Looking for any photos or information on Martin Marion Smith, PFC 313th Field Signal Bn. 88th Div. WW1

Bryan Elbell 

Thank you for posting your request on History Hub!

The Textual Reference Archives II Branch (RR2RR) has custody of the Records of the Adjutant General's Office, 1917- (Record Group 407) and the Records of U.S. Army Operational, Tactical, and Support Organizations (World War II and Thereafter) (Record Group 338).  Military unit files among these records consist mostly of historical reports, after action reports, unit journals, and general orders. These records do not include personnel information, nor do we have a name index to these records.

General orders, as referenced above, do include information about the official bestowal of medals on individual service personnel. However, these records are arranged by unit, thereunder by date and thereunder by general order number. We would need this information to search our records. If you have a copy of his discharge certificate, this information might be included therein. 

We have searched our available finding aids for the relevant series in the abovementioned record groups for records of the 804^th Tank Destroyer Battalion and found the following records:

Record Group 407

Entry (NM3) 427

Box 18665 

Morning reports for U.S. Army (and U.S. Army Air Force) units (from November 1, 1912, to 1959) and U.S. Air Force units (from September 1947 to June 30, 1966) are in the custody of the National Archives in St. Louis, MO. Please contact them for access to these records. The address is the National Archives in St. Louis, 1 Archives Drive, St. Louis, MO  63138-1002 and the email address is stl.archives@nara.gov.   

Military service personnel files and individual medical reports for the period in which you are interested are in the custody of the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, MO. To submit a request via Postal Mail please use Standard Form 180 (SF-180): Request Pertaining to Military Records to submit your request. You should complete and mail the form to NARA's National Personnel Records Center, (Military Personnel Records), 1 Archives Drive, St. Louis, MO  63138-1002. You may also apply online on our Request Military Service Records webpage.  Please be aware that there was a fire at the Records Center in 1973 and some records were destroyed.

We invite you to continue the conversation with community members on History Hub, but should you have follow up questions for the staff at Archives II, please email us at archives2reference@nara.gov so that we can assist you further. 

We hope this is helpful. Best of luck with your research!

Sincerely,

Textual Reference Archives II Branch (RR2RR)
[24-57490-PBB]

Bryan Elbell 

Thank you for posting your question on History Hub!

Initially, we would recommend requesting a copy of Martin Marion Smith’s Official Military Personnel File (OMPF). OMPFs and individual medical reports for soldiers of the U.S. Army who were separated from the service after October 1912 and before 1960 are in the custody of NARA's National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis. In many cases where personnel records were destroyed in the 1973 fire, proof of service can be provided from other records such as morning reports, payrolls, and military orders, and a certificate of military service will be issued. Please complete a GSA Standard Form 180 and mail it to NARA's National Personnel Records Center, (Military Personnel Records), 1 Archives Drive, St. Louis, MO 63138-1002. Veterans and next of kin of deceased veterans also may use eVetRecs to request records. See eVetRecs Help for instructions. If there is any information requested by the form that you do not know, you may omit it or provide estimates (such as for dates), but the more information you provide, the easier it will be to locate the correct file if it survived the fire. For more information see Official Military Personnel Files (OMPF), Archival Records Requests. 

We searched the National Archives Catalog and located a series titled Records of Divisions, 1917 - 1920 within the Records of the American Expeditionary Forces (World War I) (Record Group 120) that includes the 88th Division and may or may not include records related to the 313th Field Signal Battalion. For more information about these non-digitized records, please contact the National Archives at College Park - Textual Reference (RR2R) via email at archives2reference@nara.gov. 

The Textual Reference Archives II Branch (RR2RR) also has custody of series Records of Field Signal Battalions, 1917–1922 within the Record Group 120 Records of the American Expeditionary Forces (World War I) which may include records of the 313th Field Signal Battalion during World War I. For more information about these non-digitized records, please contact the National Archives at College Park - Textual Reference (RR2R) via email at archives2reference@nara.gov.

We invite you to continue the conversation with community members on History Hub, but should you have follow up questions for the staff at Archives II, please email us at archives2reference@nara.gov so that we can assist you further.

We hope this assists you with your research! 

Sincerely,

Textual Reference Archives II Branch (RR2RR)

[RR2RR 24-58230-VVT]

Thank You for that information, and I will be contacting them very soon. Not being able to get there to physically see and copy their archives, I'm hoping some of it is viewable and downloadable online.

I have also sent in requests to the OMFP folks for any information they may have. I am waiting to hear back from them.

Thanks again!!