Lieutenant Frank McConnell (1896-1918) was the first Richmond Hill resident killed in World War I. A star member of the Princeton crew team, McConnell was killed on July 26, 1918 in northern France during the Second Battle of the Marne. This battle marked a turning point of the war. On July 18, 1918, the Allied commander, General Ferdinand Foch, counterattacked German troops with forces that included McConnell’s division. At Château-Thierry, American troops won their first decisive victory of the war by forcing German troops back across the Marne in what was one of the first large-scale retreats by the German army.