Need help naming an American super-weird-soldier...

[FramFramson]

I think Mike or Stanley Kowalski would work best. Mike for the "Iron Mike" bit and Kowalski (usually Stanley) is the closest thing in US army lore to a Tommy Atkins sort of everyman name.

You could also call him Mike Iron or Mike Irons (Irons being a more common real last name, but the real meaning being more clear without the S).

Kilroy is also an option, but would sound wrong if used with a second name (i.e. first name + last name). So if he only goes by one name that's also an option.

[Bubbles]

Kirk Roymund. Irish Immigrant and came to american with his family at the age of the 3 to enjoy the american dream. When the Nazi's came about he didn't support them with the attacks on the British as many of his fellow country men did because he knew that if the Nazi's won it would be bad news. He joined the Army with his brother to try and help in the fight but during the battles of Italy his Brother was captured. Several Months later Kirk and his platoon stumbled across a Nazi Research facility, quickly overcoming the guards Kirks platoon began to search the facility and what they found chilled them to the bone. Allied POW's starved and tortured in sick experiments to create new weapons to help the Nazi's in their genocidal campaign. One of the worst cases was Kirk's brother. Dying and Mutilated Kirk's brother made him promise to make sure this never happens to another Allied soldier again. After that fateful day Kirk Roymund received the nickname Killroy after his uncanny ability to appear anywhere an Allied soldier might need aid and a Nazi needed killing.

That was something I thought of in about 30 seconds so it isn't very good. but it could explain the killroy thing

[Galland]

I think Mike or Stanley Kowalski would work best. Mike for the "Iron Mike" bit and Kowalski (usually Stanley) is the closest thing in US army lore to a Tommy Atkins sort of everyman name.

You could also call him Mike Iron or Mike Irons (Irons being a more common real last name, but the real meaning being more clear without the S).

Kilroy is also an option, but would sound wrong if used with a second name (i.e. first name + last name). So if he only goes by one name that's also an option.

Funny, Kowalski is one of the most common names in the Ruhr area in Germany.

[anevilgiraffe]

James W Jackson jr was the Confederate who shot and killed federal Colonel Elmer Ellsworth on the day that Virginia seceded from the Union.  He was then shot dead by one of Ellsworth's men.  That makes him the first person to both kill and be killed in the American Civil War, I think.

how can you be both the first killer and the first killed in a war unless you commit suicide? 

[Steve F]

how can you be both the first killer and the first killed in a war unless you commit suicide? 

I have the vague suspicion that you may be willfully misunderstanding for comic effect.   Your paraphrase misplaces the "both", by the way, which is cheating.

[Red Orc]

Thanks for all the suggestions. I think the way I'm going to develop this is as a stable of ghost soldiers who can turn up depending on circumstance. I've just googled 'G Company' (for Ghost Company) and found out it's a Texas military living history unit (soldiers pretending tobe other soldiers from history as it were), so that seems like a good enough justification to call the idea 'G Company'. And I'm working with all your suggestions! It gives a kind of callsign for the unit and means that when they get back to base and report that they made contact with G Company there can be that idea of file gradually amassing of the file of contacts with a non-existant unit.

So the next question would be... I have about 80 more ghost soldiers to name, anyone else want to help?  

No, really I think I'll kinda run with about sixor seven of these - Captain Jackson is too good to miss out on, and the psychic echoes of Corporal Kowalski (and his little dog) even made it to Discworld so he's definitely in. I'll work up the biogs of GI Joe, Kilroy, John Doe, and 'Iron' Mike Irons, hopefully making one a sharpshooter, one a close-combat specialist, one who knows about explosives maybe... and if I can get Jeb Stuart and the Haunted Tank in there too, I will!