Though their service is often forgotten today, eight players from Major League Baseball died during World War I. One had been traded by the White Sox for the legendary “Shoeless” Joe Jackson.

Larry Chappell, an Illinois native who had seen time in the outfield for the Sox in 1914 and 1915, was at the height of his pro baseball career when he succumbed to influenza while in World War I service at age 28.

He had given up the game to enlist and died just four months later. Of the eight major leaguers who perished in World War I service, four were due to influenza.

Born LaVerne Chappell on Feb. 19, 1890, in the tiny Jersey County village of McClusky, north of St. Louis, Chappell played semipro ball in Alton before breaking into the pros in 1911. That year, he batted .295 in 101 games with the Eau Claire franchise of the Class C Minnesota-Wisconsin League.

Class C reflects a classification that no longer exists. The current designations of Class AAA, AA, A, and rookie level began in 1963. In its earlier days, leagues were classified in descending order as AA, A, B, C and D.

In 1912, the 6-foot, 186-pound Chappell moved to the top of the minors with Milwaukee in the Class AA American Association, where he hit .274 with five homers in 131 games. Normally a left fielder who batted left and threw right, he returned to Milwaukee in 1913, and hit a searing .349 with five homers and 12 steals in 85 games.

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Milwaukee won the pennant in 1913 at 100-67. Chappell, however, had already moved on. That July 14, he was traded to the Chicago White Sox in a three-player deal. The Sox also paid $13,500 in the transaction, a high amount for the era.

He made his major league debut on July 18 and appeared in a total of 60 games, finishing with a .231 average and 15 RBI in 59 starts, mainly in left. Among his teammates was the brilliant catcher Ray Schalk, a Harvel, Illinois, native who was in the early stages of a Hall of Fame career.

He matched his average in 1914 with the White Sox, but only saw action in 21 games, with seven starts. Chappell returned to Milwaukee for most of the 1915 season and found his old form, hitting .309 in 139 games. He was hitless in his only at-bat that year with the Sox, who rolled to a 93-61 mark.

In August of that season, Chicago swung a trade with Cleveland for Jackson, who had hit .408, .395, .373 and .338 in his first four years in the majors. The Sox sent $31,500, two players, and a player to be named for Jackson. On Feb. 14, 1916, that “player to be named” was Chappell, completing the deal.

A lifetime .356 hitter, Jackson was one of eight players banned from baseball for life for fixing the 1919 World Series.

As Jackson went on to baseball lore, Chappell wound up his major league career. Cleveland sold him to the Boston Braves on Aug. 26, 1916, for $18,000, and he played in a total of 27 games for those two franchises over the 1916 and 1917 seasons. Most of those years were spent with Columbus of the Class AA American Association, where he batted a combined .287.

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In 1918, Chappell landed with the Salt Lake City franchise of the Class AA Pacific Coast League, one of the famed minor league circuits of all time. Before the Dodgers and Giants both moved to California before the 1958 season, the PCL was hugely popular on the West Coast, drawing crowds that rivaled the attendance of the major leagues.

In a region with great weather, the PCL routinely played 180-200 games a year and featured teams in San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland and Seattle, all of which would later be home to the big leagues. Celebrities often attended PCL games, and many players preferred the PCL to the majors, since the pay was often better.

Chappell flourished in the PCL and was batting .325, near the top of the league, in 77 games played. A Salt Lake City paper described him as “a great favorite with the fans, and many came to the ballpark only to see him perform.” But in late June, reports surfaced that Chappell and two teammates were leaving to join the military.

He served in the U.S. Army’s Medical Corps, stationed at Letterman General Hospital in San Francisco, which was reportedly the Army’s largest hospital of the time. But on Nov. 2, the Alton Telegraph reported that Chappell’s parents in Jersey County had received a telegram, informing them that he was seriously ill.

It would prove to be influenza, part of a global outbreak that killed 675,000 Americans. The disease also was responsible for four of the eight deaths from Major League Baseball in the war. Chappell became one of those victims when he died at Letterman on Nov. 8, 1918.

A week later, his body arrived in Jerseyville, where he was buried in Oak Grove Cemetery on Nov. 17.

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In addition to Chappell, four other major leaguers with either Chicago or St. Louis connections died in “The Great War.” One was catcher Harry Chapman, who had played in one game for the Cubs on Oct. 6, 1912, going 1-for-4 with a triple, an RBI, and a run scored in a 4-3 win over St. Louis.

Chapman later played briefly with Cincinnati and the St. Louis Browns, and also spent two years in the Federal League, a third major league that operated in 1914 and 1915. In 1917, Chapman joined the military but died from pneumonia, caused by the influenza outbreak, while in service at a hospital in Nevada, Missouri, on Oct. 21, 1918.

In addition, Newt Halliday, a Chicago native who appeared in one game for Pittsburgh in August 1916, died of tuberculosis while in service at the Great Lakes Naval Station on April 6, 1918. Tom Burr, another Chicago native, played just one inning for the New York Yankees on April 21, 1914. Three years later, he was in the U.S. Air Service.

Burr died on Oct. 12, 1918, during a drill at a gunnery school in France when his plane collided with another in mid-air.

There was also Harry Glenn, a catcher who appeared in six games for the Cardinals in 1915, his only big-league experience. An Army private, Glenn died of influenza in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Oct. 12, 1918.

In addition to the eight major league players, an estimated 65 men with minor league baseball experience also died in World War I.

• Tom Emery is a freelance writer and historical researcher from Carlinville, Illinois. He may be reached at 217-710-8392 or ilcivilwar@yahoo.com.