87th division

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1 World war I
2 World War II
3 External links
4 Sources

[edit] World war I

The Division was activated on 25 August 1917, going overseas in September 1918,but was inactivated in January 1919 without seeing action.

[edit] World War II

During World War II the 87th Infantry Division fought as part of General George Patton's U.S. Third Army. After months of training, first at Camp McCain, Mississippi,and then at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, the Division shipped overseas aboard the Queen Elizabeth. They first entered combat in France's Alsace-Lorraine, and after bloody fighting, crossed the German border in the Saar, capturing the towns of Walsheim and Medelsheim.

Caught up in the Third Army's historic counterattack in the Battle of the Bulge, the 87th Division raced off into Belgium - attacking the German Panzer Lehr Division near Bastogne at the towns of Pirompré, Moircy, Bonnerue, and Tillet. At Tillet S/Sgt. Curtis Shoup earned the Medal of Honor, posthumously, and Lt. Glenn Doman the Distinguished Service Cross.

Soon after breaching the Siegfried Line in the Eifel Mountains, the division crossed the Moselle River and captured Koblenz. Then the Rhine River crossing near Boppard and the dash across Germany which took them to Plauen, near the Czech border.