FLORIDA'S ARMY






















 + A


















 Members of the Command Post Battalion of Headquarters Company, 2d Battalion, 124th Infantry Regiment, 31st Division, near Aitape,
 New Guinea, send orders to forward patrol over an SCR-300. 1 Aug. 1944


 ing number of Florida Guardsmen still serving with the and Adak Islands in the Aleutians. There they were dis-
 unit. banded in late 1944 and the men transferred to other
 At almost the same time the 31st was moving to the formations throughout the Army.
South Pacific, Florida's other, non-divisional National The first combat assignment for the 31st Division
Guard unit, the 265th Coast Artillery, was reaching its fell to a Regimental Combat Team centered on the 124th
war station. The 265th had been federalized in January Regiment and elements of the 149th Field Artillery and
of 1941. Initially, it trained in Galveston, Texas. Then it the 106th Quartermasters, Medics, and Combat Engi-
was reorganized as the 277th, 278th and 279th Battal- neers. All these units contained Florida Guardsmen,
ions of Coastal Artillery. As with other Guard units, and all had contained Florida Guard units in 1940. The
many, perhaps most of its Florida men had been pulled Regimental Combat team was committed to action on
from the regiment's composite units and sent else- the 12th of July in the Aitape region of British New
where. After service in Texas, California, Florida,/and Guinea. For nearly a month the team fought the Japanese
Washington state, the three battalions were sent to in the jungle and swamps of tropical New Guinea. The
Alaska to man the coastal defenses of Kodiak, Amchitka, skill, efficiency, and accomplishments of the 3rd Battal-



 171 -