Posted 14 years ago
bahamaboy
(224 items)
This was my dads. he served in the U.S. Army under Douglas MacArthur in the Philippines. He was part of the Bataan death march, caught jaundice, went from 190lbs down to 78lbs. Very nearly died but because of a fellow soldier he made the march, was then nursed back to health and continued the fight until "V.J. Day" (victory over Japan) As you see he made the rank of Sargent and was an excellent marksman and was briefly involved with a sniper unit. I have all of his other medals and ribbons and such but they are in the vaults at the bank. Maybe I'll dig them out and share them at a later date.
Your Father was a Technical Staff sgt. People generally say Sargent, instead of the different ranks of Sargent. Could be why its so confusing. Lowest to highest, Sargent(e-5), Staff Sargent(e-6), Sargent 1st class(e-7), Master Sargent (e-8) We had a few Death march survivors in my town, One just passed away, but we have one or two left! there is a anual battan death march, Where alot of Local national gaurd members endure a 10-20mile run.
Thank you for looking and thank you for the info and your comment. I'm sure there are very few survivors left being as how all that served, were born in the early 1920's and before. I had several relatives that served that were well under the age of 18. One was only 15 (soon to be 16) That is damn young to go and fight anywhere. But the patriotism was so intense at that time, the likes never to be seen again I suspect.
No problem! Anytime! WWII vets are hard to find these days. My great uncle is a WWII US Army vet, He fought the Germans. Most WWII'ers are late 80s up into the 90s. I would suggest interviewing your remaining vets in your family before its too late. I wish I could do that.
Unfortunately they are already all gone. The man that wore this uniform died in 1986 at the age of 65. His job as an air traffic controller I think, being the reason. My step dad Val (age 83-too young for service at the time) and step uncle are the only ones left that are near that age and Dorsey (age 92 & in almost perfect health), my step uncle was in the Navy and stationed at Pearl Harbor the day the Japs attacked. In fact he was the one who gave me the newspapers, 1st 2nd & 3rd editions of the Honolulu Star Bulletin printed on Dec. 7th 1941 I have those three papers posted among my stuff here at C.W. Thanks again for your help.
Your father's collar insignia shows he was with the Army Corps of Engineer and his shoulder patch is for Army Amphibian Units. The ruptured duck patch is for WW2 Honorable Discharge.
Very interesting. Thank you so much for clearing up all of that of which I was unsure about. There are some other pics I want to post of the detail of the patches, stripes etc that I would love for you and others to take a look at. The main thing that is not shown in my pics here or on the other pins/medals is the stripes on the lower left sleeve of his uniform. Also why would one set of his Sargent patches show gold chevrons and the ones on this uniform show gray ones. One additional item of question is what is the large "T" stand for below the chevrons on the Sargent patch? And lastly do the two black lines along two of the three chevrons indicate E-6 while only one would indicate E-5 and three would indicate E-7? Much thanks for all the help from everyone. Boy do I love learning. It's absolutely what makes me tick. Thanks again!
The T I believe stands for technical Sargent.
Thank you Driewer for that additional info.