The First Americans Killed in World War I. A report from the Western Front in World War I tells of the first exchange of fire between Americans and Germans, and the first three U.S. combat deaths. On the night of November 3, 1917, German soldiers raided a trench in the French sector of the Western Front. However, this particular section of the trenches was held by American troops. There was intense fighting as the Germans surprised the Americans. When the fight was over, the Germans took 12 Americans back to their lines for interrogation. They left three Americans dead. In the year and nine days that remained of the warm those first American combat deaths would be followed by 53,000, as well as 63,000 non-combat deaths, mostly from the influenza epidemic that swept through the trenches.
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