Double Victory (15 page)

When the day of departure arrived, Charity learned she would travel to her destination by cargo plane—not the most comfortable form of transportation. She was handed a sealed envelope and ordered to open it after she had been in the air for an hour. When she tore open the packet, she learned she was headed to London. But the orders also contained information about Paris. She was confused. Was her destination London or Paris?

Charity arrived in London on January 28, 1945, and learned that she was to command a unit called the Postal Directory Service for the European theater of operations—the 6888th Central Postal Directory. It would consist of 31 officers and almost 900 enlisted women—all black. The enlisted WACs would arrive in stages beginning in February.

The 6888th would be in charge of all mail going to US citizens and soldiers in Europe. That was mail for an estimated 7 million people! And to make matters more daunting, mail had been piling up for months because of massive troop movements during recent critical battles across the European continent. Most of the Christmas letters and packages had not yet been delivered when the 6888th arrived in February. They had a big job ahead of them.

A white army band greeted the first contingent of WACs as they departed their train at the station in Birmingham, England. As the townspeople cheered, the band played the “Beer Barrel Polka.” The WACs marched through the blacked-out streets to their new home in the former King Edward School for boys. It had steam heat and two spacious dining halls. The WACs' first meal was a tasty roast lamb. They were pleased to see the regulation-size basketball court in the gym. But when the newly arrived WACs sank onto their beds after their long journey that first
night, they were in for a surprise. The “mattresses” were sacks of straw. Life was full of little inconveniences in wartime England.

Soon after the arrival of the WACs, Major Charity Adams held a press conference. She said after a brief training period, the women of the 6888th would begin “directing, locating and changing mail addresses of battle casualties, transferees, and hospitalized troops.”

That sounded depressing to some of the WACs—some of the mail would be returned to the United States to the families of soldiers who had been killed. But the WACs also knew that mail from home was the biggest morale booster a soldier could have. So they knew their job was helping to keep morale high among the soldiers.

It didn't take long for the WACs to start sorting through the mountains of mail. In some cases the addresses were illegible, and they had to try to decipher the writing. Packages were falling apart, and they had to repack many of the contents. Six airplane hangars overflowed with packages that had been undelivered to soldiers. They worked around the clock, splitting three eight-hour shifts, seven days a week. Sergeant Betty Jane Smith of Kansas City, Kansas, was in charge of 56 of the 6888th WACs in Birmingham. It was her duty to keep the “girls supplied with mail” and ensure that it went out to the soldiers “in the shortest possible time.”

Two of those “girls” were sisters Winona and Jacquelyn Fuller from Chicago. The Fuller sisters had volunteered for duty in Europe because they wanted to keep up a family tradition. Their father had recently been discharged with a Purple Heart for his service with the US Navy. And two brothers were serving with the navy and the army in the Southwest Pacific. But the Fuller sisters weren't the only sister team serving with the 6888th in Europe. Two of the three O'Bryant sisters from
Georgia who had joined the WAAC together—Essie and Tessie—went overseas with the 6888th.

Shortly after Victory in Europe Day (VE Day), the 6888th was ordered to leave Birmingham and move to Rouen, France. On June 9, 1945, the WACs crossed the choppy waters of the English Channel and landed in Le Havre, France. It was in Le Havre that the devastation of the war hit the women of the 6888th. They were shocked and heartbroken by what they saw. The entire city seemed to have been leveled by the Germans.

From Le Havre the 6888th boarded a crowded train for the long ride to Rouen. When they arrived, they were taken to six aging red brick buildings. The WACs' home in France was an old barrack that had housed French troops over the years. It was called the Caserne Tallandier. The WACs learned that the buildings had been used by the Nazis during the German occupation. And they heard that a German sniper was buried in the center of the huge courtyard. It was a chilling reminder that the Germans had occupied the area only a short time before their arrival.

Pvt. Ruth L. James on duty at the battalion area gate of the 6888th Central Postal Directory in Rouen, France, May 1945.
National Archives, AFRO/AM in WW II List #148

The Caserne Tallandier was surrounded by an eight-foot-high fence. When the WACs arrived, crowds of black soldiers and French men and women gathered outside the gate—trying to catch glimpses of the newly arrived black women. Both black and white military police (MPs) guarded the gate. Helping the male MPs were WAC MPs, including six-foot-tall Thelma Albin from Sterling, Kansas. The male MPs carried guns, but the WAC MPs weren't allowed weapons. However, the WACs had a secret weapon. A British soldier had offered to teach the WAC MPs jujitsu, and they had taken advantage of his lessons.

Some of the WACs were annoyed by the soldiers and the local citizens. They felt the constant attention interfered with their jobs. They appreciated the high fence that protected them from the gawkers. But other WACs felt restricted by the fence. Doris Maxwell of Terre Haute, Indiana, looked at the fence and broke into a song that had been made popular in 1944 by singing cowboy Roy Rogers—“Don't Fence Me In.”

