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Good evening. I am not sure where else to go. However, I know that there is a great deal of knowledge here. While visiting my wife's grandfather, I noticed a shadowbox. It was a bit of a memorial to his father. It caught my eye, and he mentioned that the awards we're not correct, but he didn't know how it was supposed to look right. I personally think it is an awesome idea for him to have that, in memory to his father. Well, he asked me if I could help him to make it correct. The issue is, I am very new to the Army, and have next to no knowledge as to the awards that I saw there, in all honesty. I am wondering if any of you know how one would go about finding out the information that one would need, and where one would find the order of precedence etc. for setting this up. His birthday is coming up, and I figured this would be a really awesome thing to do, not only as a gift, but something for him to remember his father. Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated. I do have a picture of the ribbon rack that he had, but I will have to upload it later from my phone. Again, thanks in advance for any and all help.
Posted in these groups: 
WWII World War Two
Awards
WWII World War Two Awards
Posted 10 y ago
Responses: 3
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It would help if you could post that picture so that we could see what we're working with. The attached link takes you to the official .mil Institute of Heraldry website that should help us identify what is what and in what order everything should be placed in.
The purpose of this site is to provide information on United States Army heraldic entitlements; how they are displayed, and how and why it is worn.
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SGT (Join to see)
SGT (Join to see) Though I think it would be far easier to identify it by eyeballing it from a good picture, if for whatever reason that's not possible there is another option. A relative of the deceased service member can request this soldiers service record be pulled from the national archives. I'd consider it as a fail safe option.
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SGT (Join to see)
SGT (Join to see) No problem! I recently had to play a similar game with one of my great grandfathers. He was a WWI vet, but he served with the British. Getting his records and reconciling his history was half a miracle considering that not many military records survived the Germans bombing London all to hell during WWII.
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The older order of precedence can be tricky. Faded decorations can also be a challenge but all in all this is easy. Try the rack builder on USA military medals of America . They have the older campaign medals, like from ww2. Does he have a full account of all his decorations? If not recommend going to the Army G1 awards website and get the paperwork to request replacements etc. in 1947 a policy was issued that awarded BSMs to those awarded the CIB and CMB.
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The best place to go is to the Army Regulations regarding the wear of awards. Rack builder.com is great too. You can build the rack per his personnel file and it will place them in the correct order of precedence for you. I use it and then double heck with the Regs.
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SGT (Join to see)
CPT (Join to see) , Sir, I wanted to thank you as well for pointing me towards the rackbulder.com website. It appears that he had the correct ribbons, though the rack was upside down, and in a different order than it should have been. Just having trouble identifying the heart shaped medal. I do not believe it is a Purple Heart, primarily due to the lack of the purple, and the silhouette of Washington.
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CPT (Join to see)
you are welcome. Glad that I could help a WWII Veteran. I'd have to see the heart shaped medal to see if I know what it is. You band send me an email with a picture of it at [login to see] and I'll try to Id it for you.
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