Bryan:
Isn't it interesting how the problems and deficiencies persist over the years with the military? I get immersed in the chaos of the record system that the South used and wonderr" how could such a system have been devised", and yet we had not advanced so far at the start of WW2. In the spring of 1942 I was in the army air corps butt had just volunteered for a secrert mission. We picked up the old airplanes we werer flying at San Antonio, Texas. I was flying with the second in command. The old planes we were flying had to be cranked to start them. While I was engrossed in trying to figure out to handle this little chore a GI came trotting up with our service records and asked where I wanted them put. I said "Oh, just put them back there in front of the vertical stabalyzer and I"ll get them in just a minute. About that time my pilot said, "Let's go" and when I looked up there went our service records all across the airfield. We were carried as AWOL for some time but eventually copies were made from such records as they could access. Then the copies , by now belonging to the VA were burned.
Ed