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Contact Info
Home Town Fairfax, VA
Last Address Washington, DC
Date of Passing Sep 22, 2001
Location of Interment Arlington National Cemetery (VLM) - Arlington, Virginia
Sergeant Major (SGM) George Edward Loikow, 93, who served Military Order of the World Wars for 19 years, as the Chief Administrative Officer, died in Fairfax, Virginia, Saturday, September 22, 2001, of a heart attack. He lived in Falls Church, Virginia. He had retired from MOWW in 1988 at the age of 80.
Sergeant Major Loikow was the United States Army’s last World War II glider serviceman to leave active duty and the first enlisted man to serve as Administrative Assistant to the Chief of Staff of the Army.
Loikow was the Chief Noncommissioned Officer (NCO) to three successive Army Chiefs of Staff and served as acting Sergeant Major of the Army pending formal establishment of that office in 1967 at Loikow’s suggestion. In 1968, at age 60, he retired from the Army.
George Edward Loikow enlisted in the United States Army in 1924 at the age of 16. He served in the Army until 1929 at which time he was discharged so he could assist his father in a delicatessen business in New Jersey.
After Pearl Harbor, he reenlisted in the Army. In April 1943, he transferred to the Headquarters of the 69th Infantry Division to become Division Sergeant Major at Camp Shelby, Mississippi. Following this assignment he was transferred to the newly created First Allied Airborne Army in Europe. He participated in airborne operations until VE day.
Loikow spent the last eight years of his Army service as the Chief NCO to the Chief of Staff of the Army. For his service in the Army, Loikow received the Legion of Merit with oak leaf cluster and Bronze Star along with numerous additional U.S. and foreign decorations.
Loikow was a member of the Fighting 69th Infantry Division Association and, although not an officer, a Special Companion in the MOWW, a special status awarded specifically to him in recognition of his many contributions to the Order.
Sergeant Major Loikow is survived by his wife of 54 years, Frances Darby Loikow of Falls Church, Virginia; his son, John Darby Loikow and his granddaughter, Elizabeth Darby Hume Loikow, both of Washington, D.C. He was buried in Arlington Cemetery with full military honors.
WWII - European-African-Middle Eastern Theater
From Month/Year
December / 1941
To Month/Year
September / 1945
Description The European-Mediterranean-Middle East Theater was a major theater of operations during the Second World War (between December 7, 1941, and March 2, 1946). The vast size of Europe, Mediterranean and Middle East theatre saw interconnected naval, land, and air campaigns fought for control of the Mediterranean, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, the Middle East, and Europe. The fighting in this theatre lasted from 10 June 1940, when Italy entered the war on the side of Germany, until 2 May 1945 when all Axis forces in Italy surrendered. However, fighting would continue in Greece – where British troops had been dispatched to aid the Greek government – during the early stages of the Greek Civil War.
The British referred to this theatre as the Mediterranean and Middle East Theatre (so called due to the location of the fighting and the name of the headquarters that controlled the initial fighting: Middle East Command) while the Americans called the theatre of operations the Mediterranean Theatre of War. The German official history of the fighting is dubbed 'The Mediterranean, South-East Europe, and North Africa 1939–1942'. Regardless of the size of the theatre, the various campaigns were not seen as neatly separated areas of operations but part of one vast theatre of war.
Fascist Italy aimed to carve out a new Roman Empire, while British forces aimed initially to retain the status quo. Italy launched various attacks around the Mediterranean, which were largely unsuccessful. With the introduction of German forces, Yugoslavia and Greece were overrun. Allied and Axis forces engaged in back and forth fighting across North Africa, with Axis interference in the Middle East causing fighting to spread there. With confidence high from early gains, German forces planned elaborate attacks to be launched to capture the Middle East and then to possibly attack the southern border of the Soviet Union. However, following three years of fighting, Axis forces were defeated in North Africa and their interference in the Middle East was halted. Allied forces then commenced an invasion of Southern Europe, resulting in the Italians switching sides and deposing Mussolini. A prolonged battle for Italy took place, and as the strategic situation changed in southeast Europe, British troops returned to Greece.
The theatre of war, the longest during the Second World War, resulted in the destruction of the Italian Empire and altered the strategic position of Germany resulting in numerous German divisions being deployed to Africa and Italy and total losses (including those captured upon final surrender) being over half a million. Italian losses, in the theatre, amount to around to 177,000 men with a further several hundred thousand captured during the process of the various campaigns. British losses amount to over 300,000 men killed, wounded, or captured, and total American losses in the region amounted to 130,000.
