UBB.threads Forums General Militaria United States Militaria WW2 US Division Patches

One of our members sent in photos of his WW2 US Division patch collection. It includes Army Air Force, Infantry, Cavalry, and Armor Division patches. I formatted the photos and you can see them HERE . If it is useful, I can add it to the GDC Reference Gallery. Comments and suggestions welcome

Vern,
Nice shots of the different patches, but before being added to the reference gallery, someone needs to correct some of the description errors. The two that stick out in my mind are:

3rd Infantry Division neglects to mention that they were also deployed in Italy (Salerno, Rapido River, Anzio, Naples, etc.)

82 Airborne was not deployed to the Pacific in 1944. They saw action in N. Africa, Sicily, Italy, France & Germany from 1942 onward.

Those two corrected. Do you have any more? Thanks

It is certainly useful, as even as a US patch collector myself, I forget sometimes on some of more uncommon division numbers. It should be mentioned that some of the armored ones shown are post war German made patches with the post war "nickname" tabs, very cool to be sure, but just not "technically" WW2 examples. Great photos!

Knowing little to nothing about patches, if you can ID the post war ones, I'll try to find good examples I take it that patches for Armor Divisions 1, 2, and 3 are post war? Thanks for the comments!

Replaced the patches for 1st-3rd Armored Divisions.

Cool Vern!
I think the 1st Div and 8th Div might be Post war theater made ones too. I think the 88th is actually a much earlier WWI or pre-war variant. Can you post the backs here?

Again these are still great patches, and actually more sought after than the common US made WW2 versions. But if the point of the reference is WWII, it may be less confusing. Maybe a thread on varaint patches.

Can't show the backs as I only have photos of the fronts Good call on those 3, replacement photos on the way. Great idea on the thread, I think it would be very interesting!

New photos posted for 1st, 8th, and 88th Infantry Divisions.

Here's a little something that you may like. Try this LINK for a gallery of patches for the First U.S. Army Group phantom divisions

Nice Vern,
I always liked the phantom patches.
BTW-there is a typo in the description though:
"Phanton" should be "Phantom"

Thanks for catching the typo. I'm an old retired computer jock and we can't spell for siht I thought they were interesting. I started putting the gallery together while looking for deployment info on the other patches. One of the patch photos was for the 15th Armored. I realized it should have been the 16th, but did a little research and ran across some good info on the phantom divisions. One advantage of collecting for almost 40 years is having a lot of books on many subjects. Also, being a gadget nut and carrying a camera to most of the shows means I have photos of ALOT of things I've been scanning the photos into my computer so I can organize them and that has led to the development of several of the reference galleries.

Another little gallery, this one contains the divisions sent to Europe for WW1. The link is HERE .

Another little gallery. This one is for the Army Groups, Armies, and Corps patches. The link is HERE

This is really great Vern!

( the 1st Army one should be the black A on all green for WW2 though...)

Thanks, it's been fun putting these together. I had that one (black/green) at first, but found this one on an Ike jacket with a photo of it in wear in late 1944, so I went for the more colorful one I can change it back if you think that would be more correct.

OK, I changed the 1st Army patch back. A bit of a question concerning the date of the photo I was shown

The first Army "A" patch did exist in WW1 and through early WW2 with various "Branch of service" colors in the center part, and are highly collectible (and as such also reproduced) But to my understanding the red and white version came out closer to the 1950's

Yes, I received a photo of the patch along with a photo of his dad wearing an Ike jacket with the red/white patch dated Nov. 1944. Then it came in again dated Nov, 1948, so I swapped the patches Thanks for the heads up. I don't always get things right and really appreciate info from a more knowledgeable source