Index to the General Orders of the 101st Airborne Division, in WWII
Statistics:
Distinguished Service
Cross 2
Recommended for the Distinguished Service Cross 1
Silver Star Medals 541
Distinguished Flying Cross 1
Soldier’s Medals 9
Recommended for the Legion of Merit 1
Bronze Star Medals 7,460
Air Medals 72
Purple Heart Medals 8,179
Combat Infantryman Badge 11
Combat Medic’s Badges 245
Recommended for (British) Distinguished Service Orders 2
Recommended for Legion of Honor 3
Recommended for French Croix de Guerre 2
(Belgian) Commanders of the Order of Leopold w/palm 2
(Belgian) Officer of the Order of
Leopold w/palm 5
(Belgian) Knights of the Order of
Leopold w/palm 8
(Belgian) Officer of the Order of the
Crown w/palm 9
(Belgian) Knights of the Order of the
Crown w/palm 12
(Belgian) Military Decorations w/palm 60
(Belgian) Croix de Guerre w/palm 87
Battle Losses 2,809
Total Awards 16,712
This book has 352 pages
ISBN 978-1-932891-30-0
ISBN 1-932891-30-7
Library of Congress Control Number 2004-559022
101st Airborne Division's WWII Order of Battle
Headquarters Company
327th Glider Infantry Regiment
401st Glider Infantry Regiment
502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment
506th Parachute Infantry Regiment
Headquarters Battery, 101st Airborne Division
Artillery
321st Glider Field Artillery Battalion
377th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion
463rd Parachute Field Artillery Battalion
907th Glider Field Artillery Battalion
326th Airborne Engineer Combat Battalion
326th Airborne Medical Company
81st Airborne Anti-Aircraft Battalion
101st Counter Intelligence Corps Detachment
Headquarters, Special Troops
801st Airborne Ordnance Maintenance Company
426th Airborne Quartermaster Company
101st Airborne Signal Company
101st Parachute Maintenance Company
Military Police Platoon
Units attached during combat operations*:
501st Parachute Infantry Regiment
509th Parachute Infantry Battalion
759th Tank Battalion
774th Tank Battalion
611th Tank Destroyer Battalion
705th Tank Destroyer Battalion
807th Tank Destroyer Battalion
813th Tank Destroyer Battalion
567th AAA Auto-Weapons Battalion
*the time period of each attachment varies
WWII Campaigns
Normandy
Rhineland
Ardennes-Alsace
Central Europe
This is the twenty-sixth in a series of indexes of all the divisions, corps, armies and commands of the US Army during WWII. Others will be published as they are completed.
This work includes all decorations cited in the general orders of the 101st Airborne Division*. Please note that many decorations presented to members of the 101st Airborne Division may have been cited in general orders of other commands. Most awards of the Purple Heart Medal were cited in the general orders of the hospitals that the men were evacuated to and, therefore, not included in the work. This index does not attempt to list all of the awards of the Bronze Star Medal that were retroactively awarded under Change 13 to Army Regulation 600-45, Department of the Army, 4 November 1947. Most awards of the CIB and CMB were made in special orders of the respective Infantry Regiments. I have made no attempt to list the unit awards, awards of specific Battle Stars, and Good Conduct Medals.
This index also includes the names from the Adjutant General’s Battle Death Report of the 101st Airborne Division. This lists all the men from the 101st Airborne Division who gave their lives in combat. This work includes the Adjutant General’s Battle Death Report for the 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment.
The general orders of the 101st Airborne Division do not give complete unit assignments. These general orders just state the branch of service and glider or parachute if applicable. It is assumed that most decoration recipients were assigned to the 101st Airborne Division, unless they are listed in a branch of service that was not organic to this division. (Example Tank Destroyer Battalion, etc.). It is hard to determine from the general orders if the decoration recipient was part of the 101st Airborne Division or was a member of a unit attached to the division. The possibility of errors occur with decoration recipients whose branch of service is listed as armored infantry or field artillery. Recipients listed as armored infantry could have been assigned to an armored infantry battalion of the 10th Armored Division during the siege of Batagone or were members of an independent tank battalion attached to the 101st Airborne Division. A similar issue arises when dealing with recipients with only, field artillery noted in the general order, as they could have been members of an artillery unit attached to the 101st Airborne Division, tank destroyer battalion or an organic artillery unit of the 101st Airborne Division. Please note that some decoration recipients may have been assigned to Headquarters, 101st Airborne Division or Headquarters, 101st Airborne Division Artillery but are listed in line organizations, because I have no way of knowing which men were in headquarters units and which were in line units. From my observations of the limited number of men from these headquarters units actually cited in the general orders, I feel that it is highly likely that they were listed by their branch of service rather than their unit of assignment. Confusing the matter some of the general orders list units while others just branch of service and some general orders are a mix of the both. Therefore, the unit listed in this reference is just a guide and all entries should be verified by another source.
