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Post by Registrar on Aug 11, 2008 7:22:43 GMT 8
Gentlemen, Given that the men who jumped into Algeria in Nov 42 were carried on the records of the 503d as at the date of their combat jump, death, and are officially buried under the name of the 503d PIR, I consider it is proper that they be recorded in the website’s 503d Honor Roll. corregidor.org/taps/control/kia_full_listing.htmSubject to any objection consensus from yourselves. They will be identified as dying in Algeria. Regards to all Registrar
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Post by Jim Mullaney on Aug 11, 2008 7:25:13 GMT 8
Certainly no objections from me.
I went through Jump School in April 1942 with many of the 503-509 Veterans.
After Jump School three of us rode together to Bragg. When arriving Col. Walsh flipped a coin to see which of us would go to the 503 Bns which eventually went to the Pacific and which of us went to 503/509 and eventually Africa. At least one of them wrote to me after they arrived in Northern Ireland.
Jim Mullaney
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Post by Chet Nycum on Aug 11, 2008 7:26:24 GMT 8
Are you changing course from a Corregidor Honor Roll to a 503 over all Honor Roll?
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Post by Registrar on Aug 11, 2008 7:34:02 GMT 8
There’s no change in course. The website has always maintained a number of separate lists: one of the men lost on Corregidor, arranged by unit,corregidor.org/taps/control/KIA_by_unit.htmlone of the men lost on Corregidor, about whose circumstance of death something is knowncorregidor.org/taps/control/KIA_by_name.htmland the other the list of ALL 503d men who died when in service of the 503d PIR or 503d PRCT, arranged alphabetically. corregidor.org/taps/control/kia_full_listing.htmThe only difference is that the internet has brought forward three men who we had never thought about before – three men who, had you asked them which unit they were when they boarded that C-47 in England bound for Algeria, for the US’s first combat jump of the war, would have told you “I’m proud I’m allowed to be one of the crowd of the 503d PIR!” They died and were buried under the name of the 503d PIR. After they were dead, someone came along and redesignated the unit to be the 509th PIR. This is not to detract from the record of the 509th in the slightest. Wat started this present issue was our project to photograph the headstones over the graves of each 503d trooper -and we found that there were more graves than the war in the Pacific had to offer. Registrar
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