Seventeen tank crewmen standing before two light tanks; Christian Henry Rohrbach's son James identified him as fourth from the left, but the partly cut-off first figure makes that position ambiguous
“Christian Henry Rohrbach is 4th from the left.”
A World War II Service Record

Christian Henry Rohrbach

Last documented: Sergeant · Company A, 757th Tank Battalion
Army · Service no. 32 100 429
Service Number
32 100 429
Last Documented Rank
Sergeant
Last Documented Unit
Company A, 757th Tank Battalion
Documented Theater
Mediterranean Theater of Operations (MTO) — Italy, Fifth Army
This timeline reconstructs Christian's World War II service from his enlistment record, family evidence, and the Morning Reports, orders and unit records held by the National Archives, searched by service number. Each card names the record it rests on, and says so when it describes his unit rather than him.
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How to read this service timeline

This page brings together records created for different purposes. The labels below tell you what kind of evidence supports each entry; open either guide when a record or military term is unfamiliar.

Confirmed — Service record

A personal military record supports the entry.

Confirmed — Unit record

A record created by his unit names him or documents the unit’s activity.

Context

Helpful background, clearly separated from personal evidence.

How to read a Morning Report

Morning Reports were daily administrative records prepared by individual Army and Army Air Forces units. They generally recorded changes—such as arrivals, transfers, promotions, illness, or return to duty—not a complete list of everyone present.

MORNING REPORT · SAMPLE
1Organization
Company A, 123rd Infantry
2Station or location
Camp Example, Virginia
3Date
14 September 1944
4Section
Personnel changes
5Pvt Smith, John A., 35123456
6asgd fr Hq Co per SO 187, Hq 123d Inf
In plain English Private John A. Smith, identified by Army Serial Number 35123456, was assigned to Company A from Headquarters Company under Special Orders No. 187.
  1. 1Organization: the company, hospital, squadron, or other unit filing the report.
  2. 2Station or location: where that unit reported from on that date.
  3. 3Report date: the date of the report, which may differ from the effective date of a change.
  4. 4Section: the part of the form containing personnel changes or the unit’s record of events.
  5. 5Soldier entry: usually rank, name, and Army Serial Number.
  6. 6Change and authority: what happened and the order authorizing it.
asgd
assigned
atchd
attached
trfd
transferred
fr
from
aptd
appointed
EM
enlisted men
SO
Special Orders
GO
General Orders
orgn
organization
sta
station
Common military and research terms
Army Serial Number (ASN)
The unique service number used to distinguish one soldier from others with similar names.
Discharge or separation paper
The document issued when a service member left active service. For many WWII Army enlisted soldiers, this is WD AGO Form 53-55. It summarizes service but is not a day-by-day history.
Morning Report
An Army unit’s daily administrative report. It usually lists people whose status changed, not every person in the unit.
Unit record
A document created by a military organization. It may name the soldier directly or provide context about his unit; the timeline states which applies.
OMPF or “201 file”
The service member’s Official Military Personnel File. Many Army and Air Force files were damaged or destroyed in the 1973 National Personnel Records Center fire.
Unit and final unit
A unit is the organization in which someone served. The final unit is the organization shown at separation; it may not be the only unit in the service history.
Rank or grade
The service member’s level in the military hierarchy. A timeline may show changes in rank over time.
MOS
Military Occupational Specialty—the Army’s classification for a soldier’s primary military job.
Assigned and attached
Assigned means formally placed in a unit. Attached usually means serving with a unit temporarily while belonging administratively elsewhere.
Special Orders and General Orders
Official directives used to authorize personnel actions, awards, organizational changes, and other decisions.
Campaign credit
Official recognition for service connected with a named campaign. It does not, by itself, describe a service member’s individual actions.
Station or location
The place from which a unit filed a report. It does not automatically prove that every member was physically present there.
Source citation
The note beneath a timeline entry identifying the record or records that support it.

Service Timeline

12 min
Two personal records agree
November 19, 1914

Born in New York City, New York

On his signed 1940 Selective Service registration, Christian gave November 19, 1914 as his birth date and New York City, New York as his birthplace. BIRLS independently gives the same date. The family request form gives 19 October 1914; no record found so far explains the one-month difference.
Source: Selective Service registration card, D.S.S. Form 1, signed 16 Oct 1940 (card image via Fold3); BIRLS; family request form
Confirmed — Record
October 16, 1940

