dskjl Posted November 20, 2018 Share #1 Posted November 20, 2018 Just picked this up from a fellow forum member. WWII Medal group from Brigadier General Claude M. Thiele. He became a Brigadier General in April 1941, and was the Commanding Officer of the 34thAAA Brigade until 1942. From 1943-44, he was Commanding General of the Anti-Aircraft Command located in Europe. In 1944, he became the Chief Anti-Aircraft Officer of the Army Service Forces in the European Theater of Operations. From 1944-46, he was Chief Anti-Aircraft Officer of the 12thArmy Group in Europe. Lots of docs to review, better pics to follow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #2 Posted November 22, 2018 Trying to put together a fitting display, i had to separate the medals into two cases and need to start pinning thing down but here is the group so far. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #3 Posted November 22, 2018 more Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #4 Posted November 22, 2018 BB&B Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #5 Posted November 22, 2018 BACK Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #6 Posted November 22, 2018 MERIT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #7 Posted November 22, 2018 There is about 10lbs of paperwork and photos to go with the group. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #8 Posted November 22, 2018 Some of of the US medals are crimp broach so i'm assuming they are replacements added later. The LOM is engraved but missing the oak leaf cluster, i have decided not to add it but keep one lose with the group. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MMcollector Posted November 22, 2018 Share #9 Posted November 22, 2018 Some of of the US medals are crimp broach so i'm assuming they are replacements added later. The LOM is engraved but missing the oak leaf cluster, i have decided not to add it but keep one lose with the group. The Campaign Medals with un-marked crimp brooches are period originals. Not issued until 1947-48. Newer re-issues will have a code on the back similar to LI-GI, etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 22, 2018 Author Share #10 Posted November 22, 2018 The Campaign Medals with un-marked crimp brooches are period originals. Not issued until 1947-48. Newer re-issues will have a code on the back similar to LI-GI, etc. Thank you, good info to have, i might have looked forever and wasted my time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 23, 2018 Author Share #11 Posted November 23, 2018 LOM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CNY Militaria Posted November 23, 2018 Share #12 Posted November 23, 2018 Great group and display! He had a really long and interesting career! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted November 23, 2018 Author Share #13 Posted November 23, 2018 Great group and display! He had a really long and interesting career! Thanks, 38 years, and man do i have some reading to do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted March 21, 2021 Author Share #14 Posted March 21, 2021 In September 1944 the War Department issued Readjustment Regulation 1-4, a move designed to provide academic, vocational, and orientation courses for every U.S. soldier serving in Europe when the war ended. The president gave General Dwight D. Eisenhower, commander of the European Theater of Operations (ETO), responsibility for carrying out the operation. Each university would enroll at least 4,000 students for two-month terms and offer a choice of eight major fields of study: agriculture, commerce, education, engineering, fine arts, journalism, liberal arts, and science. Each school would make more than 250 courses available. Faculty at each location would number 250 to 300, while necessary support services would require cadres of more than 1,000 troops. Early in 1945, with victory in Europe in sight, search teams started to survey possible locations in the United Kingdom and on the Continent. The team sent to England settled on Shrivenham Barracks, a military post about 70 miles northwest of London. The British had used the barracks as a training school until the U.S. Army took it over in 1942. On the Continent, surveyors came up with what seemed at first a bizarre recommendation: take over the hotels, villas, casinos, and other buildings in Biarritz, a resort town on France’s southwestern coast, and convert them into a learning center. In April Eisenhower appointed Brigadier General Claude M. Thiele to head the Shrivenham establishment and Brigadier General Samuel L. McCroskey to take charge in Biarritz. Thiele was a Cornell graduate in civil engineering who had fought in World War I and had risen through the ranks to become the commanding general of anti-aircraft forces in Europe. McCroskey’s wartime command had been the 55th Anti-Aircraft Battalion. The two generals were ordered to have their universities up and running within 60 days after V-E Day. They came close, with Shrivenham American University (SAU) opening its doors on August 1 and Biarritz American University (BAU) on August 20. Those intervening weeks tested the energy and ingenuity of everyone involved. To help refurbish the old Shrivenham barracks, General Thiele had the good fortune of gaining command of 782 prisoners of war (many POWs did not leave Britain until the late 1940s), as soon as his crew built a stockade for them. Geneva Convention rules said the POWs couldn’t make the beds of students or clean up the quarters, but they did take on many other support roles. At BAU, General McCroskey found that the local people, many of them idled by the wartime lack of tourism, were willing to pitch in and help prepare and operate 40 hotels and nearly 100 villas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ItemCo16527 Posted March 22, 2021 Share #15 Posted March 22, 2021 On 11/22/2018 at 3:13 PM, dskjl said: BB&B This is one truly amazing grouping! Do you know what medal this is? I don't think I've seen one before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted March 22, 2021 Author Share #16 Posted March 22, 2021 9 minutes ago, ItemCo16527 said: This is one truly amazing grouping! Do you know what medal this is? I don't think I've seen one before. it's an early split broach Amy Ordnance Association medal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ItemCo16527 Posted March 23, 2021 Share #17 Posted March 23, 2021 Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gmcrae Posted March 6, 2023 Share #18 Posted March 6, 2023 Nice presentation of this collection. I would be interested in learning more about the documents that accompanied the medals. I am researching the history of the three American GI Universities established in 1945 in Biarritz France and Florence Italy, as well as the one in Shrivenham that Thiele was in charge of. Are any of the documents from the collection relevant to that endeavor? Thiele's diaries from the war years are in the archives at the University of Wyoming - https://archiveswest.orbiscascade.org/ark:80444/xv287050 (papers 1942-47) There is a history of the University at Shrivenham published right after the school closed in 1946 authored by Capt. Robert G. Bone (A History of Shrivenham American University). A colleague in UK has also penned a short overview on this: https://giuniversity.wordpress.com/shrivenham/ Looking forward to hearing more about other parts of the collection. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manayunkman Posted March 6, 2023 Share #19 Posted March 6, 2023 Beautiful group Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted March 7, 2023 Author Share #20 Posted March 7, 2023 This group was going to go to the SOS this year for sale but I came down with COVID at the last minute and was stuck at home. Maybe next year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dskjl Posted March 7, 2023 Author Share #21 Posted March 7, 2023 12 hours ago, Gmcrae said: Nice presentation of this collection. I would be interested in learning more about the documents that accompanied the medals. I am researching the history of the three American GI Universities established in 1945 in Biarritz France and Florence Italy, as well as the one in Shrivenham that Thiele was in charge of. Are any of the documents from the collection relevant to that endeavor? Thiele's diaries from the war years are in the archives at the University of Wyoming - https://archiveswest.orbiscascade.org/ark:80444/xv287050 (papers 1942-47) There is a history of the University at Shrivenham published right after the school closed in 1946 authored by Capt. Robert G. Bone (A History of Shrivenham American University). A colleague in UK has also penned a short overview on this: https://giuniversity.wordpress.com/shrivenham/ Looking forward to hearing more about other parts of the collection. I haven’t pulled the binders out for sometime now. I will dig them out report back. On a side note my son is 2nd year PHD student at the University of WY. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gmcrae Posted March 7, 2023 Share #22 Posted March 7, 2023 Thanks. Maybe we can get your son to go dig in the archives. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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