The 64th Brigade Support Battalion, nicknamed "Mountaineers," is a United States Army support battalion, assigned to the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division in Fort Carson, Colorado.
History
The 64th Brigade Support Battalion was originally constituted as the 64th Quartermaster Battalion on 29 April 1942 and activated on 15 August 1942 at Camp Barkeley, Texas as the 64th Quartermaster Battalion (Laundry).
World War II
The battalion arrived in Lydney, England on 16 December 1943 and was redesignated the 64th Quartermaster Battalion (Base Depot) or "64th QMBD," under the command structure of the Advanced Section (ADSEC) directly supporting the 12th Army Group throughout the war in support of the European Theater of Operations (ETO).
The battalion participated in Operation Overlord in Normandy under the command of LTC Albert Barden. The 64th Quartermaster Battalion (Base Depot) was the first major sustainment organization to arrive on the beachhead of Normandy, following the axis of advance by pushing classes of supply across the English Channel. For the period from D+41 through D+90, ADSEC had requisitioned enough spare parts to maintain a 30-day level in each using unit and an additional 30-day supply in the army Class II depot. Quartermaster units were to carry a 90-day supply of special-purpose spare parts, which would last until the 64th Quartermaster Battalion (Base Depot) could establish a central parts depot on the European continent. On 13 July 1944 at Isigny-sur-Mer, the battalion was specifically tasked with collecting personal effects and baggage for the safe return to the United States, management of graves registration following the invasion of Normandy, and managing the captured German prisoner of war population. On 29 September 1944, the battalion established a base depot, Q-256, in Reims, in order to conduct salvage operations for the 12th Army Group. It became the largest single salvage installation in the ETO with the purpose of undertaking fifth echelon maintenance and manufacturing projects never contemplated by the War Department. Depot Q-256 was administered by the 64th Quartermaster Battalion (Base Depot) and operated by the 696th QM Salvage Repair Company (Fixed); these two units had been trained together at Lydney, and combined a total of 586 attached service troops or civilian employees, not including employed German prisoners of war, whose numbers swelled twenty times that number. Depot Q-256, with its facilities scattered throughout the city of Reims, received overflow salvage directly from the armies. In addition to routine processing and packaging, the depot conducted a program of manufacturing, remodeling, and improvisation. Scrap materials were used to reinforce paratroop trousers, fabricate Browning Automatic Rifle belts and rocket ammunition pouches, and patch tent-age. Materials ostensibly destined for scrap were converted into other types of end items: old tires were used to make soles for prisoners' shoes, badly torn shirts and raincoats were transformed into wiping rags, aprons, and typewriter covers, and old wool was converted into "shoddy" blankets. Besides the fixed repair activities at Reims salvage depot, twelve mobile repair teams and two technical crews worked out of this installation in answer to calls from the field. Ultimately, Q-256 also had to operate a complete machine shop where motors and other heavy equipment, including QM equipment trailers, were rebuilt, although this was originally a responsibility of Ordnance. Such activities were performed in rented French shops with captured German lathes, presses, and other heavy duty machinery. Sufficient machine tools were available to permit the occasional manufacture of badly needed spare parts such as flame cups for one-burner stoves and rotors for gasoline dispensers. By the end of March 1945 the Reims salvage depot occupied 500,000 square feet of closed space and 350,000 feet of open space; this was more than double the total space set aside for Quartermaster salvage and reclamation in all the U.K. depots as of January 1944. At the close of 1944, the depot had processed nine million items, and in March 1945 it was handling 160,000 pieces per day. Items processed in the United Kingdom shortly after D-day for shipment to the continent were in particularly chaotic condition. During the second half of November 1944, combat units of First Army complained that items arriving in the forward areas marked Class B clothing were not suitable for issue, and also reports from its own field liaison officers that 80 percent of the clothing located at Utah Beach marked Class X was actually combat serviceable and included such scarce items as field jackets.