540th American flag 63 years later....

[Walt's Daughter]

Even though I placed this on Bill Vander Wall's page, I thought it would be great to have a copy right here on the forum because of the history behind this flag.

 

Bill carried this very flag onto the beaches of the North African shores in November of 1942. As you can see, the flag made it through the war and is still in very good condition.

 

Bill had sent it home to this parents during the war and they took a pic with it then. When I spent a weekend with Bill and his wife in August, I took a pic of them with the flag almost 63 years later. It's quite a site. Fly on American Glory!

 

[Custermen]

Marion,

I recently found both flags belonging to my Dad's unit. They ended up in private hands like this one did. I would like to know exactly how that happened.

I had a friend say that most of the flags were turned in and stored at the headquarters of the Army Quartermasters or the QM Museum at Fort Lee, VA.

The story of the flag of my Dad's unit was that a soldier was disembarking off the troop ship. They had to unload everything from the ship into a warehouse. They were piling up all everything; some to be disposed of later---but that apparently never happened. There were even piles of unclaimed captured weapons. There on the floor was the flag for his artillery battalion.

I wonder if he obtained before the end of the war because the flag looked frazzled and was replaced? Can you ask him about this?

 

Steve

History of 328 FA and its Flag