The Maine Department of Defense, Veterans and Emergency Management was established to coordinate and improve the discharge of the State Government’s responsibility relating to military, veterans and civil emergency management through the authorization, planning, provision of resources, administration, operation and audit activities in these areas.
It contains the Office of Adjutant General, which has existed for most of the State’s history and played a leading role in Maine’s participation in the Civil War. Its extensive records, now at the State Archives, of Maine’s participation in the Civil War is a treasure for re-enactors, authors, and family history researchers.
One veteran, and Maine’s first astronaut and Air Force Test pilot, was Robert Rushworth of Madison. He flew the rocket plane known as the X-15, in which he attained an altitude of 54 miles on June 27, 1963.
Houlton Veterans Memorial
The veterans memorial in Houlton (right) is one of many that follow the model of the national Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C. The black background with names of casualties appears in many communities across the state, in contrast to the Civil War and other earlier memorials. For example, Allagash, Norridgewock, and Sherman.
A strikingly different approach is that of the Vietnam Memorial in Augusta’s Capitol Park.
To locate photos of other veterans’ memorials, type “veterans” (no quotes) in the SEARCH box, upper right. Then select the articles listed.
Maine has shared in the casualties of war, including a relatively high proportion in the Civil War. Veteran memorials are found in every town. The one at right is adjacent to the Carey Memorial Library in Houlton, with a World War II veteran pondering its list.
| War | Served | Killed |
| Civil War | 72,945 | 7,322 |
| World War I | 35,061 | 1,026 |
| World War II | 112,962 | 2,551 |
| Korean War | 40,099 | 233 |
| Vietnam War | 48,000 | 332 |
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Congressional Medal of Honor
The following are the number of Cogressional Medal of Honor recipients from Maine, listed by military conflict. Search “Medal of Honor” (no quotes) in the SEARCH box, upper right to view the communities whose residents received the medal, and the names of the recipients.
| Conflict | No. |
| Civil War | 67 |
| Indian Wars | 8 |
| Interim 1866-1870 | 1 |
| Korean Campaign | 1 |
| Interim 1871-1898 | 1 |
| Spanish-American War | 2 |
| Philippine Insurrection | 1 |
| World War II | 5 |
| Korean War | 4 |
| Vietnam War | 3 |
| Somalia | 1 |
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“Maine” recipients, for this compilation, are those who were born in Maine, entered the armed forces in Maine, or served in a Maine unit at the time of the award.
The President, in the name of Congress, has awarded more than 3,400 Medals of Honor to our nation’s bravest Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, and Coast Guardsmen since the decoration’s creation in 1861.
The breakdown of these for Maine is a duplicate of that in a published congressional compilation. Likewise, some minor misspelling and other errors are duplicated from the official government volume. These likely were the result of the original transcriptions. View the index of the full-text files for Maine by each war listed above under Conflict.
Additional resources
Committee on Veterans’ Affairs. U.S. Senate, Medal of Honor Recipients: 1863-1973. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office. 1973, 1979.