During the Summer of 1945, the men of the 66th Infantry Regiment prepared to go home after the end of World War II in Europe. They received a souvenir map tracing the unit’s route from England to occupation duty in Austria. The regiment’s commander, Colonel A.J. Regnier, wrote that the map would “serve to refreshen your memory as you reminisce with your families and friends in the security of your homes.”

At the end of World War II, hundreds of U.S. Army units in the European Theater of Operations produced souvenir route maps for soldiers and officers to take home. Units of all sizes produced maps, ranging from armies to companies. These maps tell the story of the war through the eyes of the men who served. They are some of the first written testimonies about the experience of war in Europe.

Cushing Memorial Library and Archives at Texas A&M University holds a large collection of these remarkable artifacts. Here, you will find more than a hundred maps, carefully annotated and made available for researchers. This is a rich corpus of data about American service in wartime Europe. There are thousands of images, places, and people searchable across the map collection. You can search by events, or by curated themes that appear throughout the corpus.

Some of these maps are colorful, while others contain details about the unit’s activities. In some cases, we know a great deal about the artists who prepared the maps, while others are lost to history. Some maps include humorous asides, inside jokes, and moments of joy. Others tell stories of sorrow, loss, and the violence of war.

These maps are some of the first records of American encounters with Nazi crimes, including concentration camps, forces labor facilities, and POW camps. They reflect soldiers’ preoccupations with meeting women and enjoying wine and beer. There are also faithful renderings of some of Europe’s great artistic and architectural landmarks, as well as depictions of ruined cities and the devastation of war.

We invite you to explore this collection for yourself. We built this tool to provide information for anyone interested in the history of World War II, including students, scholars, and those who want to know more about the experiences of members of their family.

Our team is continuing to add to the corpus of maps and to provide new data to the collection.

Contact email: mappingvictory@tamu.edu

Principal Investigator:

Dr. Adam R. Seipp

Site Designer:

Kayley Hart

Technical Editor and Site Developer:

Dr. Bryan Tarpley

Digital Collections Manager:

Mark Baggett

Curator, Cooper K. Ragan Military History Collection:

Anton duPlessis

Student Researchers:

Ilian Arellano
Jaden Chin
Bella Frano
James Franco
Travis Griffing
Samuel Hunt
Brent Johnson
Brooke Kingston
Jackson Mitchell
Campbell Morrow
Annie Ngo
Joshua Ward
Nicholas Zhou

The purchase of World War II service maps has been generously supported by:

• The Eugene Edge, III Charitable Trust
• Major General Dionel E. and Barbara Áviles Cushing Library Endowment for Military History
• Ben and Betty Huss Military History Collection Endowment
• John H. Hinton Library Endowment
• Class of ’62 Cushing Library Endowment, and the University Library Mayo Circle.