Fourth Infantry Division

Fourth Infantry Division. “The Ivy Division”. Officially organized on 10 December 1917 at Camp Greene, North Carolina, the Fourth Infantry Division was constituted from Regular Army units. The Ivy Division joined the Allied Expeditionary Force and served with distinction in five World War I campaigns. Inactivated on 21 September 1921 at Camp Lewis, Washington, the division was reactivated on 1 June 1940 at Fort Benning, Georgia, to develop and model the swift offensive methods that characterized the German Blitzkrieg. , , After taking part in the Louisiana Maneuvers and Carolina Maneuvers, the Ivy Division moved to Florida for amphibious training. Overseeing that training was Major General Raymond O. Barton, who had taken command of the division in June 1942. In January 1944, General Barton took his troops to Britain for still more assault training on the English coast, culminating with Exercise Tiger at Slapton Sands. During Tiger more than 700 Allied soldiers and sailors were lost when German E-boats torpedoed their landing ships. Praised by First Army Commanding General Omar Bradley as "superbly trained," the Ivy Division was augmented as Force "U" to spearhead VII Corps' assault on Utah Beach. Like Force "O" on Omaha Beach, Force "U" had four infantry regiments for D-Day: the organic 8th, 12th, and 22nd Infantry plus the 359th Infantry attached from the 90th Infantry Division. , , Unlike the First Division's Omaha Beach assault with two regiments abreast, the Fourth Division's attack at Utah Beach was in a column of regiments. It began, as planned, at 0630 with the 8th Infantry, followed by a battalion of the 22nd Infantry, but those units came ashore nearly two thousand meters south of the designated landing area. Assistant Division Commander Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr., a veteran of three earlier amphibious assaults, led the first wave of the assault. Recognizing that German defenses deployed at the site of the erroneous landing were weaker than those at the planned landing area, General Roosevelt turned the mistake into an advantage. For his exemplary flexibility, leadership, and courage in that assault, he received the Medal of Honor. , , With a lodgment secured, the Fourth Division's lead units moved west to establish contact with US airborne units. Follow-on forces attacked northwest to enlarge the beachhead. By dusk most of the division had come ashore, with elements of the 12th Infantry fighting seven miles inland. On D+1, the division broke through to Sainte-Mère-Église and relieved elements of the 82nd Airborne Division. From there it pressed the attack towards Cherbourg, meeting increasingly dogged resistance en route. , , The division's rapid seizure of the westward invasion area contributed much to the success of Operation Overlord. By the end of June, the Allies controlled the entire Cotentin Peninsula. The first American unit to enter Paris, the Ivy Division distinguished itself in four more European campaigns before returning to New York in July of 1945 to begin preparing for the invasion of Japan, which the Japanese surrender days later precluded. Throughout its rich history, the Fourth Infantry Division has embodied its motto: Steadfast and Loyal. , In homage to all the “Steadfast and loyal “ soldiers, past and present, of the Fourth Infantry Division. Given by Mr. and Mrs. Wallace Stettinius.