Jeroen van der Schaaf of Rotterdam, The Netherlands is trying to find out about these locomotives. If you have any information or photos of these locos please contact me, Nancy : militaryrailwayservice@gmail.
His web page can be found here https://army-whitcombs.info/s/aw/page/about
Thanks to Jeroen for this great photos of two of these 65-DE-19A Whitcombs in Rome 1944.
Joroen writes ... this photo shows two of these locos on the 4th of July 1944, pulling the first train into Rome. It carried a load of coal, which was sorely needed to help boost the output of electricity and gas for the city.
At the end of the war in Europe, about 118 of these locomotives were
sent back to the United States during the summer of 1945. They were
intended to be refurbished and sent westwards to aid in the war against
Japan, but this plan was abandoned because of the rapid conclusion of
the war in the Far East. With the war over, the locomotives were
disposed of via the War Assets Administration (WAA) at the beginning
of 1947. Most of the USATC Whitcombs were sold through dealers to
industrial operators and short lines in the United States, Canada,
Mexico and Cuba.
