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386TH INFANTRY REGIMENT FLAG.

Currency:USD Category:Firearms & Military Start Price:300.00 USD Estimated At:600.00 - 800.00 USD
386TH INFANTRY REGIMENT FLAG.

6’ x 6’ silk embroidered, crest in eagle’s shield of moose head and motto “NIA NATAHMI” which is Delaware Indian language “We are the First”
This regiment was a component of the 97th Infantry Division. The division initially formed in the early fall of 1918 for deployment to Europe. The unit began training in New Mexico becoming activated on September 5th. Soon moving to South Carolina for more training with additional units and manpower to be added (the plan being men from New England for the most part) including some 5000 troops from Oklahoma and Minnesota, but an overall lack of sufficient manpower slowed its training track. Then, in October 1918, the Flu Pandemic struck the division sickening some 500 men of whom 100 died.
The flu having run its course, the division was then pre-empted by the armistice of November 11, 1918 ending World War 1. The nascent division demobilized on December 22nd. On June 24, 1921, the division was placed into the Organized Reserve and assigned to the states of New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine, about the date of this flag’s manufacture.
World War 2 and the massive expansion of the U.S Army brought the 97th Infantry Division back into existence on February 25, 1943 at its training camp in Texas. The Army was creating units faster then they could be filled with men and often units already existing were stripped of men who were shipped to other commands. This was the case with the 97th Infantry Division which absorbed a large cadre of men from the 95th Infantry Division. In February 1944, the division moved to Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri for further training but they would lose at least 5000 men for shipment to other divisions as combat replacements thus delaying its eventual deployment.
Sent to California to receive amphibious training and eventual deployment to the Pacific Theater in July 1944, General Dwight Eisenhower, concerned abut the Germans in the Battle of the Bulge and the large combat losses incurred in that campaign, asked for two more divisions above what was already allocated. The 97th Infantry Division ended up going to Europe instead arriving in France in early March 1945.
The division moved to the Rhine River area crossing it and taking part in the reduction of the Ruhr pocket engaging in heavy fighting at a German castle with well dug in defenders. A member of the 386th Infantry Regiment, PFC Joe R. Hastings, was posthumously awarded a Medal of Honor for his actions as the regiment attacked a German town on April 12th. Men of the 97th Division soon liberated an Allied POW camp freeing over 800 men. The division also helped liberate two concentration camps.
By the end of April 1945, the division, covering the left flank of Patton’s Third Army, had moved deep into Czechoslovakia when orders for a general cease fire came on May 7th. The division is credited to firing the last shot of World War 2 in Europe by the U.S. Army when PFC Dominic Mozetta shot a German sniper shortly before midnight on May 6th.
The 386th Infantry Regiment took part in all of the engagements of the 97th Infantry Division.
The division returned to the United States in late June where its members earned a thirty-day leave. Upon returning to duty, the division was ordered to deploy to the Pacific reaching Japan in late September where it deployed units around the nation, the first combat unit from Europe to reach the Pacific.
The colors of the 386th Infantry Regiment are blue as with other Army infantry regiments.
CONDTION: very good overall, light fading to field. (02-17547-56/JS). $600-800.