Private First Class (Pfc) — confirmed continuously Mar-Nov 1944; PFC also confirmed as terminal/discharge rank by his VA government headstone (Find A Grave #234899973) · 1325th Service Unit, Indiantown Gap Mil. Res., PA (Nov 1944, last documented; overseas unit Med Det, 80th Station Hospital, Bizerte, Mar 1944)
U.S. Army · ASN 33 146 214
Service Number
33 146 214
Rank
Private First Class (Pfc) — confirmed continuously Mar-Nov 1944; PFC also confirmed as terminal/discharge rank by his VA government headstone (Find A Grave #234899973)
Final Unit
1325th Service Unit, Indiantown Gap Mil. Res., PA (Nov 1944, last documented; overseas unit Med Det, 80th Station Hospital, Bizerte, Mar 1944)
MOS
835 — Supply Clerk
Theater
Mediterranean Theater of Operations (MTO) — North Africa (Bizerte, Tunisia, APO 763)
This timeline reconstructs Ottie's World War II Army service from National
Archives Morning Reports (searched by his service number), his Pennsylvania veterans'
bonus application, his Army enlistment record, and his VA headstone. His own discharge papers
most likely burned in the 1973 National Personnel Records Center fire, so nothing here rests on
them. Every entry names its source and is tagged by how firmly we know it — see the key
below. Items marked Newly discovered were recovered from the records.
Map of Service
From the steel town of Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, across the Atlantic to
North Africa — and home again. Ottie's overseas service took him to the
80th Station Hospital at Bizerte, Tunisia, on the Mediterranean coast.
Service Timeline
How to read this timelineConfirmed — proven by a record we holdReconstructed — pieced together from related recordsAssumed — a reasoned conclusion, not yet documented
Confirmed · Family record
April 27, 1920
Born in Evans, Jackson County, West Virginia
Ottie Owen Oldham Jr. is born in Evans, Jackson County, West Virginia, the youngest son of Ottie Owen Oldham Sr. and Lillie May Miller.
Source: Birth date from the Social Security Death Index and his newspaper obituary; 1920 / West Virginia corroborated by the 1940 U.S. Census and his Army enlistment record
Confirmed · Family record
May 24, 1940
Jackson County, West Virginia — the 1940 Census
At age 20, single and with four years of high school behind him, Ottie is living in the Ripley District of Jackson County, West Virginia, in the household of his married sister Isabelle Faye and her husband Clarence Ankrum, with his aging parents Ottie Sr. and Lillie and his younger sister Viola and brother John. He has no job yet — the census marks him as a young man looking for work. Newly added from FamilySearch.
The Oldham family in the 1940 census — “Ottie Jr., brother[-in-law], 20, single”
Source: 1940 U.S. Census, Jackson Co., WV, Ripley District, ED 18-10, Sheet 17B, household 317 (FamilySearch image 279/459, Image Group 005462137)
Confirmed · Family record
July 1, 1941
Aliquippa, Pennsylvania — registers for the draft
Ottie has left rural West Virginia for the steel town of Aliquippa, Beaver County, Pennsylvania, where he registers for the draft, about six months before he is inducted. It is the first record placing him in the town he would call home for the rest of his life.
Source: Military Draft Registration, 1 July 1941, Aliquippa, PA (FamilySearch tree LYDF-PNR)
Confirmed · Service record
January 27, 1942
Inducted into the U.S. Army
Drafted from Aliquippa through Selective Service Local Board No. 7, Ottie enters active service as a Private at the New Cumberland, Pennsylvania reception center. He is a 21-year-old steelworker with four years of high school, single. His service number, 33 146 214, is assigned here, and it ties together every record in this timeline.
Source: Pennsylvania WWII Veterans' Compensation application (fields 5/7/13) and NARA WWII Army Enlistment Record, RG 64 (Box 0617, Film Reel 2.281) — both give 27 Jan 1942, New Cumberland PA, grade Private
Confirmed · Service record
July 1, 1943
Foreign service begins — bound for North Africa
After about seventeen months of stateside duty, Ottie's foreign service begins and he ships out for the Mediterranean Theater. Within two weeks the 80th Station Hospital he serves with opens at Bizerte, Tunisia, where his own records later place him. July 1, 1943 is his recorded foreign-service start date; the exact ship, convoy, and port of embarkation are not yet documented.
