WORTH McKENZIE LEWIS was born in June 1897 in Jefferson County, Alabama, the son of Thomas Dix Lewis and Maud McKenzie, who had moved to Bessemer, in Jefferson County, from Butler County. Worth enlisted for service with the National Guard on the Mexican border in 1916, and then became a sergeant in Co. D, 167th Infantry of the Rainbow Division. He was killed in action during the Battle of Croix Rouge Farm on July 26, 1918, and he is buried in the Oise-Aisne American Cemetery in Fere-en-Tardenois, France. There is a memorial marker for him in Elmwood Cemetery, Birmingham, where his parents are buried.

The American Legion Post in Bessemer (Jefferson County, Alabama) is named for Sgt. Worth M. Lewis, and in 1937 a portion of Bessemer Highway 11 (the "Gold Star Highway") was dedicated to his memory. His name is inscribed on the identification tags of the fallen soldier being carried by his comrade, depicted in the bronze sculpture of the Rainbow Division Memorial at Croix Rouge Farm in France. This memorial was commissioned and donated by Nimrod T. Frazer of Montgomery, Alabama, whose father, William J. Frazer, served in Company D, 167th Infantry Regiment, 42nd Rainbow Division.