The tag is for a member of the 124th Infantry Regiment, which when compared to other units, was extremely active and well traveled during the war. This unit started out life with the 18th Division within the 35th Infantry Brigade and fought in China including the Battle of Nanjing. It later became part of the Kawaguchi Detachment that landed and fought in Borneo and the Philippines and later ended up on Guadalcanal,all between 1941 and 1943. It was later evacuated from Guadalcanal and ended up in the 31st Division which ended up in Burma in 1944. I don't quite know what to make of the middle column. That is the area of the company number and I am leaning towards two possibilities: Either the "2" is canceled out and the soldier was in the 1st company, the 2 being crossed out once, or the kanji for company was sloppily done and minimal strokes were used since the context was already known. Either way, the company is most likely the 1st company. The last number on the left is the soldier's ind. number. I would think that the tag would most likely fall within the time of the 18th Division, pre-1942 (otherwise I believe the unit code of 8906 would have been used), although stranger things have happened.
Tom
Tom
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