In October 1945 the 6888th received orders to move to Paris. The WACs packed up and traveled from Rouen to Paris. When they arrived they were thrilled to find their new “barracks” were three hotels complete with rich furnishings, chefs, and maids. Paris was the last stop for the 6888th. Gradually, groups of WACs were deployed to the United States. By March 1946 all the WACs of the 6888th had left Europe and returned home.

Adele Ricketts, Eloise McNeely, Lucia Pitts, and Bernice Huggar were four black WACs who returned to the United
States on the troop ship the USAT
Thomas Barry
in August 1945. There were 41 WACs onboard with 4,300 white soldiers. When they landed in New York they were taken to Camp Shanks, where they were served a steak dinner with coffee, cake, and ice cream. The four black WACs talked about their experiences.

Adele praised the British people, many of whom had lost their homes to enemy bombs. She was impressed with how they managed to maintain their morale during the war. The French also made a lasting impression on her. “The French underwent terrific bombings and suffered the worst hardships of the war,” said Adele. “However, they still have high spirits and a bright outlook on life.”

Eloise reminisced about her travels in France and England: “We made tours to Versailles, the Pierre Fonds Castle in Compiegne, and also to Stratford-on-Avon in England. Socializing with the French was no problem, and the English were wonderful to us.” Eloise had been in the army for almost three years, and she was eager to see her daughter in California and her son who was in the army.

“I loved the English people, their atmosphere and the beauty of their country,” Lucia said.

“Although I am happy to be back again, I'm also glad I had the chance to go overseas,” Bernice commented. She was looking forward to seeing her husband, William, who was in the army serving with the 92nd Infantry Division.

Racism Back Home

“We wanted the Negro WACs out because, well, they'd ruin property values,” said a member of a neighborhood association in Chicago in June 1945. The group's racist beliefs were made very clear in a letter to the War Department protesting the
housing of black WACs near their homes. Among other things, the group said it feared the black WACs might have “colored boyfriends coming to call on them.” The group was also worried that the housing of the black WACs near their white neighborhood might “lead to general social intermingling” between white and black residents.

In May a group of 55 WACs (and more were scheduled to come) had been assigned to work at Gardiner General Hospital, where they would help care for wounded soldiers—both black and white. They were living in barracks in Burnham Park next to an exclusive, all-white neighborhood. For years racist members of the white neighborhood had worked to establish restrictive covenants that kept black people from moving into their neighborhood.

In their letter to the War Department, members of the neighborhood association tried to justify their racism by insisting their purpose was noble—“to promote harmonious race relations.” They explained, “We believe that a poll of the patients and staff of the Gardiner General Hospital will show that Negro WACs are not wanted or needed for the care, comfort, or welfare of the wounded and convalescent American soldiers.” They said that the idea of housing black WACs near their neighborhood was “a plan on the part of a few agitators to impose Negroes upon whites in a white community.” One wealthy business owner in the neighborhood didn't try to disguise his racist views. He told a newspaper reporter he wondered where “Negroes got the idea that they had the right to live anywhere they want to.”

Not all residents of the white neighborhood agreed with the cruel, racist actions of the neighborhood association. Some wrote letters to the War Department offering their support for the WACs. They wrote that they “welcome these Negro WACs into the community.”

The War Department must have listened to the “welcoming” whites and refused to cave to the racist demands of the neighborhood association because it did not move the WACs from the barracks. And the WACs continued to work at Gardiner General Hospital.

Too Hot to Handle

August can be sweltering in Washington, DC. Not all buildings were air-conditioned in 1943. It wasn't completely out of the ordinary for offices to close for a few hours—or maybe even for a day—just until things cooled off a bit. That
could
explain what happened at a recruiting office one day when six black women tried to complete applications to join the US Navy. Or it might have been a case of race discrimination.

When Althea Jefferson, Hazel Lee, Velma Hammond, Bernice Jacobs, Cleomine Lewis, and Cora Wright entered a Navy Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES) recruiting office in the nation's capital, the male recruiter handed them the paper application forms. As the women began to write, the recruiter was called from the room. When he returned he told the potential WAVES that he had been ordered to close the office because of the intense heat. He asked them to leave through the rear door of the air-conditioned office. The women went around the corner to a store to do a little shopping and returned to the recruiting office about 25 minutes later. They found the office open. When they entered, the same recruiter explained that he had closed the office for a short time but decided to reopen when a breeze passed through, cooling things off. The women were given some pamphlets about the WAVES and told there was “no place for them at the present time.” The
recruiter said they would be notified as soon as actions had been taken that would permit enrollment of black women.

Over a year later the navy started to permit black women to join the WAVES. But it took an order from the president of the United States to get it done. In October 1944, President Franklin Roosevelt gave the order requiring the navy to admit black women to the WAVES.

The first two black WAVES were Harriet Pickens and Frances Wills. They were the only black candidates in the officer training school at Northampton, Massachusetts. Harriet finished the training in third place in a class of 186 students. Harriet and Frances's white classmates described their black fellow officers as “swell,” “brilliant,” and “marvelous.” By July 1945—after the war had ended in Europe and a month before the Japanese would surrender—the navy had trained 72 black WAVES.