Heritage Album

Researching a WW2 Veteran?

I am attempting to learn more about my Grandfather, who died in 1989. He served in the navy during World War 2, but I do not have the exact entry or end of service. I do have his Social Security number, but not his service number or the variation of his name that he served under (Bill, William, Will, Billy, etc.) Furthermore, that information is unavailable in the family. He didn't marry my Grandmother until well after the war, and that information was never handed down. How can I go about getting that information so I can make a request to the National Personal Records Center for information about his Military Career? He was said to have earned some medals during Guadalcanal, but I haven't found his name for any WW2 lists of Silver Medals, Navy Crosses, or Medals of Honor.

Public Comments

1. Have a look at http://labs.familysearch.org and http://www.ancestry.com ancestry is a subscription site but some local library's have a subscription. you can search the ancestry web site for free so you can make a start, also the labs web site is free to use, while it will not give you his service number you can gather as much Information as you can. Was your Grandfather buried in a veterans cemetery have a look at http://www.findagrave.com/ Hope this helps Good luck
2. Some states and counties also have military record information. Try contacting a state veterans affairs office, state archives or other location with historical records. For veterans affairs offices, it will be important to clearly state your case so that you are not simply referred back to St. Louis, since they tend focus more on current needs of veterans. If you talk to the right person, they may know the right local sources to try. If you know what county he lived in following the war, many veterans had their discharges recorded with the county recorder and so this would now be public.
3. This might help. You can also post you grandfather's name here and someone may be able to help http://www.archives.gov/
4. Did he use VA benefits, medical, VA loans for houses? Did he have Military Honors at funeral and is he buried in a Veteran's Cemetery? This is the VA website to locate grave sites in Veteran's Cemeteries: http://gravelocator.cem.va.gov/j2ee/servlet/NGL_v1 He should have enlisted under his full legal name. Look at newspapers in the area he lived from 1940 to 1945. There might be a mention of his enlistment or his visiting family on leave and when he got a his medals and also news when he came home. Contact the county VA office in the county he lived in right after being discharged. He might have filed his DD214 with them to receive G.I. benefits. Also are there no old boxes or trunks in garage, closet or attic that haven't been opened in awhile? A couple of years ago Donna Reed's daughter found one from her mother's garage she never opened since Reed's death in 1986. In it she found letters from military men who wrote to Reed during WWII, seems she saved all the ones from her home town and state (Denison, Iowa). So keep an eye out and question aunts and uncles about what happened to "stuff" from grandparents house when he died.