February 1, 2019
Hello ,
One thing I love about publishing the true stories of women, is that after the book comes out, I begin to hear from people connected to the story I've written.
In Standing Up Against Hate, I write about the all-black 6888th Postal Battalion, the only African American unit of the Women's Army Corps deployed overseas during WWII.
Surviving members are in their nineties today, and five of them lived to see a monument dedicated in their honor at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, last November.
The monument honors the 855 soldiers who sorted and re-directed a backlog of mail to soldiers fighting in Europe. A bust of Major Charity Adams who commanded the unit tops the memorial.
Private Anna Mae Wilson Robertson, 94, enlisted into the WAC in March 1943 and joined the 6888th in 1944. Her daughter Janice Banyard joined her for the dedication.
“I’ve been to college and I don’t think I’ve ever seen the WAC or the 6888th in the history books,” Banyard told the Ft. leavenworth Lamp. “God seen fit. The monument itself is the most beautiful thing and to have her name put in there, that is history. I can’t say it any other way.”
The Six-Triple-Eight, as the women called their battalion arrived in Birmingham, England in February 1945, where they found seven airplane hangers stacked with mail bags.
The women worked shifts around the clock, seven days a week, handling 65 thousand letters and packages a day.
The women had no databases or computers. They worked with three-by-five address cards, one for every soldier in Europe, and every time a soldier moved, he got a new card and sent it to the Central Postal Directory.
As an example of the difficulty of the job, there were 7,500 men in the army named Robert Smith, and mail came to all variations of the name, Bob, Bert, Rob, and so on.
But within three months, every long-delayed envelope and package was on its way again, the Six-Triple-Eight breaking all speed records for re-directing military mail. The women then moved to France to sort two additional backlogged mailrooms, before returning home at the end of the war.
Private First Class Elizabeth Barker Johnson returned to her hometown of Hickory, North Carolina and used the GI Bill to graduated from Winston-Salem University.
She taught middle school for 30 years and then volunteered in the classroom for another 17 years.
Here she points to her name, "Barker, Elizabeth B PFC," on the back of the monument at Buffalo Soldier memorial area at Ft. Leavenworth. Photo by Prudence Siebert/Fort Leavenworth Lamp
Private First Class Deloris Ruddock now lives in Laurel, Maryland.
She went to school in New York City to study fashion design, but due to the excess number of designers in the industry by the time she graduated, she went to work for a bank, where she worked for 27 years before retiring.
Corporal Lena Derriecott Bell King, 95, enlisted in the service after a close friend was killed and inspired her to do something in his name.
“His name was Abraham Davis, and he was shot down on his first mission,” King told the Leavenworth Lamp. “When I heard that, I felt so terrible, and that was one of the things that inspired me to join, to do something in his name. I felt that he gave his life, and he was such a very close friend. I was just really anxious to do something. It was that drive that had me wanting to go into the service.”
When the Six-Triple-Eight returned home from Europe in 1945, they received no credit for their wartime contributions. More than 70-years-later, Lena voiced appreciation for the new monument.
"Someone thought we did a good job. Somebody cares and someone feels that it was a worthwhile cause,’ and I just couldn’t believe that we would be remembered in such a way,” King said. “It wasn’t an easy life over there as far as comfort. Even though I was away from the unit for the last five or six months after the mail thinned out, it was difficult."
Lena became a nurse after the war in her hometown Las Vegas, Nevada.
Private Maybeel Rutland Tanner Campbell , 97, enlisted into the WAC on Aug. 4, 1943, at Fort Des Moines, Iowa.
“(The monument dedication) makes me feel great,” she said. “The contribution to history means a lot,” she said.
Following her discharge in 1944, Maybell worked as a federal employee in a printing office for more than 30 years and currently lives in Alexandria, Virgina.
Source: http://www.ftleavenworthlamp.com/news/20181206/veterans-recall-service-in-6888th-postal-battalion/?tag=1
Had a terrific day visiting with students at Icicle River Middle School in Leavenworth, WA this week about black women's contributions to the Allied effort in World War II. This group of seventh graders made a poster to welcome me and my good
friend, Author Claire Rudolf Murphy.
One of the highlights of the day was walking down memory lane to the cafeteria for lunch. They had the exact same trays I remember from my elementary school, except a different color. Another difference was the salad bar. No salad bar in the 60s & 70s.
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