Index of Decorations and Orders Announced in All Hands and Its Predecessors, Prior to 1950
Statistics:
Medal of Honor 143
Navy Cross 1958
Distinguished Service Cross 1
Navy Distinguished Service Medal 291
Army Distinguished Service Medal 12
Merchant Marines Distinguished Service Medal 1
Silver Star Medals 2,997
Distinguished Flying Cross 2,745
Navy and Marine Corps Medal 1,310
Soldier’s Medal 9
Legion of Merit 2,251
Bronze Star Medal 3,281
Air Medals 864
Purple Heart Medal 299
Navy Commendation Ribbon / Medal 1,457
Army Commendation Ribbon / Medal 53
Letter of Commendation 610
Gold Lifesaving Medal 8
Silver Lifesaving Medal 108
2nd Byrd Antarctic Expedition Medal:
Gold 61
Silver 7
Bronze 7
Prisoners of War 404
Defenders of Bataan 407
Medal of Merit several
N-4 Medals several
Marine Corps Brevet Medal a few
Navy Specially Meritorious Medal a few
Belgian Orders and Decorations 4
Brazilian Orders and Decorations 4
British Orders and Decorations 50
Columbian Orders and Decorations 1
Dutch Orders and Decorations 5
Ecuadorian Orders and Decorations 8
French Orders and Decorations 73
Greek Orders and Decorations 1
Guatemalan Orders and Decorations 1
Haitian Orders and Decorations 7
Italian Orders and Decorations 8
Japanese Orders and Decorations 5
Nicaraguan Orders and Decorations 49
Portuguese Orders and Decorations 3
Soviet Orders and Decorations 207
Spanish Orders and Decorations 1
*** This statistical listing likely does not account for all the decorations
and orders contained in the book, but is given here to demonstrate how much
information is contained in this book.****
Total Awards 19,728
This book has 424 pages
ISBN 978-1-932891-39-3
ISBN 1-932891-39-0
Library of Congress Control Number pending
This is a companion to the series of indices of general orders 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, orders and selected service medals announced in issues of Bureau of Navigation News Bulletin, Bureau of Naval Personnel Information Bulletin and All Hands published prior to 1950. These magazines and bulletins were the Department of the Navy’s primary means of releasing news and information through out the fleet.
The first issue of Bureau of Navigation News Bulletin No. 1 was released on August 30, 1924. It was published in irregular intervals thru issue No. 302 published in May of 1942. The Bureau of Navigation was renamed the Bureau of Personnel and the name of the bulletin was changed to Bureau of Naval Personnel Information Bulletin. It was published on an irregular basis until October 1942. The numbering sequence continued where the old series left off. The magazine became a monthly periodical starting with issue number 308, which was released in November 1942. The June 1945 issue was printed with the banner “All Hands” proclaiming the defeat of Germany. This name stuck and since that issue the magazine has been known as All Hands.
Due to the Navy Department’s administrative policies in how decorations were awarded, these bulletin and magazines are some of the best sources of information other than individual index cards at the Washington Navy Yard. I feel that this work is currently the most compressive representation of Navy decorations awarded between 1924 and 1949. That is not to say that no decorations are missing; there are other works published that will likely have a greater number of Navy Crosses or Silver Star Medals issued by the Navy Department. To this point there has not been a good source of information on the Navy’s lower decorations. Also I have recorded a fair number of Navy Crosses and Navy Distinguished Service Medals issued after Stricker’s book was compiled and prior to World War II and, therefore, not in Gleim’s Navy Cross book. I feel that the percentage, of total awards during WWII of each decoration represented in this work decreases as you travel down the pyramid of honor. I have noticed that many of the lower decoration announcements were cut off at early surnames as the pages allotted to decorations were filed. Likewise, after early in 1943, it is unusual to find citations for Air Medals in these sources. The citations printed for lesser decorations, in most instances, are very brief and only a small percentage of Marine Corps awards are mentioned in these sources, other than awards to the 4th Marines.
