“Wow. If you can share any photos, we’d love to see them.”
My sister has his “campaign” book that I’ll get from her the next time I’m in NJ (whenever that is, I’ a road warrior who moved to NH two years ago).
If I recall correctly, haven’t seen it since I was a kid, it was an Army “yearbook” of sorts for his company, much like the couple I have from my 72-75 West Pac deployments. If I remember correctly, it had a bunch of pictures and I’m sure it is a rare copy.
I do have a couple of things though that I picked up last year from his “box of war stuff” that I scanned into my home computer when I was researching his unit.
One of things I scanned was an original copy of General Order Number 2 that awards the bronze service arrowhead to him (and a bunch or other guys) for the Normandy assault, along with his discharge papers detailing the campaigns he fought in.
He did keep a few photos, but I’ll have to look through them again. I still have his uniform, complete with all his battle stars, ribbons, and the distinguished First Special Engineering Brigade Patches. I need to get a formal picture of that to post.
I remember him telling me that Normandy was tough, (particularly when the bombs dropped on his position near St. Lo), but he always spoke of the Salerno invasion as being the toughest. He was in Company C, the one that almost got completely wiped out there during the first few days.
A close second to Salerno in his mind was the Battle of the Bulge where, and he only said this once to me, and I’ll remember it always, “the last thing you ever want to hear is the order to fix bayonets”.
He was a quite and kind man with a great sense of humor who worked hard to provide for his family.
Can’t wait to see what you are able to find.