VII Corps [90th Infantry Division]

Complex map showing VII Corps operations across Europe.

The VII Corps of the United States Army participated in combat in the European Theater from D-Day landings on the beaches of France to linking up with the Soviet Army in eastern Germany. The entirety of the corps’ campaign can be seen on this map, drawn by the Headquarters of the Engineering Section and reproduced by the 663rd Engineer Topographic Company.

Dated lines of advance show movement across the continent. Because the corps was comprised of different units at different points throughout the war, the authors have provided a meticulous amount of detail regarding which groups operated where, and when. Symbols for individual units can be seen adjacent to many of the routes depicted on both the main map and various insets which show Cherbourg, the Battle of the Ardennes, and the Roer-Rhine river crossings. These symbols can also be seen in the battle summaries across the top of the map. The summaries also contain the tallies of captured prisoners of war. According to statistics in the upper right, between 6 June 1944 and 6 June 1945, the VII Corps captured over 377,000 Axis soldiers, the vast majority in the Ruhr Pocket.

This particular example was distributed to veterans of the 90th Infantry Division, who were assigned to VII Corps for the early part of their campaign. A small note stapled to the center-left explains further, while the original mailing envelope (included) indicates it was sent from a sergeant to his family in Texas. The base map is well-represented in institutional collections, with WorldCat noting 15 examples as of June 2024. OCLC# 1158278509