Marvin Ralph Alexander
Service No.: 34673896
Ship Assignment: USS LST-531
ABMC Memorial Page: Click Here
Marvin Ralph Alexander was born on April 6th, 1925, to Samuel Thomas Alexander and Eloise “Ella” W. Alexander (nee Holmes) at Edenton in Chowan County, North Carolina.
Marvin had 6 sisters and 2 brothers.
Growing up in the port town of Edenton, Marvin attended high school for three years and worked as a semiskilled chauffeur and driver, before joining the army.
Military Service
Marvin enlisted at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, on May 19th, 1943, and was assigned to the 607th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company.
He was recorded as being single, 6 feet 1 inches in height, and 89 lbs in weight.
On October 23rd, 1943, the 607th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company was transferred to Pole Mountain Military Reservation, Wyoming, a Target & Manoeuvre Reserve Area), located twenty-five (25) miles from Fort Francis E. Warren, for bivouac and field training.
On March 23rd, 1944, Marvin’s unit left Boston POE and sailed to England on troopship USAT “Edmund B. Alexander”. The Atlantic crossing to Liverpool, in the United Kingdom, took thirteen days, arriving on April 3rd, 1944.
Marvin’s trip would have been far from comfortable. The personnel were crammed into the holds, below sea level, and slept in bunks four high; having to stand to eat the meals served twice a day.
Following arrival in the United Kingdom, the 607th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company spent some time in Oxford, before being stationed near Bristol, Gloucestershire, where it was to start an intensive period of training both on land and on water.
On April 15th, Marvin, as a member of the First Platoon, was relocated to 1st Engineer Special Brigade, at Truro, Cornwall, in preparation to take part in Exercise Tiger. The 607th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company was put aboard LST-531 for Exercise Tiger at St. Mawes, Cornwall, on April 8th, 1944. Having moved along the coast, LST-531 departed Plymouth, England, on April 27th, 1944, as part of the fateful Convoy T-4.
Marvin’s unit suffered heavily during the German E-boat attack of April 28th, 1944, when LST-531 was torpedoed and sunk during the incident. It cost the First Platoon of the 607th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company one officer and fifteen men killed, and one wounded out of twenty-four.
PFC Marvin R. Alexander status was designated as “Missing in Action”, dying aged just 19 years of age. His remains have never been recovered.
Honours and Memorials
Private First Class Marvin Ralph Alexander was awarded a Purple Heart.
Marvin’s name is inscribed in the American Roll of Honour book in the American Memorial Chapel Roll of Honour at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, and is commemorated on Tablets of the Missing at the American Battle Monuments Commission Cemetery and Memorial, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
