The 63rd Infantry Division’s Shoulder Sleeve Insignia, as well as its Official Special Designation of “Blood And Fire,” was inspired by a statement issued by President Franklin Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill at the famous 1943 Casablanca Conference that proclaimed “the enemy would bleed and burn in expiation of their crimes against humanity.” Constituted that same year as the 63rd Infantry Division, the unit entered combat in France in December 1944.
By the middle of March, it had contributed its part in making the statement an accurate prediction of Germany’s fate, smashing through the Siegfried Line on 15 March 1944, crossing the Rhine less than two weeks later and turning southeast to continue its spearhead into Germany. In this brief period, the 63rd Infantry Division’s actions were recognized with seven Presidential Unit Citation, 16 Meritorious Unit Commendations, and a French Croix de Guerre with Palm.
But this would be the last combat the unit would see. Allotted to the Army Reserve in 1952, it was inactivated in 1965, then redesignated as the 63rd Army Reserve Command—but retaining the famed “Blood And Fire” insignia. It would undergo a flurry of redesignations in the coming decades, and in each instance the insignia was also redesignated for the unit’s new role.
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63rd Readiness Division Unit Crest (DUI)In addition to the 63rd Army Reserve Command, the following designations also wore/wear the insignia: