11th Airborne graduates Camp MacKall

1943 Camp MacKall, 11th Airborne yearbook

Smitty had acquired additional postcards to show the people back home what Camp MacKall looked like.  They were in the scrapbook his mother put together and was saved for all these years….

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General Order No. 1 listed the original organic units of the 11th Airborne Division, as they moved on with their training, as follows:

Headquarters, 11 A/B Division

Headquarters Company, 11th A/B Division

Military Police Platoon, 11 A/B Division

408th A/B Quartermaster Company

511th A/B Signal Company

711th A/B Ordnance Maintenance Company

221st A/B Medical Company

127th A/B Engineer Battalion

152nd A/B Antiaircraft Battalion

HQ & HQ Battery, 11th A/B Artillery

457th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion

674th Glider Field Artillery Battalion

E. Smith, back row, 5th from the right – HQ Co/187th Regiment

675th Glider Field Artillery Battalion

187th Glider Infantry Regiment

188th Glider Infantry Regiment

511th Parachute Infantry Regiment

__________________________

Total = 8,321 men

 

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Military Training Humor – 

 

 

 

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Farewell Salutes – 

Ollie Baird – Malin, OR; Civilian, WWII, B-17 production

Nathan Burke – Lubbock, TX; US Navy, Airman

Stanislaw F. Drwall – WV; US Navy, WWII, PTO, USS Oklahoma, Pattern Maker 1st Class, KIA (Pearl Harbor)

James Hawkins – Decatur, IL; US Army, WWII, PTO

Jeffrey Wester “Pug” Lee – Hamilton County, FL; US Army, WWII, PTO, 243rd Port Company Transportation

Dennis Merriman – Chicago, IL; US Army, Korea, 187th RCT

Bruce Meyers – Los Angeles, CA; US Navy, WWII, USS Bunker Hill  /  invented the dune buggy

Frank Occhiuto – Longmont, CO; US Navy, WWII & Korea, radioman, USS Lowry

Joan Parks – Ypsilanti, MI; Civilian, WWII, Willow Run bomber production

Ramon L. Smith – Knox County, TN; US Army, Korea, Pfc. # 14270116, 50th AntiAircraft Battalion, KIA (No. Korea)

Nicholas J. Valentine – Cassville, WI; US Army, Korea, Sgt. 1st Class, Batt B/57 Field Artillery/7th Infantry Division, KIA (Chosin Reservoir)

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About GP

Everett Smith served with the Headquarters Company, 187th Regiment, 11th A/B Division during WWII. This site is in tribute to my father, "Smitty." GP is a member of the 11th Airborne Association. Member # 4511 and extremely proud of that fact!

Posted on April 19, 2021, in SMITTY, WWII and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , . Bookmark the permalink. 97 Comments.

  1. Thanks for your like of my post, “Tribulation Prophecies And Doctrine 5 – Waiting For The Last Days? ” You are very kind.

    Liked by 1 person

  2. I am glad your father kept a scrapbook, GP!

    Liked by 2 people

  3. Wonderful album. What a historical document!

    Liked by 1 person

  4. Thanks for your like of my post, “Tribulation Prophecies And Doctrine 3 – Events Of The Day Of The Lord.;” you are very kind.

    Liked by 1 person

  5. I kept scrapbooks through junior high and high school, and somewhere along the line they disappeared. I suppose it’s natural that youngsters don’t appreciate the value of such things — I’m certainly glad that this one survived, and that it’s become such a treasure for so many people!

    Liked by 2 people

    • There is so much I wish I had kept from those younger years as well, so I understand how you feel about your scrapbooks. I was very happy to relocate Dad’s!! That one I always knew I wanted!!

      Liked by 1 person

  6. Great, scrapbook, yes it’s they golden time memory…
    i wish all the best to you and your family 💐👍
    Ramadan karim

    Like

  7. Great pictures. Thank you for sharing them with us

    Liked by 1 person

  8. Truly great photos. You are lucky to have them.

    Liked by 1 person

  9. GP, I love the scrapbook that your grandmother put up. I always believe that scrapbook or album from the old days are better mememtos than how we store pictures today. With the constant change of technology and reminding password which I can’t remember most of the times, I’d rather look at scrapbook to remember things of the past. That is a treasure!

    Liked by 1 person

  10. Great to have those postcards, G. And I laughed when I saw the please back in proctology cartoon. –Curt

    Liked by 1 person

  11. Correct spelling of Mr. Lee’s name is Jeffrey Wester “Pug” Lee.
    Frank Paul Occhuito, 96, should be Frank Paul Occhiuto. (misspelled in source document)

    Liked by 1 person

  12. Wonderful, GP! Thank goodness your mom kept the post cards and also a scrapbook.

    Liked by 2 people

  13. I’m thinking it wasn’t what anybody dreamed of and much of it was tough and testing. Yet many years later .. proud and worthy recollections.

