As I mentioned in my new recruit post, here is my first set of questions about one of my hometown's vet. The first is Lyle Kay Kumler. He was a paratrooper in Co. H. of the 508th. I've managed to find quite a bit already (thanks largely to the 508th website) and I've seen his file at the national archives in St. Louis. But I have a few questions about his service that I was hoping you all could help me with. His serial number is 46048069. I'm having a hard time tracking down his first few days during D-Day. Is there anyway to get at least an idea of where he was? Or how about who was in his stick when he jumped? There's a story that he told his family that he was the sixth to jump from his plane, but the first to land alive. The Ralph DeWeese diary mentions him, around D+4 but I'd like to find out something before that if possible. By the way, the DeWeese diary is a very interesting read for those interested in D-Day. Is there a way to confirm where he did his basic training if it wasn't in his file at the archives? I had assumed he completed basic with the rest of the 508th at Camp Blanding, but the dates listed for that Camp are Oct. 20 '43 to Jan '44. He enlisted in mid-November '43. Would he have still done basic at Blanding? Or just joined them at jump school? What are some good sources on the medical camps in Europe? Kay took some shrapnel (in lets say an unfortunate area if you get my drift) but stayed in the line. He then received medical care at the following places: 96 Evac Hosp (July 7th) 4th Conv. La Combe (July 8th) Hospital train to 348th Station Hospital, Grantham (July 12th) Returned to duty (July 24th) Lastly, Kay won a Distinguished Service Cross during Operation Market Garden for his actions around Beek. While I have a pretty good understanding what he did to earn that, I'm interested in any good sources for information about fighting in that area. Thanks so much for your help!
As mentioned in your other thread the 508th PIR site has lots of info. 508th PIR He shows up in the Camp MacKall company photo of October 1943. The stick rosters from D-Day have not been found to date so only a couple of jump rosters are known to exist and they are from B Company. 3/508th was widely scattered on D-Day and unless he mentioned or is mentioned by a specific officer you just don't know where someone landed. Guys from the same stick were separated by miles sometimes. You basically have the group that settled in on Hill 30 (LTC Shanley) and the group that formed up with Col Lindquist on the wrong side of the Merdet River. Those groups didn't get together as a regiment until 10 June. There were a number of guys that didn't get to Allied lines for several weeks. If you can find some of his early letters home they should have a return address that can tell you his original training location. My father joined in November 1942 and after initial in-processing he ended up a Camp Toccoa with the 501st before going to Camp Blanding to join the 508th. The 508th left Blanding in January 1943 for Fort Benning and jump training. In April they moved to Camp MacKall where they continued jump training then participated in Divisional exercises and specialist training until December 1943 before going to Ireland. I think when Kumler joined up the Army had centralized jump training at Fort Benning so he would have been part of the school classes and not part of a unit. He probably joined the Regiment in Ireland or England as a replacement.
For information on medical care, try here http://www.med-dept.com/ You can check specifics on the various elements.
If you want antedotes of the 508th find books by Zig Boroughs, 508th Connection and The Devil's Tales, My father didn't talk much about his time in the service. There was one story during the Tennessee Manuvers where my father was part of a referee team (him a Private and a Captain). They got to pick their ranks so he became a Staff Sergeant and the Captain was a Lieutenant Colonel. They would go around to the various units and assign casualties and critique the unit leaders. My father enjoyed chewing out Captains for doing dumb things like charging straight at a machine gun. He was also there when some paratroopers were caught (I think they were 508th guys) and one of the troopers still had a flour grenade after being searched. So the trooper was escorted into the HQ tent to be interrogated and he slammed the flour grenade into the table 'killing' everyone there. My father let them know they were all casualties and laughed with the trooper as he was handing out tags assigning the wounds to the Battalion staff. The bad thing about being on the referee team was that by the time he got back from all the briefings and debriefings at the end of the manuvers he missed getting a promotion to PFC that every other private got. He didn't get promoted for another 3 months and that steamed him.
