Index to the General Orders of the 69th Infantry Division, in WWII
Statistics:
Silver
Star Medals 117
Soldier’s Medals 6
Bronze Star Medals 2,286
Air Medals 41
Purple Heart Medals 732
Army Commendation Ribbons 7
Combat Infantryman Badges 3
Combat Medic Badges 298
Battle Losses 382
Total Awards 3,490
This book has 66 pages
ISBN 978-1-932891-19-5
ISBN 1-932891-19-6
Library of Congress Control Number 2003-283737
69th Division's WWII Order of Battle
Headquarters Company
271st Infantry Regiment
272nd Infantry Regiment
273rd Infantry Regiment
Headquarters Battery, 69th Division
Artillery
724th Field Artillery Battalion
879th Field Artillery Battalion
880th Field Artillery Battalion
881st Field Artillery Battalion
69th Cavalry Reconnaissance Troop, Mechanized
269th Engineer Combat Battalion
369th Medical Battalion
69th Counter Intelligence Corps Detachment
Headquarters, Special Troops
769th Ordnance Light Maintenance Company
69th Quartermaster Company
569th Signal Company
Military Police Platoon
Units attached during combat operations*:
777th Tank Battalion
661st Tank Destroyer Battalion
461st AAA Auto-Weapons Battalion
*the time period of each attachment varies
WWII Campaigns
Rhineland
Central Europe
This is the tenth 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 69th Infantry Division.* Please note that some decorations awarded to members of this division may have been cited in the general orders of other commands. Many awards of the Purple Heart Medal, for example, are missing as they were cited in the general orders of the hospitals which received the evacuated men. This index does not attempt to list all of the Bronze Star Medals 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 order of the respective infantry regiments. This work does list the awards of those specialty badges cited in the general orders of the 69th Infantry division. Unit awards, awards of specific Battle Stars, and Good Conduct Medals are not listed.
General orders of the 69th Division do not give complete unit assignments. They may be missing the numerical designation of the regiment or the separate battalion of the decoration recipient. It is assumed that all decoration recipients were assigned to the 69th Division, unless they are listed in a branch of service that was not organic to this division. (Example: Tank Destroyer Battalion, etc.). Unlike the general orders of the 86th Division, the 69th Division’s general orders do not state company assignments. Please note that some decoration recipients may have been assigned to headquarters , 69th division or Headquarters, 69th Division Artillery, but are listed in a line unit; I have no way of knowing which men were in headquarters units and which were in line units.
This index also includes the names of all men who gave their lives in combat listed in the Adjutant General’s Battle Death Report of the 69th Infantry Division.
How to read the sources: (GO#82,1945,69DIV) is broken down as “GO” (General Order), “#” (Number 82, 1945), “69DIV” (69th Division). Information cited as (69DIVAGOBD) is from the Adjutant General’s 1947 Battle Death Report for the 69th Infantry Division. Italicized entries are men who were either “Killed in Action” or “Died of Wounds.”
* Note that the last general order in the 1944 series present in the file at the National Archives is dated 12 November 1944. The division was in transit to the Port of Embarkation shortly after that date. Although it is possible, I believe it unlikely that any other general orders were issued in 1944. The 1945 series ends with General Order #97, dated August 26th. The division was deactivated 18 September 1945. Again, it is unlikely, although possible, that there may be general orders containing individual decorations beyond General Order #97.
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.