Index to the General Orders of the 63rd Infantry Division, in WWII
Statistics:
Silver
Star Medals 440
Soldier’s Medals 26
Bronze Star Medals 5,190
Air Medals 73
Purple Heart Medals 1,839
Combat Medic Badges 348
Battle Losses 973
Total Awards 7916
This book has 163 pages
ISBN 978-1-932891-16-4
ISBN 1-932891-16-1
Library of Congress Control Number 2004-268692
63rd Division's WWII Order of Battle
Headquarters Company
253rd Infantry Regiment
254th Infantry Regiment
255th Infantry Regiment
Headquarters Battery, 63rd Division
Artillery
718th Field Artillery Battalion
861st Field Artillery Battalion
862nd Field Artillery Battalion
863rd Field Artillery Battalion
63rd Cavalry Reconnaissance Troop, Mechanized
263rd Engineer Combat Battalion
363rd Medical Battalion
63rd Counter Intelligence Corps Detachment
Headquarters, Special Troops
763rd Ordnance Light Maintenance Company
63rd Quartermaster Company
563rd Signal Company
Military Police Platoon
Units attached during combat operations*:
70th Tank Battalion
740th Tank Battalion
753rd Tank Battalion
692nd Tank Destroyer Battalion
776th Tank Destroyer Battalion
822nd Tank Destroyer Battalion
436th AAA Auto-Weapons Battalion
*the time period of each attachment varies
WWII Campaigns
Rhineland
Central Europe
This is the eighteen in a series of indexes of all the divisions, corps, armies and commands of the US Army in WWII. Others will be published as they are completed.
This work includes all decorations cited in the general orders of the 63rd Division.* Please note that some decorations to members of the 63rd Division may have been cited in General Orders of other commands. Most of the Purple Heart Medals were cited in the General Orders of the hospitals to which the men were evacuated. This index does not attempt to list all 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 General Orders of the respective Infantry Regiments. This work does list the awards of those Specialty Badges that were cited in the General Orders of 63rd Division. I have made no attempt to list the Unit Awards, awards of specific Battle Stars, and Good Conduct Medals.
Some general orders issued before General Order #150 of the 1945 series do not give complete unit assignments. These general orders may be missing the numerical designation of the regiment or separate battalion that the decoration recipient was assigned to. It is assumed that all decoration recipients were assigned to the 63rd Division, unless they are listed in a branch of service that was not organic to this division. (Example: Tank Destroyer Battalion, … etc.)
(GO#676,1945,63DIV) is the last general order in the 63rd Division’s file. General Order #676 is dated 7 September 1945. Since the 63rd Division was not deactivated until 27 September 1945, it is possible that there may additional general orders numbered beyond #676. I find this possible, but not likely since the 63rd Division was deactivated one day after arriving back in the United States. I assume that most of the nearly three weeks before the division’s arrival in the US was spent in transit from Germany to the port of embarkation and the trip by ship back to the US.
This index also includes the names from the Adjutant General’s Battle Death Report of the 63rd Division. This lists all the men from the 63rd Division who gave their lives while in combat.
How to read the sources: (GO#46,1945,63DIV) is broken down as “GO” (General Order), “#” (Number 46, 1945), “63DIV” (63rd Division). Information cited as (63DIVAGOBD) is from the Adjutant General’s 1947 Battle Death Report for the 63rd Infantry Division. Entries that are in italics are men who were either Killed in Action or Died of Wounds.
* The following general order is missing from the 63rd Division’s file at the National Archives:
(GO#196,1945,63DIV)
* Pages from the following general orders are missing from the 63rd Division’s Files at the National Archives:
(GO#217,1945,63DIV) is
missing pages beyond page 1
(GO#236,1945,63DIV) is missing pages beyond page 1
(GO#250,1945,63DIV) is missing pages beyond page 1
(GO#427,1945,63DIV) is missing pages beyond page 1 **
It is not known if any of the additional pages contain any additional decoration information.
* (GO#673,1945,63DIV) is missing large pieces and some information is therefore missing.
Anyone with a copy of any of these general orders or missing pages 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.