard. Its performance in combat during World War I as part of the Forty-second “Rainbow” Division, and during World War II with the Thirty-fourth “Red Bull” Division, drew high praise from senior Army commanders and remains a source of pride to the soldiers in its ranks.

The 151st traces its beginnings to the Civil War. Organized at Fort Snelling in 1864 as the First Regiment of Heavy Artillery, Minnesota Volunteers, it took charge of heavy guns surrounding Chattanooga, Tennessee. After the war, it emerged as a light artillery battery in Minnesota’s fledgling National Guard. In 1893, it became the First Battalion of Artillery, consisting of Battery A in St. Paul and Battery B in Minneapolis. By 1913 it had grown into a regiment—the First Minnesota Field Artillery—with a First Battalion in St. Paul and Second Battalion in Minneapolis. Each battalion had three firing batteries.

Border attacks in 1916 by Mexican revolutionaries prompted President Wilson to activate the National Guard. The First Minnesota Field Artillery went to Camp Llano Grande on the southern tip of Texas. For seven months, it trained and patrolled the border along the Rio Grande.

It was activated again when the US entered Europe’s stalemated “Great War” in April 1917. The Army re-designated the regiment as the 151st Field Artillery and assigned it to a newly-created Forty-second “Rainbow” Division, made up of National Guard units from all parts of the country (thus the name “Rainbow”).

Commanded by Colonel George E. Leach of Minneapolis, the 151st shipped to France, where it fired French 75mm guns in six campaigns: Lorraine 1918, Champagne 1918, Champagne-Marne, Aisne-Marne, St. Mihiel, and the climactic Meuse-Argonne. An armistice was signed on November 11, 1918, ending the war. Although the entire Minnesota National Guard had been called up, the 151st—nicknamed the “Gopher Gunners”—was the only Minnesota National Guard unit to see combat. It received a tumultuous hero’s welcome upon returning home to Minnesota in May 1919.

The regiment became part of the Thirty-fourth Infantry Division when it was reconstituted in 1921. In February 1941, with Europe already at war, the Thirty-fourth Division was activated for a year of precautionary training at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana. Enlistments were extended for the duration when the US entered World War II that December. The Army restructured its infantry divisions and the regiment’s First Battalion was re-designated as the 151st Field Artillery Battalion; its Second Battalion became the 175th Field Artillery Battalion.

The new battalion embarked from New York harbor with other elements of the Thirty-fourth Division on January 15, 1942, becoming the very first contingent of American troops to sail for Europe in the war. After training in Northern Ireland, the unit proceeded to the battlefields of Tunisia. From mid-February to mid-May 1943, it fired British 25-pounder howitzers against German forces until the enemy withdrew from North Africa.

In September 1943, the battalion was temporarily attached to the Thirty-sixth Infantry Division to aid in establishing a beachhead at Salerno, Italy. After rejoining the Thirty-fourth, it provided artillery support—now using US M2 105mm howitzers—for the tough Italian campaigns that followed: Naples-Foggia; Anzio; Rome-Arno; North Apennines; and, finally, Po Valley. The war in Europe ended in May 1945. By the time the 151st got back to the US in November, its battle-hardened soldiers had spent over four years and eight months on active duty.

When war swept over Korea in the summer of 1950, the US immediately dispatched troops to aid the South Koreans. The 151st, as part of the Forty-seventh “Viking” Infantry Division, was sent in January 1951 to Camp Rucker, Alabama. For two years it trained replacements for combat units in the Far East Command.

Few National Guardsmen were activated to fight in Vietnam (1964‒73), although some units, including the 151st, were designated as a Selected Reserve Force (SRF). They received additional training and prepared for deployment on short notice, but the call never came.

After the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the Guard became an operational force of the Army rather than a strategic reserve. This meant that for most National Guard soldiers, deployments became the “new normal” due to on-going conflict in the Middle East. The First Battalion, 151st Field Artillery, deployed to Iraq for a year in 2005‒2006 and to Kuwait and Iraq in 2009‒2010.