This U.S. Marine fought at Belleau Wood in June 1918. The 4th Marine Brigade battled through the wood for twenty-six days during the German Spring Offensive, advancing across open wheat fields into entrenched machine guns, wire, and gas. By the time they had cleared it they had taken nearly 5,000 casualties. The Germans, the story goes, called them Teufelhunden — Devil Dogs — a name the Corps still carries. Belleau Wood made the modern Marine Corps' reputation, and the French afterward renamed the wood itself the Bois de la Brigade de Marine in the Marines' honor.

The pump-action shotgun was an American innovation in the trenches. The Winchester M1897 and Remington Model 10 were issued to a few men in each company for trench clearing and close-range work where a bolt-action rifle was too slow; the Germans formally protested the weapon as illegal under the Hague Convention, and the United States dismissed the complaint. W. Britain sculpts this Marine in the firing pose, shotgun shouldered, in the M1917 helmet and wool service dress with full pack and puttees. A trench-gunner is a rare figure in any WWI collection, and he rounds out a Belleau Wood squad beside a Marine advancing with rifle and a Marine standing firing, with a Marine carrying the Chauchat laying down automatic fire.

W. Britain model 13076. 1/30 scale (approximately 60mm), matte-painted metal. Single foot figure in the firing pose on a sculpted groundwork base. Boxed.