VA demands proof World War II combat vet with Purple Heart served in military | Fox News

Actually, I did ask about that a cpl of times...my uncle, and my wife's Dad, were both Army...you all likely know the fire, as mentioned on the Wikipedia page about it, I'll try to send it in here, only damaged Army stuff, which, as turned out to be the case, did include the stuff for my uncle, and my wife's Dad, a good deal of it was lost...when we got my wife's Dad's VA headstone amended awhile back, a few months ago, I'd sent that in, when we got it corrected, if you wanna look on here, you can probably still see it, we had me ask VA and NPRC for an appeal to let his Bronze Star have a combat "V" as he'd walked through a minefield to get back to the artillery battery he was commanding near the Moselle River during the crossing from France into Germany, I've told the story before on here...anyway, NPRC asked Army to look at the request, which they said couldn't be done as the "V" usually wasn't given during WW2, it was apparently approved 12/45, we'd been told, after WW2 was over...the thing was, Army actually found the general orders of his Bronze Star award, without the "V" in their files, explicitly mentioning heroic svc...so, while they couldn't amend his file for the "V", they said they'd send a couple of "V"s to us, which we're still waiting for...I sent the Army letter to VA, to the cemetery he's in by us, as well as NPRC, though NPRC already I think had a copy...VA appealed it to the Natl Cemetery Admin (NCA), NCA said we could have the "V" on the stone, that was the photo I'd sent in, showing the "BSM w/V"...the reason I told you all that was that Army did actually find that general order stuff listing my wife's Dad, so, as I've also gleaned over time in yakking with NPRC about other stuff, all the svcs can generally reconstruct the bulk of stuff lost in the fire, or, if not the bulk, then, certainly, a good deal of it, from digitized and/or microfiche files...we never had any other instance where that needed to be done, what NPRC had originally on my uncle and my wife's Dad had only been fragmentary...if you go on the Natl Archives (NARA) site, all of the enlistment stuff for all Army vets was digitized to be searchable, that was how I found the enlisted serials for both of them, though when my wife's Dad was commissioned through Army field artillery OCS at Ft. Sill in 1943 as a corporal going through the program, that stuff was separate...interestingly, when he was discharged, he didn't get a DD214, that only started later, though my wife's stepdad got one from Navy...my wife's Dad actually got an Army adjutant genl ofc (AGO) discharge, which looks pretty much the same, I only mention that as most generally think DD214 was the only paper discharge ever issued, which, as I'd found out, was most definitely not the case...I just figured you might all find that of interest, at any rate, if you'd all care to yak about it, just gimme your thoughts, whenever, no rush, OK?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Personnel_Records_Center_fire

Here's that site on the fire....

And also, if you guys all think it'd be worth trying to help about the whole thing, I've actually yakked with one of the really senior NPRC guys at some length, when we were trying to do the stuff for my wife's Dad, so, if you think it'd help, as I'd said, he would most definitely know how to go about it, pretty much for sure, I should think...if you think I should maybe try to send him the story, I can try, certainly, however, I just don't know if it'd be my place...I should certainly think his Congress offices should certainly be able to get ahold of those senior NPRC guys, by all means, to try to see if they could help seeing if Army could help dig out his archived stuff on their side for VA, you know? Just a thought, obviously, lemme know what you all think, I'd obv be interested, OK?

https://www.newspapers.com/clip/4258758/in_war_casualty_list_proof_emil/

I was doing some looking, purely out of curiosity, and found this...there's a picture of him in uniform on the site, I just figured you'd all find it of interest, I'd also seen he apparently was already showing as lost, being 96, I gather, at the time...I did see mentions of him having to go through the whole proof thing as well, this one just struck me as esp. interesting, given the story on the thread here, you know?