Marr, Howard K. (32688904)

Howard K. Marr
Howard K. Marr, from the History of the 5th Mobile Radio Broadcasting Company. Photo credit: (c) National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 407, History of the 5th Mobile Radio Broadcasting Company
Personal details
Born	15 June 1919 Vienna, Austria
Died	7 August 2023 Williamstown, Massachusetts
Nativity	Austria
Military service
Allegiance	United States
Branch	United States Army
ASN	32688904
Rank	Technician Fourth Grade

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Howard K. Marr (15 June 1919 – 7 August 2023) was a Vienna-born photographer and Ritchie Boy who began interrogator training at Camp Ritchie, Maryland, in 1944 before joining the 5th Mobile Radio Broadcasting Company, and served in Europe as a prisoner-of-war interrogator and morale analyst in psychological warfare intelligence.

Biography

Howard K. Marr was born in Vienna on 15 June 1919, possibly under the name Kurt Marr; his religion is not recorded. He attended elementary and secondary school in Vienna and probably fled to the United States after the Nazi takeover of Austria in 1938. By 1940 he was living in New York City, where he studied advertising and design at the City College of New York without finishing and took an evening course in photography; he worked as an office machine technician and photographer.

Marr entered the Army in early 1943, and from March he took infantry basic training and served as an armorer-artificer in Headquarters Company of the 75th Infantry Division at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri; in May 1943 he became a United States citizen at Waynesville, Missouri. In August 1943 he was sent as an Army Specialized Training Program student to the 3701st Specialized Training Assignment and Reclassification Unit at the University of Wyoming, and in September to the 3654th Army Specialized Training Unit at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. On 11 April 1944 he arrived at the Military Intelligence Training Center at Camp Ritchie and trained briefly as a German-language prisoner-of-war interrogator in the eighteenth MITC class (IPW 5C, German), but he was quickly transferred to the combat propaganda unit of the 4th Mobile Radio Broadcasting Company and, from 31 May 1944, to the 5th MRBC at Camp Sharpe, Pennsylvania, where he took the psychological warfare course.

In August 1944 Marr sailed from Camp Kilmer, New Jersey, to Kettering, England. In September the VIII District Transient Camp No. 1 there sent him to propaganda training with the War Office Selection Board at Watford and at the Psychological Warfare School in Brondesbury Park, London. He then served as a prisoner-of-war interrogator and morale analyst in Psychological Warfare Intelligence in the 12th Army Group's area of operations, possibly first for the Ninth U.S. Army with Detachment A of the 5th MRBC in northern France and the Netherlands, and in Belgium; by the spring of 1945 he was detached to the Psychological Warfare combat team of the First U.S. Army, and in March 1945 he was interrogating prisoners near Flammersfeld in the Rhineland-Palatinate. After the war he did screening and denazification work near Stuttgart. He was discharged as a technician fourth grade at the Separation Center at Fort Dix, New Jersey, in December 1945. He died in Williamstown, Massachusetts, on 7 August 2023.

Gallery

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Timeline

• 15 June 1919 — Born in Vienna, Austria.
• 1940 — Living in New York City; studied at the City College of New York.
• March 1943 — Infantry basic training, Headquarters Company, 75th Infantry Division, Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri (ASN 32688904).
• May 1943 — Naturalized at Waynesville, Missouri.
• 11 April 1944 — Arrived at Camp Ritchie; began training in the eighteenth MITC class (IPW 5C, German).
• 31 May 1944 — Assigned to 5th MRBC; psychological warfare course at Camp Sharpe, Pennsylvania.
• 4 August 1944 — Departed Camp Ritchie; sailed from Camp Kilmer to Kettering, England.
• September 1944 — Propaganda training at Watford and Brondesbury Park.
• March 1945 — PWI interrogator near Flammersfeld, Germany, with the First Army combat team.
• December 1945 — Discharged as T/4 at Fort Dix, New Jersey.
• 7 August 2023 — Died in Williamstown, Massachusetts.
• August–September 1943 — ASTP, University of Wyoming and University of Wisconsin.

Technical record

Field	Imported value
MRBC5	5
Approx Age at Death	84
row_source	demographics

Research notes

• to 5th MRBC 5/31/44
• Death date conflict: the Austriansoldiers biography gives 7 August 2023 in Williamstown, Massachusetts; the earlier import listed death year 2003 (approximate age at death 84). The full dated entry is used; needs review.

Sources

• Camp Ritchie Museum, Inc. (The Ritchie History Museum), Classes 1–31 roster data
• Dan Gross research spreadsheets, including original Excel timeline/roster work, combined with other research and records
• NARA World War II Army enlistment records (where a NARA ASN is present)
• 1940 U.S. Census (where a census match is present)
• Austriansoldiers biography: Howard K. Marr, Austriansoldiers / Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Research on Consequences of War (in German; accessed 25 September 2026)