Family

Searching For Our WWII Veterans – Amazing What You Find

by barbarawhitaker
Dad’s Gun

I posted this picture in 2011 with an article about the 276th Armored Field Artillery Battalion that my father-in-law, Dewey Paul Whitaker, served in during WWII. This is the gun he served on named “Cry’N Room.” The group of men in the photo are from his battery, but my father-in-law is not in the picture.

The photo we have does not have any names on it so the men have always been unknown.

Recently while researching for information about his father, Donald Rotett found this picture on my website. He recognized the picture and his father, Edwin J. Rottet (front row second from the left). He had the same picture and his copy had the names listed on the back.

“Left to Right Front row: {Lennon or Sernon}, Rottet, Stover, Erly. 2nd row: O’Brien, Swank, Bruce “Hedge row,” Clifford, {Peppers or Geppers}. (one name missing)

Per the roster in the History of the 276th Armored Field Artillery Battalion

Lennon, William F., Pfc., Trfd to Valley Forge Gen Hosp., Phoenixville, Penn. 29 August 1945 – Battery A

Rottet, Edwin J., Sgt., 1342 Leopold St., Jasper, Ind. – Battery A

Stover, Russel J., Sgt., 229 Main St., Olyphant, Penn. – Battery A

Erby, Charles E., Tec 5, Rt. 2, Newport, Tenn. – Battery A

O’Brien, Joseph H., Pfc., 189 Grand Ave., Englewood, N. J. – Battery A

Schwank, Henry V., Pfc., Discharged 10 September 1945. – Battery A

? Arwine, Bruce C., Pfc., Rt. 1, Corryton, Tenn. – Only Bruce listed in Battery A

Clifford, Joseph T., Pfc., Box 72, Stevenson, Conn. – Battery A

Peppers, Henry W., Pfc., Trfd to 177th FA Gp June 1945 – Battery A

Later, Donald contacted me to tell me about a model kit he found that had “Cry’N Room” as the name of the gun. We went online and found the kit made by a company in Italy. We couldn’t order directly from the overseas company so we searched and found a U.S. distributer. Our grandson is putting it together for us. It will be so cool to have a model of the gun Paul Whitaker served on to display in our home.

The model maker must have Googled the M7 looking for pictures on the internet, because the above picture comes up in the search results. They selected “Cry’N Room” for the decal on the model. We are so grateful they did because it represents memories of our fathers’ service.

Thanks to Donald Rottet for the names of the men in the picture and thanks for the information on the model of the M7 Priest. And thanks to everyone who has contacted me via my website. I appreciate all the questions and comments. I may not be able to help you every time, but I will try to get back to you.

Join me on Facebook at Barbara Whitaker Author

Sign up for my Newsletter

Oak Ridge in A War Apart and Personal Memories

by barbarawhitaker

The city of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, was created in 1942 when the U. S. Government bought up a large section of land along the Clinch River in Anderson county for a secret defense project. Construction began immediately after the residents of the area were moved off the property, much like the Tennessee Valley Authority had done when they bought up land for dams. Many locals, as well as people from all over the country, went to work building what would become plants that separated uranium-235 to be used in the first atomic bomb.

Between 1942 and 1945 the population of Oak Ridge grew to 75,000 residents with employment at approximately 82,000. The plants ran continuously to produce the Uranium 235 needed for the secret project and construction struggled to keep up with growth. After the war ended these numbers fell drastically. By 1950 the City of Oak Ridge had a population of 30,205, still fifth largest in Tennessee. Employment decreased, too, especially in construction. But the plants continued to run producing the fuel for the atomic age.

In my latest novel, A War Apart, my heroine, Rosemary, took a job at Oak Ridge to support the war effort, earn some money and, most of all, to get away from home. She worked in the K-25 gaseous diffusion plant which used one method of separating Uranium-235 from Uranium-238. Her cousin, Martha Sue, worked in the Y-12 electromagnetic plant which used a different method for separating Uranium-235. Neither woman, nor any of the workers, knew what they were making because secrecy about the project was of highest priority.