This work also includes rosters of known recipients of some service medals, but only those that are so rarely awarded that it is noteworthy, such as Byrd’s Antarctic Service Medals, etc. Decorations for service other than during World War II are annotated by the years covered, in parenthesis, after the assignment. Often the year was not given. In these instances a question mark replaces the year. When a recipient of a decoration for service other than during WWII received a decoration for service during WWII, each piece of information that pertains to the pre-war decoration is followed by the appropriate years or a question in parenthesis. Besides the expected inter-war decorations and commendation there are some interesting instances of the Navy and Marine Corps Medal, being awarded for service as far back as 1889.
I have listed Secretary of the Navy and Chief of the Bureau of Navigation Letters of Commendation announced prior to WWII, even though these commendations do not entitle the recipients to a decoration. The recipient’s actions, however were most likely so deserving of recognition that, if the act occurred later, it would have warranted a decoration. Starting in 1942 I have listed these commendations as Navy Commendation Ribbons, which was not created until 1944, but was awarded retroactively back to December 7, 1941. This issue is complicated as not every commendation entitles the recipient to a Navy Commendation Ribbon. As some of the recipients listed in this work may not be entitled to the Navy Commendation Ribbon, therefore each instance must be evaluated.
Due to the fact that Bureau of Navigation News Bulletin and the Bureau of Naval Personnel Information Bulletins were issued on an irregular basis, I have listed entries from issues prior to issue number 308 in the following fashion: (BureauOfPer#306,1942) which is broken down as “BureauOfPer” (Bureau of Naval Personnel Information Bulletin) or “BureauOfNav” (Bureau of Navigation News Bulletin) followed by the issue number and publication year. Starting with issue number 308 the month and year replaced the issue number. This source coding continued when the name changed to All Hands in the following manner (AllHandsOct1947).
I have attempted to extract each instance of a reference to an individual decoration. On many occasions a photo would appear one or more issues after the decoration was announced. Or a decoration is announced in a latter issue that had a lower number of Gold Stars than was announced in an earlier issue. These instances cause some confusion and each issue cited should be consulted to see if duplicate announcements were made, or if the announcements were released out of order. It is entirely possible that the later announcement could be an additional award. I can only surmise why these announcements were made: it could be due to the fact that the earlier decoration was not announced at the time it was approved due to operational security or it could also be due to the Navy Department’s decoration procedures of issuing temporary orders and later issuing permanent orders for the same decoration. The uncertainty of these situations have caused me to annotate the following statement after the source codes of the corresponding decorations recipients “*May be entitled to ______ to his ______”. I apologize for not investigating each occurrence of this, but this project has already taken over a year to complete. I do not want to delay the publication of this information any longer, as it should prove to be the best reference on US naval decorations awarded during WWII.
Due to the fact that service numbers were not published in the sources used, I have not been able to positively identify when the same person is mentioned in multiple issues. I have used common sense in merging entries. It is entirely possible that I may have merged a son with his father if they had the same name, similar ranks and served in similar branches of the naval service. For the most part I only did not merge multiple entries if there was a vast disparity between the ranks or, for example, one entry was for an aviator and the other entry is for a submariner.
Many times a decoration is awarded for service earlier in the war after decorations were issued for later operations. This mainly applies to the Bronze Star Medal, which was not instituted until 1944, or awards of the Silver Star Medal, which was not approved by the Navy Department until late in 1942. Because of this it is difficult to arrange a recipient’s assignments if they were different. When it is possible, I have annotated that the assignments listed may be out of order. It is very probable that most recipients had other assignments not mentioned in any of the citations for their decorations.
Please note several issues did not contain any decoration information.
I would like to acknowledge David Schwind for his assistance in this project. He promptly located, photocopied and mailed me issues that I was missing. This was no small feat, considering he was a graduate student at the Naval Academy and a new father at the time. Thanks, Dave.
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.