Howard Carnahan

Hi, my name is Randy and my father in law was a member of the force his name was Howard Carnahan of sv co 474th infantry regiment. We found out that you could write and recieve your loved ones medals that were lost through the years so we just got them in the mail and that just wetted my appatiate to know more.If anyone has information on my father in law I would be greatfull or any other information that you may feel would be helpful I would appreciate it. Also, he received the bronze star, I was just wondering if anyone knows how you find out why or what he did to get that.

Hi Randy,
You through your wife can request a copy of her fathers service record on line or by directly writing to St Louis, you may have used this same site to get his medals. The only catch is the "Infamous Fire of 1973, his records may have been burned partially or completely in the fire. Depending on how energetic (helpful) the government worker wants to be they will get the file and mail it to you and this can take from 3 weeks to 6 months. Below is the link to the site. You may have to cut and past the link if the forum does not allow it to be active, being new to this forum I do not know for sure if we can. OK I cannot post the link so here goes: Google archives.gov veterans military-service-records. Admin sorry about that i'm just a FNG and want to pass the information on to help someone do a search.



My wife (with my assistance) requested her fathers records and she received them in about 2 months. The only draw back is any photo of the veteran may be a poor scan. You may want to request that they make a digital copy of his picture. Also you may have to request a copy of the citation for the Bronze Star Medal(BSM). FYI many US WW2 veterans who received a BSM received it when the Army authorized all recipients of the Combat Infantry Badge (CIB) or Combat Medic Badge (CMB) so there will be no citation for the award just a certificate indicating the date that the BSM was authorized and this is normally the date they received their CIB or CMB. If your father-in-law received the medal while in the force or the 477th Infantry Regiment you should be able to request the citation from either St Louis or College Park Maryland but you would more than likly need the General Order (GO) Number and Date of the issuing command. This information may be located on his discharge paper work back page. If you do not have the original it may be on file at the town he went to after discharged. Veterans were told to register the discharge with the the Public Records Clerk in the event they loose the original as the document can be used for proving their service in order to get Government approved loans for buying a home, attending a trade school or college and filing for disability if wounded or injured on active duty . Good luck and let us know how it goes in your search for more about the service of your father-in-law.
Regards,
John