Source: Foreign-service start date from the Pennsylvania WWII Veterans' Compensation application (field 6: foreign service Jul 1, 1943 – Apr 17, 1944); theater confirmed by his March 1944 Morning Report at Bizerte (APO 763)
Confirmed · Unit history
July 13, 1943
Bizerte, Tunisia — the 80th Station Hospital opens
The 80th Station Hospital — the unit his March 1944 Morning Report places him in — opens in the Bizerte area as a 500-bed fixed hospital just after the fall of Tunisia, caring for casualties and prisoners of war evacuated from the Sicily campaign and for Navy personnel of the Bizerte port. His foreign service had begun on July 1, 1943. The hospital's opening is documented; the exact date Ottie joined it is not yet on record, so we cannot place him there on opening day.
Source: AMEDD/CMH, Medical Service in the Mediterranean & Minor Theaters (Pub 10-8), ch. 5
Assumed · Family account
July 1943
A family account — wounded in the Sicily campaign
Ottie's son recalls his father saying he was wounded during the invasion of Sicily — that he was hit by machine-gun fire from a German tank, and that the wound ended his Army service. The family holds no record of it, and we have not yet found one, so it is set down here as family memory, honestly flagged — it may point to something the documents have not shown. It does not fully square with the records in hand: by March 1944 he was a supply clerk in the Medical Detachment of a rear-area station hospital at Bizerte, and he served on for another seventeen months — including eight months of stateside duty — before his discharge in December 1944, so a wound in July 1943 did not literally end his service. But the timing falls in the one stretch we have never documented him personally (July 1943–February 1944); his unit's work was caring for casualties evacuated from Sicily; and his unusually early December 1944 discharge has always looked as though it might have been for medical reasons. Records that survived the 1973 fire — the Army's hospital admission-card file and any VA disability claim — can confirm or rule out a wound, and those requests are now first in line.
Source: Oral history relayed by his son, June 2026 (unverified). Reconciliation and the records that would test it: RESEARCH_LOG.md §18 and RECORD_REQUESTS.md §4A/§4B
Reconstructed · Unit morning reports
December 1943
Bizerte, Tunisia — the 80th on station through the autumn and winter
A unit-wide sweep of the Army Morning Reports places the 80th Station Hospital at APO 763 (Bizerte, Tunisia) every month from September 1943 through February 1944. The unit's presence at Bizerte is documented for each of those months; Ottie himself is named in the records only from March 1944 onward. We reconstruct that he served his whole overseas tour at the Bizerte hospital, consistent with his July 1943 foreign-service start and his March 1944 appearance there, but the monthly pages do not name him individually.
Source: NARA Morning Reports — 80th Station Hospital rolls, APO 763 throughout Sep 1943–Feb 1944
Confirmed · Morning Report
March 18, 1944
Bizerte, Tunisia — listed for the voyage home (Roster 128)
Two days before his hospital morning report, Pfc Oldham appears on Roster No. 128 of the Headquarters, Eastern Base Section & 8th Port (Bizerte), the personnel roster cutting orders to send a group of men back to the United States. Newly discovered.
His name (line 16) on Roster 128, Hq E.B.S. & 8th Port, March 18, 1944.
Source: Special Orders roster — Hq E.B.S. & 8th Port, Roster No. 128, per SO 78 (NARA Roll 0567 pt05 p108, 18 Mar 1944)
Confirmed · Morning Report
March 20, 1944
Bizerte, Tunisia — found in the Army's Morning Reports
Located at last: Pfc Ottie O. Oldham Jr., serving in the Medical Detachment, 80th Station Hospital (a supply clerk, not a hospital medic), at APO 763 (Bizerte, Tunisia). On this day he is reassigned to the Personnel Centers, the pipeline that sent him home a month later. Newly discovered.
His line on the 80th Station Hospital's morning report, Bizerte, March 20, 1944.
Source: Morning Report — Med. Det., 80th Station Hospital, APO 763 (NARA Roll 0539 pt28 p105, 20 Mar 1944)
Confirmed · Service record
April 17, 1944
Returned to the United States
Ottie arrives back on American soil, ending his overseas tour. A month earlier his Morning Report had pulled him from the 80th Station Hospital into the ‘Personnel Centers’ — the pipeline that rotated men home. The hospital itself stayed on in Tunisia. That this was an individual rotation rather than a unit move is our reading of the records, well-supported but not stated outright in them.