Registers for Selective Service in Nassau County

He signed his registration card through Local Board 712. He was living at 17 Thorman Avenue, Hicksville, Nassau County, New York and named his mother, Mrs Emma Rohrbach, at the same address. The card's serial number 2291 is a Selective Service number, not his later Army service number.
scanned record
The signed front records his birth date, New York City birthplace, address and mother. We added the highlight to show his name and service number. The record itself carries no mark.
scanned record
The reverse records the registration date and physical description.
Source: Selective Service registration card, D.S.S. Form 1, Local Board 712, Nassau County, signed 16 Oct 1940; card image via Fold3
Confirmed — Service record
August 29, 1941

Inducted into the Army

Inducted at Induction Station G, Fort Jay, Governors Island, New York.
Source: Army Serial Number Merged File (RG 64) · AAD WWII Army Enlistment Records rid 2769140
Confirmed — Service record
August 29, 1941

Entered active service

The Veterans Administration index records this as his entry date; his Army enlistment record places his induction at Induction Station G, Fort Jay, Governors Island, New York the same day.
Source: BIRLS; Army Serial Number Merged File (RG 64) · AAD WWII Army Enlistment Records rid 2769140
Confirmed — Unit record
September 12, 1941

Sent to Fort Knox, and into armor

Fourteen days after he put on the uniform, Special Order 210 moved him out of the reception centre to the Armored Force Replacement Center at Fort Knox, Kentucky. Six of the men inducted with him went too. The rest of his intake scattered that same week to the coast artillery in Texas and the field artillery at Fort Bragg. This is the earliest record we have found that puts him on an armored-force path.
scanned record
The order. Fort Knox, Kentucky, 12 September 1941.
scanned record
Second sheet, where his name and number appear.
Source: Morning Report — Co I, 2nd Receiving Bn, 1229th Reception Center, 12 Sep 1941, SO 210 para 6 (NAID 442051071, images 730-731, Inclosure #19)
Confirmed — Unit record
January 1, 1942

Joins Company A, 757th Tank Battalion

He transferred out of Headquarters Company and reported to Company A at one o'clock in the afternoon, on Battalion Special Order 98. Twelve men moved with him. Four of them reappear on later Company A rosters in Italy: Fusco, O'Brien, Oros and Ziehl. The surviving records do not show that the group remained together continuously. He was still a private.
scanned record
“Trfd. fr. Hq. Co. Bn. S.O. 98, Jd 1:00 P.M.”
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn (L), January 1942 (NAID 440311564, image 3864)
Confirmed — Unit record
April 1942

Technician Fifth Grade

His first documented promotion, on Battalion Special Order 52.
scanned record
Appointed Technician Fifth Grade.
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn (L), April 1942 (NAID 440311564, image 3914)
Confirmed — Unit record
April 23, 1942

Technician Fourth Grade

Promoted again inside the same month, on Battalion Special Order 67, with Becker, Beinhorn, Brandt, Lee and Schuster.
scanned record
Appointed Technician Fourth Grade, 23 April 1942.
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn (L), 23 April 1942 (NAID 440311564, image 3922)
Confirmed — Unit record
August 9, 1942

Camp Edwards, Massachusetts

Company A's Morning Report was headed Camp Edwards on Cape Cod when he came back from a fifteen-day furlough on the 9th, still a Technician Fourth Grade. A battalion-level index places the 757th at Camp A.P. Hill later that month. The records found so far do not explain the difference.
scanned record
Camp Edwards, Mass., across the top of the page.
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn (L), August 1942 (NAID 440311564, image 3985); AGO cross-index, 24 Aug 1942 (NAID 671321643, image 387)
Confirmed — Unit record
September 22, 1942

Sergeant

Company A promoted four men to sergeant that day. He was one of them, and he held the rank through every record of his that follows, down to December 1944.
scanned record
“Tech 4th Gr Rohrback … aptd Sgts.”
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn (L), 22 September 1942 (NAID 440312565, image 4005)
Confirmed — Unit record
December 2, 1942

Furlough during the reported week of his wedding

The company sent eleven men off on a fifteen-day furlough on 2 December and logged them back on duty on the 17th. On 10 December 1942, in the middle of that leave, he married Mary Ann Elizabeth Ryan in Hicksville.
scanned record
2 December: “fr duty to 15 day fur.”
scanned record
17 December: “fr 15 day fur to duty.”
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn (L), December 1942 (NAID 440312565, images 4047 and 4050); Mary Ann Rohrbach obituary, 2018
Context
March 18, 1943

The battalion lands at Casablanca

The 757th came ashore in North Africa and spent its first weeks unloading ships as stevedores, because equipment had been lost to torpedoes on the crossing, then did military police duty at Port Lyautey. Its commander wrote it up afterwards: none of us could recall having read in a field manual that tank battalions were so employed. This is the battalion's movement, from its commander's postwar monograph. Whether Rohrbach sailed with it is not directly documented, though he was with Company A in December 1942 and on its next shipping roster.
Source: Lt Col R. C. Erickson, “The Operations of the 757th Tank Battalion, Italian Campaign, November 1943 – June 1945”, Command & Staff College 1946-47 (CARL Digital Library)
Confirmed — Unit record
October 1943