In the 1950’s when I was a young child, my uncle worked at Oak Ridge. My sister and I visited for a week. Our cousins showed us around the area where they lived and played, then on the weekend, when our parents came to get us, my uncle showed us around Oak Ridge. All I remember is the car stopping in front of a big metal gate and Uncle John saying that was as far as we could go. When I was older, our family returned to Oak Ridge and went to the Atomic Energy Museum. I still have a dime that was irradiated there.

As I learned more about Oak Ridge I found the story of its origin fascinating. That such a highly technical and highly secret plant could be built and run in rural Tennessee sounded implausible, if not impossible. Yet it really happened. Later, I learned that many of the women who worked at Oak Ridge during the war were young women from Tennessee with no special training, just a willingness to work and follow directions. So, of course, one of these young women had to be the heroine in one of my stories. When my character, Rosemary, needed a job, Oak Ridge provided the perfect place for her to work.

In doing research for my novel, A War Apart, I primarily used three books for my research on Oak Ridge. They were “City Behind A Fence” by Charles W. Johnson and Charles O. Jackson, “Images of America Oak Ridge” by Ed Westcott, and “The Girls of Atomic City” by Denise Kiernan.

The Trip To Nowhere

by barbarawhitaker

Young men seek adventure especially when they are living in a small town, out of school and out of work. That’s true today and it was true in the past. The particular adventure story I’m going to tell you took place in 1937 (my estimate) and one of the young men was my father, Vernon R. Knight. He and his friends, J. V. Averitt, Charles E. Covington, and Hugh Dickson, set off to see the country in an old car that belonged to one of them.

Vernon R. Knight

My father never talked about this trip. The only way I knew about it was through a conversation with my aunt, his sister, after his death. We were going through some old pictures. We didn’t know where some of the pictures were taken so we asked her about them. She said, “Those must be from the ‘trip to nowhere.'”

Aunt Sissy went on to tell us about how my father and his friends took an old car and headed west. They drove as far as they could on the money they had, and then they stopped and found work. One place they worked was in the oil fields in Texas. When they had enough money, they started out again.

Somewhere along the road my father bought a camera. This old style camera, that expanded when you opened it up to expose the lens, was always in a drawer in the dining room along with an old photo album. As kids we would take out the camera and examine it with the natural curiosity of children. We would also take out the old photo album and flip through the pictures, amazed at what our parents looked like when they were young.

Hoover Dam

The first pictures in the album from the “trip to nowhere” were taken at Hoover Dam (known as Boulder Dam at the time). These helped me date the trip. Hoover Dam was completed in 1935. In 1936 the water in Lake Mead was high enough to begin electrical generation. It took some time for water to fill Lake Mead. In my Dad’s pictures, the lake is almost full so I am guessing it was a year or two after completion of the dam.

J. V. Averitt and Charles Covington at Hoover Dam

Lake Mead

Hoover Dam Spillway from electric turbines

Lowering Loaded Flat Car at Hoover Dam

 

The next pictures find our young men in the Petrified Forest in Arizona. At that point they would have been along Route # 66. J. V. Averitt told his son, Phil, about how many times they had to patch the tires on the old car. Back then, tires had inner-tubes, that held the air, inside the outer tire. If the tube got a hole in it, they would take the inner-tube out, patch it, then put it back inside the outer tire before re-inflating it.

The next group of pictures are landscape shots. My father probably took them because the terrain was so different from what they were familiar with in Tennessee. These are pictures of the desert alongside the road, possibly in Arizona or New Mexico.

Only a couple of the pictures featured any of the young men. My Dad apparently didn’t want to take pictures of people. After the photos of the desert there are no more pictures from this trip. Did he run out of film? Maybe, but I don’t know.

