Original Item. One-of-a-Kind. This is a gorgeous & scarce copy of “The Devils in Baggy Pants with the soldier’s insignia all pinned to the cover of the book. The book is a World War II personal narrative book about the 82nd Airborne Division's 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment's fight across North Africa and the Battle of the Bulge. This example has some water damage across the book.

The cover of the book is complemented by an 82nd Airborne Division patch, a blue white-bordered oval trimming patch, and a U.S. Army Airborne Command patch. Below this is the soldier’s paratrooper wings which are marked on the back Sterling with a maker’s mark however we are unable to remove the wings to check. Next to this is a European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign medal ribbon with five campaign stars. Under this is the soldier’s CIB (Combat Infantryman Badge), and below the title are his U.S. & Infantry collar discs. There may have been other items on the middle right as there are tears from where they may have been, but they are now lost.

The book itself has a fair amount of water damage mostly toward the back pages, where a couple are stuck together. The book itself measures roughly 13 x 9½” and was printed in Paris. On the final page of the roll of honor, hand-written annotations have been added including the total killed in action, missing, deaths, and prisoners the regiment had, with a grand total of 853. On another blank page, the owner has pasted in 9 cigarette cards from German cigarette packs including photos of AH and German flags. One has come off but all are present and a great addition to an already phenomenal book.

This is a fantastic history book for the 504th Parachute Infantry, 82nd Airborne Division, with a soldier’s period insignia applied. Unfortunately we have been unable to find a name in the book, but we did not look terribly close at every page so we may have missed something. Even with the water damage, this is a tremendously rare piece. Comes ready for further research and display!