Source: Foreign-service end date from the Pennsylvania WWII Veterans' Compensation application (field 6); corroborated by his 20 March 1944 Morning Report reassigning him to the Personnel Centers
Confirmed · Morning Report
May 22, 1944
Camp Reynolds, Pennsylvania — home from overseas
Five weeks after returning to the States, Pfc Oldham appears at the Army Service Forces Redistribution Station, Camp Reynolds (Greenville, PA) — the system that received and reassigned troops rotated home from overseas — in Company E, 3rd Group, 1st Training Regiment. Beside him is Pvt Kenneth L. Doty, who shows up next to him in every one of his Pennsylvania reports. Newly discovered.
His line on the Camp Reynolds morning report, May 22, 1944 (ASN 33146214, Pfc).
Source: Morning Report — Co E, 3rd Gp, 1st Tng Regt, ASFRD Camp Reynolds PA (NARA Roll 0416 pt07 p86, 22 May 1944)
Confirmed · Morning Report
October 4, 1944
Camp Reynolds, Pennsylvania — still in the redistribution pipeline
Pfc Oldham (now carrying MOS 835) is moved within the 1st Training Regiment from Company E to its Headquarters Detachment, Casual, and back to Company E two weeks later (Oct 18). Routine processing as he awaits his next assignment; Pvt Doty moves with him. Newly discovered.
His line at Camp Reynolds, October 4, 1944 (Pfc, MOS 835).Transferred back to Company E, October 18, 1944.
Source: Morning Reports — Hq & Hq Det Casual / Co E, 1st Tng Regt, Camp Reynolds PA (NARA Roll 0055 pt17 p60, 4 Oct 1944; Roll 0056 pt01 p74, 18 Oct 1944)
Confirmed · Morning Report
November 24, 1944
Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania — the last station before home
Pfc Oldham is attached to the 1325th Service Unit at Indiantown Gap Military Reservation, PA, joined from Camp Reynolds — the staging point just weeks before his discharge. Still Pfc, still MOS 835, still alongside Pvt Doty. From here he went to Fort Dix for separation on December 13, 1944. Newly discovered.
His line at Indiantown Gap, November 24, 1944 (ASN 33146214, Pfc, MOS 835).
Source: Morning Report — 1325th Service Unit, Indiantown Gap Mil. Res., PA (NARA Roll 0177 pt05 p92, 24 Nov 1944)
Confirmed · Service record
December 13, 1944
Separated from active service — Fort Dix, New Jersey
After processing back through Camp Reynolds and Indiantown Gap, Ottie is separated from active service at Fort Dix, New Jersey, a little under three years after he was inducted. He leaves the Army a Private First Class: his Morning Reports show him as Pfc continuously through November 1944, and his VA government headstone records the same terminal rank. The separation date and place are documented, and PFC is confirmed by the headstone. That the discharge was honorable is a reasonable inference — his VFW membership required qualifying war service and no record notes anything adverse — but his discharge document itself most likely burned in the 1973 NPRC fire.
Source: Separation date and place from the Pennsylvania WWII Veterans' Compensation application (field 9); terminal rank Pfc confirmed by his VA government headstone (Find A Grave #234899973) and corroborated by continuous Pfc in his Morning Reports (Mar–Nov 1944)
Assumed · Analysis
December 1944
Probable medals and campaign credit
From his service dates and theater, several awards are near-certain even though we have not yet seen the record that lists them: the World War II Victory Medal, the European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, and the American Campaign Medal; likely also a Good Conduct Medal and one Overseas Service Bar. A Naples-Foggia campaign star is plausible — he was in the theater the whole period — but unconfirmed for a rear-area station hospital. None of these are confirmed by a record yet. His discharge document (WD AGO 53-55) or final pay voucher would settle them; his obituary names no decoration.
Source: Reasoned reconstruction from his Mediterranean service dates — see web_research/web_campaign_credits.md. Not yet confirmed by a discharge or award record
Confirmed · Family record
June 27, 1983
Ottie Owen Oldham Jr. passes away
Died June 27, 1983 (age 63) and was laid to rest in Woodlawn Cemetery, Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, the steel town he came home to. His VA headstone marks him simply: Ottie O Oldham · Pfc US Army · World War II. This timeline is offered in his memory.
Ottie in later life.
Source: U.S. Social Security Death Index + newspaper obituary; VA government headstone (Find A Grave #234899973)