The only other thing I remember seeing from the trip was a card my Dad sent to his mother to let her know he had made it to the Pacific Ocean. I’m not sure where the card ended up.

I treasure the pictures and this little bit of history about my father when he was an adventurous, young man.

New Year’s Eve 1941

by barbarawhitaker

What was it like on New Year’s Eve 1941? Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor just three weeks before, followed by attacks on the Philippines, Guam and many other places in the Pacific. Germany and Italy had declared war on us. Prospects for the new year looked bleak.

It wasn’t as though we weren’t aware of the wars raging in Asia and Europe but strong pacifist sentiment fueled the belief by many that the United States could stay out of these wars. Until December 7th, 1941. Then everything changed.

Vernon Knight with his mother, Bessie, and his nephew, Norman.

My father had just turned twenty-seven, was married but had no children. I imagine he was debating whether to enlist or wait until he was drafted. I doubt my parents did much celebrating that New Year’s Eve.

My father’s younger brother, was in the National Guard. He’d joined a Calvary Unit to make some extra money and ride horses on the weekends. The National Guard was nationalized in 1940 so by New Year’s Eve 1941 he was already in the Army and stationed in far from home.

My father-in-law, who would later fight his way across Europe, was still in high school in 1941. I imagine he and his family worried about whether the war would last long enough for him to have to serve. Of course, it did.

Paul Whitaker in high school.

My mother’s sister and cousins lived in Sitka, Alaska, at the time. I remember reading a letter her cousin wrote in early 1942 which gave some insight into their thinking early in the war. She was concerned that they may not be able to travel home to Tennessee that year. She mentioned the possibility of an invasion by the Japanese but didn’t sound too worried.

No one knew what would come in 1942. So many lives would change and change rapidly. Although many celebrated the end of 1941 and the beginning of 1942, there must have been a lot of apprehension about the future. We know what came next. They were still in the precipice staring into the unknown.

Communications With Loved Ones During WWII

by barbarawhitaker

In today’s age of technology we have a variety of ways to instantly communicate with our loved ones, even those who are serving overseas in the military. We have cell phones that allow us to communicate by phone call, by text, by social media apps like Instant Messenger, Snap Chat or Instagram. We can even communicate face to face using programs like Skype.

Not so during World War II. In the 1940’s the most used form of communication was the letter. Yes. Actual hand-written, paper letters. Many a romance blossomed through letters written over the long months and years of separation.

The telephone did exist, but long-distance telephone calls were expensive. You couldn’t dial the number and have your loved one answer, not if you were calling someone out of town. You had to get a long-distance operator and have her place your call. Yes, I said “her” because all the telephone operators were women. This wasn’t a wartime thing. Women were always used for telephone operators.

It would have been rare and extremely expensive to place an overseas telephone call during the war, although these were possible due to the undersea cables. But they were very limited. Roosevelt may have called Churchill in England but the average person could not call up their son stationed over there.

Another mode of communication used in the 1940’s was the telegram. Western Union operated telegraph offices in practically every town in America. If someone wanted to send an urgent message to a loved one far away, say a son stationed at a military base in another state, then they would go to the Western Union office and send a telegram. Western Union employed delivery boys or girls or older men to deliver telegrams from the telegraph office to the addressee’s home or office. Mickey Rooney earned an Academy Award Nomination for his role as a telegraph delivery boy in The Human Comedy. It is a little known film well worth watching.

Although telegrams could deliver joyful news, like the birth of a baby or a loved-one’s pending arrival, telegrams often conveyed bad news, like a death, so many people dreaded receiving one. The U. S. Government used telegrams to notify families when a soldier was killed, wounded or missing in action.

Telegrams and telephone calls weren’t instantaneous but, for the time, they were quick forms of communication. On the other hand, letters could take anywhere from days to weeks to reach their destination. Mail sent to soldiers or sailors overseas might take two weeks each way. And they might not arrive in the order they were sent. Pretty hard to carry on a conversation at that rate. And if the mail bag was blown up or sunk the letter never got to its intended recipient.

