Fall 2026 Militaria and Aviation Auction
Lot 148:
Description
WWII Sharp & Dohme Lyovac Normal Human Plasma Shipping Carton, Repurposed as a Soldier’s Mailing Box by PFC C. W. Gochnauer, Company D, 329th Medical Battalion, 104th Infantry "Timberwolf" Division, APO 104 – with Two Modern Display Bottles Offered here is an original World War II U.S. Army and Navy shipping carton for Lyovac Rapidly Lyophilized Normal Human Plasma, produced under American Red Cross and Sharp & Dohme contract, which was later converted by its soldier-owner into a personal mailing parcel addressed home to Baltimore, Maryland. The carton’s printed lid bears "Standard Army and Navy Package, " "Property of the U. S. Government, " the "LYOVAC" trademark, lot number X286380, and an expiration date of June 28, 1948, alongside the familiar Red Cross emblem. Handwritten in period pencil and ink across the top and side panels is the sender’s identification – PFC C. W. Gochnauer, service number partially legible, Company D, 329th Medical Battalion, APO 104 – addressed to Mrs. Gertrude Gochnauer at 2430 Kentucky Avenue, Baltimore 13, Maryland. No separate published biography of PFC Gochnauer has been located; his service is documented here solely through this surviving mailing artifact and unit designation. The 329th Medical Battalion supported the 104th Infantry Division, nicknamed the "Timberwolves, " which trained stateside before deploying to the European Theater in 1944, landing in France and driving through Belgium, Holland, and into Germany. Combat medics of the 329th treated the wounded throughout the division’s advance, and dried plasma such as that originally packaged in cartons of this type represented one of the era’s great battlefield medical breakthroughs – a technique advanced through Red Cross and Army Medical Department contracts with pharmaceutical houses including Sharp & Dohme and Eli Lilly, building on research associated with Dr. Charles R. Drew. Once its wartime contents were administered or exhausted, it was common practice for soldiers to repurpose the sturdy government-issue pasteboard cartons as makeshift parcels for sending small personal items home, turning a piece of frontline medical logistics into an intimate artifact of correspondence. The carton itself is constructed of pasteboard with printed red and black lettering, showing honest wear consistent with wartime handling and postal transit: edge fraying, split paper tape seams, corner crushing, and scattered toning and foxing throughout. The original interior divider remains in place. Fitted inside are two glass infusion bottles, each labeled "U.S. Army Human Plasma, Donated, Normal, Sterile, For Intravenous Infusion Only" and marked "Parke-Davis and Co., Detroit, Michigan, " with printed U.S. Army Contract 43-8995462 dated March 15, 1943, and lot number 44-63802; these bottles, with their bright chrome-like hanging bands, are modern reproduction display pieces created for study or reenactment purposes and are not part of the original wartime contents. A tangible, named link between frontline plasma logistics and a Timberwolf Division medic’s wartime correspondence home.
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