    Liked by 2 people

  14. I just updated my page with more Camp Mackall postcards and photos of men from Company G at the camp and at Oro Bay. Copy this link and take out every space:

    https:// sites.google.com / view / companyg187gliderinfantryreg / home

    If I post the above link without spaces, the spam filter stops me from commenting.

    Liked by 1 person

  15. Great! A wonderful remembrance, these postcards. In spite of all the nostalgia you can not forget – which I sometimes like to do – that it was a time of war and that many soldiers literally represented “cannon fodder”. Thank you for sharing, GP! Enjoy your week! Michael

    Liked by 2 people

  16. I enjoyed looking through the postcards. Such a piece of history now!

    Liked by 1 person

  17. That is a lovely set of postcards. They really capture the flavour of the place where he was living so very well.

    Liked by 2 people

  18. Wonderful pictures and post cards! Letters were treasured by pictures would have been a real bonus. I’ve got to see if I can find a couple of pictures of my uncles while serving in WWII. I don’t think they have any places mentioned though.

    Liked by 1 person

  19. Oh, the lives, the history, the memories in that scrapbook! What a treasure! Thank you for sharing this with us!
    (((HUGS))) 🙂

    Liked by 2 people

  20. A lady at church gave me her mother’s scrapbook from the war years and I’m so happy to have it – they’re a wonderful inside look at how the war affected people day-to-day! 🙂

    Liked by 2 people

  21. Great slideshow, GP. I have my dad’s cruise yearbook and it is a treasure beyond value.

    Liked by 2 people

  22. GP, Ken Smith had quite a few postcards, including some that you have included here. I have been trying to get Ken’s photos to you. When I post a link to my website in a comment, it always gets rejected. Do you have an e-mail private channel where I can send you the link?

    Liked by 3 people

    • Your settings must have a block on it for links. I do not. Does the link work if you put it here?

      Liked by 1 person

      • I don’t have any filter settings that I know of. When I post a reply with a URL, the entire comment simply never appears in your comments section. ‘This site uses Akismet to reduce spam.’ I suppose that Akismet thinks I am a spammer and blocks my comments if I post a URL.

        Let me see if I can post this URL with spaces in it:
        “https:// sites.google.com / view / companyg187gliderinfantryreg / home”

        Liked by 1 person

        • I always check my Spam before I delete. I moderate my comments before publishing, so they may appear to vanish to you.

          Like

          • Okay, I can see the comment I posted April 19, 2021 at 2:08 PM with a spaced URL. Can you access my site?
            I do think something might have been automatically blocking me before.
            Also, my wife her Dad’s Camp MacKall banner. She is pressing it somewhere to get the creases out. I will photograph it tonight.

            Liked by 1 person

            • The link is not working as it is now. Shouldn’t the spaces be removed?

              Like

              • Yes, remove the spaces from the URL before hitting enter.

                I wonder how many of these men I can track down. Is it possible to get rosters of soldiers who served in the regiment or just Company G, 187th? I just found the obit for Orvin McGavin online, but it will take some work to identify the men in the photos.

                Liked by 1 person

                • The link worked and I am thrilled with it. I would love to send some of these pictures to the 11th Airborne Association newspaper, “The Voice of the Angels”. We should work on some background of the men, with what you have before we lose all the original Angels.

                  Like

  23. The scrapbook is wonderful, GP.

    Liked by 2 people

  24. Postcards used to be where we went for pictures. These are excellent.

    Liked by 3 people

  25. How lucky that that scrapbook was A..kept and B survived.

    Liked by 3 people

  26. Loved the pictures, GP. When we were deployed to Bosnia, General Order #1 dealt with no alcohol unless you were in the Beer Tent (which I didn’t run but was responsible for in Taszar) or were partaking in an official function with our Hungarian allies, where to refuse a drink would be an offense. Did you know that the Army is bringing back the WWII era pink and green uniform? (Your slide show of those handsome guys in their Class As reminded me of this bit of trivia.)

    Liked by 2 people

  27. Those cards are such a tresor for mams,the kept then forever.tha they keeo

    Liked by 2 people

  28. What a wonderful souvenir to have. And the four soldiers in their Number One uniforms look so smart!
    Best wishes, Pete.

    Liked by 3 people

  29. Scrapbooks are wonderful to show what mattered on the personal level. OMG the back in funny!

    Liked by 3 people

  30. I loved looking through the scrapbook. What a treasure! I also enjoyed the cartoons 🙂.

    I hope your week is off to a good start. Thanks for sending mine in that direction.

    Liked by 3 people

  31. Such a priceless album

    Liked by 2 people

  32. Thank you, Ned.

    Like

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