Existing comment:
Brigadier General George C. Marshall:
Colonel George Catlett Marshall purchased this uniform in November 1929 when he was the assistant commandant of the Infantry School at Ft. Benning, Georgia. Marshall left the Infantry School in 1934 to become the Senior Instructor for the Illinois National Guard and served in that capacity for the next two years. During this time, Marshall devised new training techniques and raise the standard of National Guard training to a level that would become the backbone of Army doctrine in the years immediately preceding World War II. When President Roosevelt federalized the National Guard in 1940, the training curriculum that George Marshall created would ensure all Army units would be ready for overseas duty.
After Illinois, Marshall was assigned as the Assistant Division Commander, 3rd Infantry Division where this uniform was finally configured as you see here. Only a few short years later, Marshall would be promoted to the rank of General of the Army and would serve as the Chief of Staff of the Army through World War II. Post World War II, Marshall also served as Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense under the Truman and Eisenhower administrations and was the architect of the Marshall Plan that rebuilt Europe and Japan after World War II.
The photo at right was taken in the Winter of 1937 and is one of very few known photos of Brigadier General Marshall wearing this uniform. |