The Battle of The Bulge and the Epic story of World War II's Most Decorated Platoon. On December 16, 1944 a small group of 18 men from an Intelligence platoon face off with the main thrust of the German advance through the Ardennes. Vastly outnumbered, the platoon repulsed three large-scale attacks before being captured.

http://www.wvculture.org/HISTORY/wvmemory/...es/hughes09.jpg

This is the first time I saw this. My father was one of the units that landed at St Raphael during the invasion of Souther France in August of 1944.

Info on the 1109th

Here are pages that discuss the 1109th Engineers:

http://home.bellsouth.net/p/s/community.dl...geid=154824&ck=

http://carol_fus.tripod.com/army_hero_157ceb.html

http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/academic/histor...st/e/engr3c.asc

http://www.150th.com/stories/others/haroldwhiting2.htm

From time to time we get asked about military rank, etc. Here's a good chart to view:

RANKS

The hierarchy of military ranks used by the U.S. Army during World War II was:

RANK - CODE - NORMAL DUTIES

Major General - MAG GEN - Commands a Division

Brigadier General - BRIG GEN - Assist Div. Commander or Artillery Commander

Colonel - COL - Commands a regiment

Lieutenant Colonel - LT COL - Commands a battalion

Major - MAJ - Special

Captain - CAPT - Commands a Company or Battery

1st Lieutenant - 1ST LT - Executive Officer of a Company or Battery

2nd Lieutenant - 2ND LT - Commands a platoon

Chief Warrant Officer - CWO - Special, mostly in artillery units

Warrant Officer Junior Grade - WOJG Special, mostly in artillery units

Sergeant Major - SGT MAJ - Top enlisted rank, assigned to Regimental HQ

1st Sergeant - 1ST SGT - Top enlisted rank in a company, normally ~200 men

Master Sergeant - M/SGT - Special duties at battalion or regimental level

Technical Sergeant - T/SGT - Top enlisted rank in a platoon of about 40 men

Staff Sergeant - S/SGT - Commands a squad of 12 men

Sergeant - SGT - Second in command of a squad

Corporal - CPL - Special

Private First Class - PFC - Satisfactory performance of duties, including KP

Private - PVT - Bottom of the heap

Technician 3rd Class - T/3 - Special skills and duties; = S/SGT rank

Technician 4th Class - T/4 - Special skills and duties; = SGT rank

Technician 5th Class - T/5 - Special duties, such as Mail Clerk ; = CPL rank

Tec5 was my dad's rank

I mailed a copy of the VI Corps Engineers slide show to my dear friend Russ Weiskircher. He just received it and sent this note. I am delighted that people are getting so much joy from the creation.

The mail man just delivered your slide show and I have just taken a trip back in time. What an experience. Those engineers were all around us, supporting, building, fighting---what a thrill to hear the songs, see the sights, recall those days. Thank you Marion. With your permission I am going to make copies and put the disc in our Holocaust Library where students and teachers research history. I would like to put it in the eye witness WWII section along with my saga and about 200 other contributions.