This is interesting
I saw this Soldiers Medal in the WW2 "coffin case" tucked away at an antique store in the middle of nowhere. I've never seen or heard of the little note inside of the box before though. Thought you guys mike like seeing it.
Usually sent with KIA medals.
Would expect the medal to be engraved if it came with that note
You might be right - there was also a Purple Heart in a separate coffin case with it.
Check the back and research the name. Here's a posthumous AM
Woah! Nice find!
I have had medals like this that had a card like this. A lot of higher awards during ww2 were issued with this card and its a common miss conception that they were only issued to those who were killed or missing in action and while a lot of awards during ww2 were posthumous it was wasn't all. Its like people saying all engraved medals were to guys who were killed.
Here is a picture of a engraved Bronze Star group I have that has the same card. The Bronze Star was officially engraved and awarded to the him in 1946. He wasn't Killed, Wounded or a POW.
Also in terms of the original post the medal was found at a antique store and could've been separated from his other awards of witch may have been engraved.
Very interesting. So it's possible the recipient got them after the war, which would make sense why they were forwarded. I bet with all of the other priorities such as seizing objectives and winning the war, awarded medals would fall to the wayside in many cases. Thanks for the response!
Its definitely possible however they also forwarded awards during the war as well. If he was seriously wounded and was unable to attend a presentation they may have forwarded them to his wife of family. However without documents proving either it's hard to say.
To expand on the "all engraved are KIA"
There is private vs personal engraved. Some Soldiers liked to have their medals engraved to commemorate the event or because they took alot of pride in these (these are private engraved).
The government did also issue engraved Purple Hearts to WW1 recipients who retroactively applied for them and to POWs who sent claims with proof that they were injured when captured.
Some medals thar families applied for came with engravings. I have an engraved Bronze Star to a Mess Cook who earned it by having a CIB (in an interview he said he got his CIB by delivering food to the front line troops).
A Bronze Star to a mess cook in interesting but then again one eared the Medal of Honor for actions in Europe.
Also I have been in this this community long enough and have been to enough shows to say that there's a lot of misconceptions and misrepresentations of all kinds of things but by far medals and ribbons are number 1. I have seen it go as far as people calling the police and claiming that selling military items including medals is illegal.
The only Medal that's illegal to own is the Medal of Honor however there's several loopholes that if you know you know.
Soldier's Medal is the first level of valor medal that has a more lengthy and involved approval process. Bunch of mandatory reports and witness statements and whatnot. Sometimes they'll give a lower merit medal, push the paper, then do an upgrade. Could be what happened here.
They just did this with the shooting on Ft. Stewart in Aug. 2025. SECARMY flew down following day to personally give the guys who neutralized the shooter the MSM. It was the highest applicable award he could authorize immediately given the circumstances. Pretty sure he'll sign to upgrade it to the SM as soon as the paperwork is ready.
Itd the highest award a Soldier can earn of valor without being in a combat zone.
Its the highest medal for non combat heroism for the army
Fancy. BG Walsh' obituary says he was in charge of procuring textiles for the Army during WW2 and commanded the Philadelphia depot. There probably weren't a ton of opportunities for a ASF commander to award these, so maybe that's why he put a special note in there.
Edit - Other commenter suggested this may be a posthumous award. That makes sense. Idk if ASF units were responsible for casualty assistance, or whatever version of casualty assistance existed in WW2, but it would make sense as the ASF was dispersed across the U.S. and was probably the closest military personnel for most large cities.
The Philadelphia depot was where medals were stockpiled and engraved. My guess is that certain higher valor medals included cards like this.