First Lieutenant WILLIAM C. WILKINS, JR. O-446488,
First Lieutenant WILLIAM C. WILKINS, JR. O-446488, US Army Infantry. He is the husband of Ruth Staman Wilkins, 3001 Elm Street, Shreveport Louisiana, and father of Carol Ann Wilkins. He is the son of Mr. W. C. Wilkins of Shreveport, and attended Creswell and Byrd High Schools. He entered the Army in the Infantry June 10, 1942, at Camp Wheeler, Georgia, IRTC, where he served as platoon leader. From the Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, he went to Camp Blanding, Florida, as company commander, of G company 255th Infantry, 63rd Infantry Division and served also at Camp Van Dorn, Mississippi From Fort George G. Meade, Maryland, and Camp Shanks, New York, he embarked December 12, 1943, for Scotland with the 509th Military Police Battalion. He was stationed at First Army Headquarters, Bristol, England, and landed in Normandy June 10, 1944, on the struggling beachhead with the First Army with which he served through the Campaigns of Normandy, Northern France, the Ardennes and the Belgian Breakthrough, the Rhineland, and Central Europe, to Kassel, Germany, on V-E Day. His battalion transferred to Bremen for occupational duty with the 29th Division and was deactivated August 23, its personnel returning to the States from Antwerp. He has the European Theatre Ribbon with five campaign stars and Victory Medal with star.
Source:
1- THE FIGHTING MEN OF LOUISIANA – LOUISIANA HISTORICAL INSTITUTE – 1946
2- Timothy A. Malone’s 63rd Infantry Division Records