The military devised a method to both speed up the mail and to cut down on the bulky shipments. They called it V-mail or Victory Mail. The person at either end would write their letter on a special, V-mail form. After mailing the V-mail form would be photographed and put on microfilm. The microfilm would be transported overseas, to Europe or Australia or wherever, and at the other end the microfilm would be printed. This printed “V-mail letter” would then be delivered to the addressee.

So be glad you live in this modern age of instant communication. Or maybe not. Back during World War II when you wrote a letter you had to think about what you were going to say, weigh the words your loved on would read far away on some battlefield or home worrying about you. The letters were often saved and cherished for years, especially love letters from someone special far away.

My mother saved a box of letters my father wrote to her during World War II. Reading them not only told me about the events of the time but also gave me insight into who my parents were as young people, their thoughts and feelings. It’s the kind of thing this current generation won’t have thanks to our various technological modes of communication.

“Meet Cute” during WWII

by barbarawhitaker

In the movie “The Holiday” (2006), Eli Wallach’s character explains to Kate Winslet’s character what a “meet cute” is in the movie business. “It’s how two characters meet in a movie,” he says. In other words, it is the scene where something brings the hero and heroine together and often the chemistry between the two is evident from the start.  In Romantic Comedies the writers try to make the meeting something awkward or unusual or “cute.”

Holiday (2006)
Eli Wallach and Kate Winslet

The term isn’t used as often when referring to novels, but romance novels always have a scene where the hero and heroine meet. There is a “meet cute” scene even if it’s not “cute.”

When I hear how couples met during WWII, I imagine the “meet cute” scene. I go on to ask what brought them to this point in their lives and how did their relationship develop into lasting love. Many had challenges such as parental disapproval, religious differences, physical separation due to the military, differences in social status or simply their own uncertainties. These challenges create conflict within the love story. Yet the challenges are overcome.

In real life the initial meeting may not seem so dramatic. Yet to those involved, it was life changing. My in-laws met on a blind date and, incredibly, married twelve days later before he shipped out. I wrote a post about Frank Towers who met his wife-to-be at a church social held for soldiers far from home, a social he didn’t want to attend. I wrote in another post how Irving Grayson’s future wife saw him showing off his skills at a skating rink. All these are “meet cute’s.”

In my novel, Kitty’s War, the hero and heroine first meet when she pulls him from the surf and saves his life, which is less of a “meet cute” and more of a dramatic encounter. Their second meeting is the awkward, unsure moment we think of as a “meet cute.”

Of course, plenty of couples knew each other before the war started. Maybe they went to school together or lived in the same town. Even in these instances, the war accelerated their desire to get together and see where their mutual feelings took them.

What makes these meetings during WWII unique? Many couples would never have met if it hadn’t been for the war. Servicemen trained far from their homes in different places across the country before going overseas. Other men and women met while serving overseas in the military. Even defense plant workers moved from their home towns to cities where factories and shipyards had geared-up for wartime production. In these places far from home, lonely men and women found each other. And the war added an element of urgency to the romantic relationships.

“The Clock” (1945) with Judy Garland and Robert Walker is a good movie example with a “meet cute” in a train station. A soldier on 48 hour leave in New York City meets a girl in Pennsylvania Station. The two fall in love before he ships out.

The Second World War caused a great mixing in our population. Millions of men and women moved all around the country during the war. Most had never traveled very far from home.  They were exposed to different cultures, different scenery and different climates. My mother told of eating Italian food for the first time while renting rooms from an Italian family in Florida. My father-in-law saw the ocean for the first time when he sailed across the Atlantic to fight in Europe. Raised in New England, Frank Towers trained in the humid heat of Camp Blanding, Florida. They had so many unique experiences.

During World War II, many young Americans found love in unexpected places. Just imagine all the different “meet cute” scenes.