The 501st Parachute Infantry, 506th Parachute Infantry, and the 463rd Parachute Field Artillery Battalion were attached to the 101st Airborne Division during most of the 101st Airborne Division’s combat operations. The latter two units were officially assigned to the division in March of 1945; the former was never assigned to the division. From a strictly technical point of view, they were not actually organic parts of the division until very late in the European Campaign, if at all. In this work, I have overlooked this fact and listed members of the above units as members of the 101st Airborne Division since they were associated with the 101st Airborne Division during most, if not all, of the combat operations in which the 101st Airborne Division participated. The reason for this is that most general orders do not give the numerical designation of the units, making it very difficult for me to identify which decoration recipients were assigned to the 101st Division and which were attached to it. The fact that the 506th Parachute Infantry and the 463rd Parachute Field Artillery Battalion’s relationships to the 101st Airborne Division changed over the period covered in this work, compounds the problem. Lastly it is commonly accepted that, even though these units were attached to and not assigned to the 101st Airborne Division, they were “part” of the said division.
The 401st Glider Infantry poses another unique situation. Just prior to the jump into Normandy, one of the two battalions of this regiment was attached to the 82nd Airborne Division. This attachment continued until March of 1945 when the regiment was disbanded and the battalion attached to the 82nd Airborne Division became the 3rd Battalion of the 325th Glider Infantry. The remaining battalion became the 3rd Battalion of the 327th Glider Infantry. Therefore, some of the men listed as members of the 401st Glider Infantry Battalion who gave their lives in combat are correctly listed as members of the 101st Airborne Division, even though they were attached to and serving with the 82nd Airborne Division at the time of their deaths. Please consult this and my Index to the General Orders of the 82nd Airborne Division when researching a member of the 401st Glider Infantry. As mentioned above the 463rd Parachute Field Artillery Battalion was attached to the 101st Airborne Division. This occurred during the siege of Bastonge. Prior to that date this unit saw combat in Sicily, Italy and Southern France and, as a result, many of their decorations for service prior to their attachment are not found in the general orders of the 101st Airborne Division.
Later in the war the Table of Organization for Airborne Divisions changed, allotting more parachute field artillery battalions. This was accomplished by converting a glider field artillery battalion. Until the whole unit was parachute qualified, I believe the unit was said to be an airborne field artillery battalion. I feel this is the reason for some recipients being listed in earlier general orders as members of a glider field artillery battalion and later as a member of an airborne field artillery battalion. This brings me to another point. As the high point men were returned to the US after VE Day, there was a lot of reorganization of units. You will note that several decoration recipients were reassigned within the 101st Airborne Division--from a Parachute Infantry Regiment, for example, to the 81st Airborne Anti-Aircraft Artillery Battalion or from a Glider Infantry Regiment to a Parachute Infantry Regiment.
How to read the sources: (GO#46,1945,101AbnDiv) is broken down as “GO” (General Order), “#” (Number 46, 1945), “101AbnDiv” (101st Airborne Division). Information cited as (101ABDivAGOBD) is from the Adjutant General’s 1947 Battle Death Report for the 101st Airborne Division or the Adjutant General’s Battle Death Report for the 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment. Entries that are in italics are men who were either Killed in Action or Died of Wounds. A decoration followed by the “#” sign means that the medal’s serial number was recorded in the general order, and is listed after the “#” sign.
* General Order #30, 1945 is missing all pages after page number six. At this time I feel it is unlikely that any individual awards were issued beyond page six.
Anyone with copies of any of the missing General Orders is encouraged to contact the author.
Every effort has been made to minimize errors and misspelled names. An error may be attributable to the source document, or may have occurred while transcribing the names/units. Some of the original documents are of very poor print quality, making them difficult to decipher.