Way OT.. How can I find out about my dad's military service record/medals?

[dirty ethel rackham]

When we were going through my mom's things looking for photographs to bring to the funeral home, I happened upon a box that had my dad's army discharge papers from his service in the Korean War. Dad never talked much about it (except for the "army buddy" type stories.) Well, I found out that my dad was awarded 3 bronze stars and 2 other medals (I forgot what they were and those boxes are at my brothers house.) Dad never mentioned them and neither did my mom.

 

How can I found out what the circumstances were that he was awarded them? I never found the medals themselves or any paperwork on them, just a note on his discharge papers.

[Tressa]

If you contact the VA, you should be able to get a copy of his service record. You can start with a copy of his DD214, or is that the discharge paper that you are talking about? I am asking my husband right now, and he says the only problem that you may encounter is that in "the old days" some medals were issued on the spot for bravery and weren't documented properly. But start with the VA. Hope this helps.

[AuntieM]

If you contact the VA, you should be able to get a copy of his service record. You can start with a copy of his DD214, or is that the discharge paper that you are talking about? I am asking my husband right now, and he says the only problem that you may encounter is that in "the old days" some medals were issued on the spot for bravery and weren't documented properly. But start with the VA. Hope this helps.

 

This is great info, my dad was a WWII vet and I'd love to have more info. Thanks!

[4kiddies]

If you have any problems you can also contact your state rep and ask them for assistance. Call the local office, they typically have a veteran affairs staffer.

[susie in tx]

Thank you to your family for your dad's service.

 

It's possible for you to receive his medals, too. Many times, family members put together boxes with the service members flag and medals. We are still working on doing that for my fil. I have the flag, just haven't started the process to get the medals.

 

I think that your dad was in too long ago for his records to be held in St. Louis at the MEPPS center there. But, you could contact them and ask them. They had a fire there in the 70's and lost a lot of records, but they might know another place where the records were located. San Antonio had a bunch of them for whatever reason. Be sure that you have his service number when you contact the military, as that is how they will be able to locate him.

 

If I think of anything else, I'll try to post it. You're not the first person to have dealt with this, so I'm sure there is a method and process to get this information.

Edited January 11, 2010 by susie in tx
cleared up grammar

[KristenS]

I'm glad this was posted ... I too would like to learn about my dad's service records. He died many years ago.

[dirty ethel rackham]

Thanks so much for your help. I wanted to surprise my family with this information. All of my siblings were surprised to hear that my dad was awarded medals, since he never talked about it. Most of my siblings are much older than me and heard more of the family lore. I knew that my dad was in the signal corps, but I didn't really know how dangerous that was until much later. I thought he had a Radar O'Reilly type job, but later found out he was ahead laying wire before troop advancements. He wasn't even supposed to go - he was supposed to stay behind and be an instructor, but a snafu sent his unit instead. My mom was pregnant with my oldest brother when Dad shipped out.

[asta]

Erm...

 

There was a horrific fire in 1973 in St. Louis that wiped out almost everyone's records.

 

If you have any paperwork at all, the VA will most likely just take you at your word if they don't have any of their own. They are really nice about it.

 

{sorry}

 

 

a

[ConnieB]

It's actually not unusual for military folks from that era to not discuss their medals....the Bronze Star for example, is the 4th highest honor that a military solider can receive. It's for bravery, acts of merit, or meritorious service. Many soliders don't feel that their acts deserved the medal because despite their brave actions their buddies died anyway. My dad never talked about his military life until he was terminal and his kids begged him to let us gather his life memories for the grandkids, etc. We kids felt we had a very incomplete picture of him our whole life, and boy did we learn how right we were.

 

I would certainly make the effort to try to locate his service records, but realize that records that old may have been a part of the ones that were lost in the 1970's....and back then there were no back ups. Now-a-days there are redundant redundancies so it's much easier to get ahold of them. Contacting your state rep is a good suggestion if it seems that you are getting the run-around from the military itself. My DH needed a copy of his DD214 for some refinancing we were doing and despite the fact that he'd only been out of service for about 4 years at the time it took weekly phone calls and nearly 2 months before we saw the paperwork. It's not a fast process, lol.

 

While his military record may have some of the facts, it's going to be short on details that will really give you a full picture. For that, your best bet is to try to track down men he served with.....if the base(s) where he was stationed are still open you might see if they have an alumni association because they may have a list of people who are still alive that served with him.....it may take a lot of phone calls to find his closer buddies if you don't have names, but you may be amazed how much these old guys can pull up names of fellow soliders and who they all hung around, lol...yet they can't remember what the wife sent them to the garage to get, lol. Be patient and prepared to listen to some great old stories....but hopefully you'll find what you're looking for. We did but not soon enough to truly appreciate the guy my dad really was.

[susie in tx]

Erm...

 

There was a horrific fire in 1973 in St. Louis that wiped out almost everyone's records.

 

If you have any paperwork at all, the VA will most likely just take you at your word if they don't have any of their own. They are really nice about it.

 

 

 

'Tis true, but I recently found out that there were some units in Texas that had duplicate records in San Antonio. For some odd reason, DD214's can sometimes be found in St. Louis as well, though you have to ask about them a lot. There seems to be no rhyme or reason for what is and is not in St. Louis.

[stripe]

I think that your dad was in too long ago for his records to be held in St. Louis at the MEPPS center there.

Well, this is the case for my relative's records, who served around the same time as the OP's.

[Guest ggent001]

How can I found out what the circumstances were that he was awarded them? I never found the medals themselves or any paperwork on them, just a note on his discharge papers.

 

The circumstances for these awards are listed in his unit's general orders which include citations detailing the awards. You need the corresponding number for the specific order to to locate these, which should be on his personnel file discharge. Unfortunately, because many military service records were burned in the '73 fire, a great many of the personnel files were lost(and along with them the actual order numbers showing the citations). It is often necessary to reconstruct the service history of individual veterans using alternate resources because of the fire. Here is a link to one site which specializes in this: http://www.goldenarrowresearch.com

 

Good luck!

[Bang!Zoom!]

Ya, it's a really straight forward process to get the papers. But listen, three very important things here.

 

1. Newspapers have articles of awards given and descriptions of the service condition they were given under.

 

2. If you do this, join Navy Fed Credit union, you can pass on the benefits to your kids and pass it down. Many military memberships and honorary organizations must be inherited directly from parent to child. Join everything you can so the kids can inherit memberships. Super super important.

 

3. Take your collection of documents to the library. Ask that the local genealogy section keep a copy for future generations. This preserves the work and honor dang near indefinitely. You may also wish to register the primary sources with the LDS archives. If you ever lose your papers, or someone else wants them, this is very secure backup pathways.