 

Cooling Tower Implosion

by barbarawhitaker

I usually write about World  War II, but this month I decided to veer away from my usual topics for something more current. On June 16 we attended the implosion of the cooling towers at St. Johns River Power Park where we used to work. My husband and I both retired from SJRPP after working there over 20 years. JEA, co-owner with FPL, invited the retirees to attend the implosion as VIP’s. It was quite and experience. Very sad but also thrilling to see, especially up close where we were sitting.

These 464 ft. towers have been in place since the 1980’s cooling down the water used in two coal fired boilers so that the water could be recycled – water to steam to produce electricity, then steam back to water to be reused. They have been a familiar part of the skyline to everyone in the area. It only took 12 seconds for these huge concrete icons to come down.

Watch the videos on the local TV stations – Action News Jax, News For Jax, another on Action News Jax.

I took a series of still photos. See below.

 

Christmas 1943 – Where were they?

by barbarawhitaker

Many of us associate December and WWII with the famous Battle of the Bulge in December 1944. I was wondering what was going on the year before, in December 1943. We had been at war for two years at that point. Where were the people and units I’ve written about with Christmas 1943 approaching?

On December 19, 1943, my father-in-law, Dewey Paul Whitaker, and the 276th Armored Field Artillery Battalion boarded a special train at Fort Riley, Kansas, for the Tennessee Maneuver area in Middle Tennessee east of Nashville. They had been at Fort Riley for battalion tests after training in Camp Phillips, Kansas. They arrived at Gallatin, Tennessee and from there they moved to a bivouac area in a meadow near Hickman, Tennessee, where, in the pouring rain and mud, they celebrated Christmas 1943.

My Dad, Vernon R. Knight, arrived at Moore General Hospital near Asheville, North Carolina, on Christmas Eve. This was his first hospital post after completing training in rehabilitation therapy at Camp Grant, Illinois. From a letter to my mother dated December 24, 1943, (his birthday), he wrote of the loneliness and disappointment he felt at being away from home for Christmas.

My Uncle D. T. ( Boots) Knight was in Camp Roberts, California, where the 947th Field Artillery Battalion had been stationed since December, 1941. The battalion had originally been part of the National Guard activated in late 1940. After two years in California they spent Christmas 1943  preparing to ship out. On December 28, 1943, the 947th Field Artillery Battalion moved to Camp Stoneman to prepare for departure, and then, on January 9, 1944, the battalion sailed from San Francisco on the USAT Seaflasher, destination New Guinea.

My Dad’s cousin, Herman Connell, was working in Bowling Green, Kentucky, after dropping out of high school. No doubt he traveled by train down the line to his hometown of Paris, Tennessee, and spent Christmas 1943 with his family. He would turn eighteen the following spring and join the Army. In March, 1945, he was killed in Germany.

At Camp Atterbury, Indiana, Frank Towers had reported to the 30th Infantry Division. He and his bride, Mary, celebrated Christmas in Indiana as the division prepared for shipment overseas. Through final training at Camp Atterbury, the division coalesced into a fighting unit before moving to Camp Myles Standish near Boston in February, 1944. After a short stay in Boston, the division sailed for England.

Christmas 1943 was the second, and in some cases the third, Christmas away from home for many of our military after the United States entered the war in December 1941. Those I’ve written about here were finishing training and would soon depart for battlefields overseas. Some would be home for Christmas 1945, but some would not.

We should all remember those serving in the military all around the world this Christmas. Like their counterparts in World War II, they are lonely and missing their families back home during this holiday season. Pray for their safe return so they can spend future Christmas’s at home with their families.

 

Nostalgia

by barbarawhitaker

Our lives are divided up into phases and seasons, so it is only fitting in this fall season that I should wax nostalgic. So many memories of times past swirl through my head. Memories of both good times and bad, times of contentment and times of upheaval.

These memories brought to mind a poem that I came across years ago and committed to memory. The words can apply to so many times and places in my life. They seem to fit my mood today.

