Item Detail
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22738
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0
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0
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English
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The Mormon Battalion Revived : Mormon Religion, Recruiting and Relationships in World War II
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Provo, UT
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Brigham Young University
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122
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Master's thesis
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"In 1942, the United States Marine Corps launched a recruiting scheme that revived the name of the Mormon Battalion, a group of Mormon men that marched during the early days of the Mormon Migration. The Marine Corps filled three platoons of men using this revivial of the Mormon Battalion by advertising in newspapers and holding large events featuring the enlistees in the first platoon. Although some men enlisted because they wanted to serve with men who shared their same faith and standards, many more enlisted in this group merely to avoid the draft. After each platoon trained as an all-Mormon unit, the men were separated and placed in various units in the Marine Corps. As the men engaged in combat overseas, they found that their religion distinguished them in many ways. The unique dietary practices of Mormonism, the universalist teachings of their faith, and the srong promises of safety that many of the men took with them into battle gave them an experience that was often different from the experiences of the men around them. Many of the men met with other members of their faith as often as they could to gain spiritual guidance and direction that way. Even the relationships that the men of the Mormon Battalion had with the other members of the Marines were affected by their religion. The other Marines knew that the Battalion members adhered to the Mormon faith, and asked many questions about the religion and gently chided the men for their abstinence from coffee, alcohol and cigarettes. Many of the men who joined the Marines as part of the Mormon Battalion became more religious as a result of their wartime experiences." [Author's abstract]