Outgoing transport roster — destination not stated

Company A appears on an outgoing-transport form listing twenty-eight men. He is ninth on it, a sergeant. The same roster runs again in November. The form names no port or destination. The battalion's chronology makes a move from North Africa to Italy likely, but the roster itself does not establish that.
scanned record
The October roster. He is number 9: Rohrbach, Christian H., Sgt, 32100429.
scanned record
The same roster run again, stamped 22 November 1943.
Source: Morning Reports — Co A, 757th Tank Bn (L), Oct and Nov 1943 (NAID 454570267 image 329; NAID 456935817 image 1257)
Confirmed — Unit record
February 16, 1944

Vairano, Italy

The first time the records place him on Italian soil. Company A was at Vairano, north of Naples, and he left at two in the afternoon for detached service at St. Agata. Fifth Army was fighting its way up toward Cassino.
scanned record
His line on the report ending 16 February: “FR DY TO DS ST. AGATA, ITALY LEFT Co. 1400.” The clerk wrote the station as “Vairona”.
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn, 16 Feb 1944, Station Vairano, Italy (NAID 464104531, image 780)
Confirmed — Unit record
March 1944

On the St. Agata roster — trading Stuarts for Shermans

A twenty-three-man detached-service roster for Company A, APO 464, signed by Captain Ted Rosen. Sergeant Christian H. Rohrbach is listed fifth. St. Agata was where the battalion re-equipped: it reorganised there from a light tank battalion, with 37 mm guns on Stuarts, into a standard battalion of Sherman medium tanks. He had served in the battalion through its change from light to medium tanks; his specific crew position remains unknown.
scanned record
Sgt. Christian H. Rohrback, 32100429, is the fifth name on it.
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn, APO 464, March 1944 (NAID 466569322, image 422); reorganisation per Harry Yeide, “The Infantry’s Armor”, Appendix A, and Erickson’s monograph
Confirmed — Unit record
May 8, 1944

At the Fifth Army rest centre, Caserta

Five men from the company left for Caserta at noon on 8 May and returned to duty at 1500 on the 13th. He was one of them. The clerk entered the move on the report ending 9 May, when Company A was at Torani. The report that brought them back was headed S. Clemente.
scanned record
Report ending 9 May, Station Torani: his name among the five men sent to the Fifth Army rest centre.
scanned record
Report ending 13 May, Station S. Clemente: “THE ABOVE 5 MEN FR DS 5TH ARMY REST CENTER CASERTA TO DY.”
Source: Morning Reports — Co A, 757th Tank Bn, reports ending 9 and 13 May 1944; the first records his 8 May departure (NAID 474630107, images 3872 and 3881)
Context
May 11, 1944

Company A leads the attack on La Guardia Hill — and he is at a rest camp

The Fifth Army opened its drive on Rome. The 757th, attached to the 1st Free French Division, crossed Tiger Bridge over the Garigliano behind the artillery at 2300. Company A crossed the anti-tank ditch first, and twelve of its tanks laid a rolling barrage fifty yards ahead of the French infantry going up La Guardia Hill. Two of the company’s tanks hit mines, two took mortar damage to the suspension, one lost its bow gun. C Company had to pass through and carry the attack on. Sgt Rohrbach was at the Fifth Army rest centre at Caserta from noon on 8 May until 1500 on 13 May. Company A fought this major documented action while he was away. Both facts come from records set side by side.
Source: Erickson monograph, pp. 8–13 (CARL Digital Library); rest-centre dates from Morning Reports, NAID 474630107 images 3872 and 3881
Confirmed — Unit record
July 3, 1944

Temporary duty at the Fifth Army rest centre in Rome

Rome had fallen on 4 June. A month later, Special Order 67 from battalion headquarters put him on temporary duty at the Fifth Army enlisted men's rest centre in Rome from the 3rd to the 7th, with thirty-two others named on the same order.
scanned record
Special Order 67. He is listed under Company A: Christian H. Rohrbach, Sgt, 32100429.
Source: Morning Report — HQ 757th Tk Bn, APO 464, SO 67, 2 July 1944 (NAID 481423744, images 2445 and 2453)
Context
August 9, 1944

First time the company fired indirect

Two platoons of Company A moved out of the battalion bivouac to a firing position and spent two hours shelling a road junction across the Arno. The battalion’s own monthly return marks it: this was the first time Company “A” had delivered indirect fire against the enemy. This is a company event; the return does not name the men in those two platoons.
Source: 757th Tank Bn historical return, August 1944, p. 88 (CARL Digital Library)
Confirmed — Unit record
September 1944

Attached to the 133rd Infantry

One officer and twenty-seven enlisted men from Company A went on detached service with the 133rd Infantry Regiment of the 34th Division. Tanks worked in support of infantry in the mountains, so his company was parcelled out to the regiments it fought alongside.
scanned record
“The following O and 27 EM fr dy to DS w/133rd Inf Regt” — he is fifth on the list.
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn, September 1944 (NAID 570157876, image 660); corroborated by the battalion’s own September return, p. 101: “One platoon of ‘A’ Company attached to the 133rd Infantry”
Confirmed — Unit record
September 14, 1944

Sick, in the line of duty

At seven in the evening he left the 133rd Infantry for hospital, marked line of duty: yes. The company was at Cirignano. Twelve days later the Army moved him to a Detachment of Patients under Fifth Army.
scanned record
“FR DS W/133RD INF REGT TO SK IN HOSP LOD YES, 1900 14 SEP 44.”
scanned record
Twelve days on, the Army moved him to the Detachment of Patients, Fifth Army.
Source: Morning Reports — Co A, 757th Tank Bn, report ending 25 Sep (entry dated 14 Sep) and report ending 26 Sep 1944 (NAID 570157876, images 690 and 693)
Confirmed — Unit record
October 3, 1944

Back with the company at Bruscoli

Returned to duty and rejoined Company A at Bruscoli, in the Apennines north of Florence, while the battalion worked the Gothic Line.
scanned record
One entry fills the page. He came back from the Detachment of Patients and rejoined the company on 3 October.
Source: Morning Report — Co A, 757th Tank Bn, report ending 4 Oct 1944; entry records his 3 Oct return, Station Bruscoli (NAID 572480059, image 636)
Confirmed — Unit record
November 24, 1944

Infectious hepatitis

The 602nd Clearing Station sent him to the 81st Station Hospital with hepatitis, acute, infectious, with jaundice, moderately severe. He was register number 11902. Two other men admitted on the same page had the same diagnosis, one from the 350th Infantry and one from the 133rd.
scanned record
The admission sheet. His row: 32100429, Rohrback, Christian H., Sgt, Co A 757 Tank Bn, register 11902, admitted from the 602nd Clearing Station.
Source: Admission and Disposition Report — 81st Station Hospital, APO 384, 24 Nov 1944 (NAID 576540551, image 1010)
Confirmed — Unit record
December 12, 1944

Moved to the 118th Station Hospital

After more than two weeks at the 81st Station Hospital, its disposition report listed him for transfer on 10 December. The 118th Station Hospital at APO 387 admitted him on 12 December as register number 15460, still with hepatitis and jaundice. This is the last wartime service record found that names him. NARA has digitised no Morning Reports at all for 1945, so the eleven months between here and his release are not online. They exist on microfilm at St. Louis.
scanned record
The 81st Station Hospital's disposition list, 10 December 1944.
scanned record
The 118th Station Hospital admits him two days later: register 15460, source of admission “81 Sta Hosp”. This is the last wartime service record found that names him.
Source: Admission and Disposition Reports — 81st Station Hospital, 10 Dec 1944 (NAID 578921379, image 1647); 118th Station Hospital, APO 387, 12 Dec 1944 (NAID 578931296, image 2242)
Context
January 22, 1945

Company A after his documented wartime trail ends

His documented wartime trail currently ends with the 12 December hospital admission. Company A stayed in the line. Through the snow of the Apennines it held Savignana Ridge attached to the 88th Infantry Division, was relieved on 20 January after swapping eight tanks with the 752nd because of the state of the roads, and closed into bivouac at half past three in the morning on 22 January — after being in active operations since 2 October 1944. This unit history does not establish whether he returned to Company A after his hospitalization.
Source: 757th Tank Bn, “Historical Records and Histories of Organizations”, return dated 12 February 1945, p. 123 (CARL Digital Library)
Context
Unit record · 1943–1945

The battalion's four campaign credits

Official unit references credit the 757th Tank Battalion with Naples-Foggia, Rome-Arno, North Apennines, Po Valley. These are the battalion's credits.
Source: 757th Tank Battalion lineage in Stanton, Order of Battle; campaign code key in Department of the Army Pamphlet 672-1
Confirmed — Service record
November 5, 1945

Released from active service

The Veterans Administration index records his release from active service on this date, after four years and two months in uniform.
Source: Veterans Administration BIRLS release date
Confirmed — Record
December 9, 1978

Christian Henry Rohrbach dies at 64

He is buried beside his wife at the Cemetery of the Holy Rood in Westbury, Nassau County.
Source: BIRLS; family request form; Find A Grave memorial #171600609