Into my heart an air that kills
  From yon far country blows:
What are those blue remembered hills,
  What spires, what farms are those?
 
That is the land of lost content,
  I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
  And cannot come again.

By A. E. Housman, "A Shropshire Lad"

Elnora Boone Knight – May 1, 1917 – March 31, 2002

by barbarawhitaker

Today, May 1, is my mother’s birthday. Had she lived, she would have been 100 years old today. It’s hard to believe that this beautiful, intelligent, vibrant woman has been gone for fifteen years. I miss her still.

Elnora, a child of the depression, graduated from Erin High School in 1934. The next-to-youngest of nine children, who lost her father when she was only four years old, Elnora didn’t have much growing up. What she did have was imagination and a sense of adventure. In the late thirties when her older sister needed help, Elnora boarded a train in tiny Erin, Tennessee, and traveled to New York City alone. She made her way to her sister’s home in the Flatbush area of Brooklyn and while she was staying there she journeyed to Niagara Falls before returning home to Tennessee.

My parents married in 1938 and after a brief stay in Detroit, they returned to make their home in Tennessee. Then the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Daddy enlisted and after training he was assigned to the Coastal Artillery near San Francisco. My always-eager-to-travel mother again boarded a train and traveled across country to join him in California. She described the trip as an adventure. When she recounted changing trains in Bakersfield, CA., she said she had to walk a long way carrying her own bags to catch her next train. Some nice soldiers helped her and even years later she expressed her gratitude for their kindness.

During the war my mother followed my father across the country getting jobs wherever they were stationed. She returned to Tennessee when he went through his medical training in Illinois, then joined him at his first hospital assignment in Asheville, North Carolina.  Later he was transferred to a hospital in Palm Beach, Florida, which turned out to be the converted Breakers Hotel. Before the end of the war, when Ream General Hospital (The Breakers Hotel) was closed, my father was sent to Lawson General Hospital in Atlanta, GA. That’s where my sister was born which necessitated my mother returning home to Tennessee to await my father’s discharge.

The love of travel never left my mother. As we grew up we didn’t have a lot of money so we’d go visit her many relatives who lived across the country. We visited her brother in Oak Ridge Tennessee and explored the Smoky Mountains. We drove to the coast of Georgia to stay with her older brother who lived right on the beach on St. Simon’s Island. Other times we went to south Alabama, the panhandle of Florida and Akron, Ohio, to visit her sisters. One of her sisters lived in Sitka, Alaska, and she always talked of going to visit her but sadly she never did. She did however, visit a cousin in Boulder, Colorado, with her mother and aunt.

As money became available we took family trips to New Orleans, Panama City, Washington D.C., New York City and Palm Beach to see the Breakers Hotel and where they had lived during the war.

When my father retired my mother had accumulated enough leave from her job at the local Post Office for them to take several long road trips. I was lucky to accompany them at least part of the way on one trip out west. We visited Mt. Rushmore, Yellowstone, and the Grand Tetons. She had me take her picture at the top of Yellowstone Falls to prove she was brave enough to go out there. She had a fear of heights but she wouldn’t let it stop her from going to the edge of the falls or from a bubble-top helicopter ride over the Bad Lands of South Dakota. I had to fly home but they went on to visit my aunt in Oregon, up to Vancouver and then back down the California Coast to San Francisco. Then they came home through Salt Lake City and Denver. On another trip they drove through the northeast all the way to Nova Scotia, across Canada to Montreal and back home. And another year went across Texas and the southwest to the Grand Canyon and then dipped down into Mexico. How I would love to duplicate any one of those trips.

My mother didn’t learn to drive until the late 1950’s. After my father underwent major surgery she decided she could no longer depend on others to drive her around. She was never the best driver but that didn’t keep her home. While we were in high school, she would drive us to Nashville at least twice a year to shop for clothes. She could make her way downtown to Cain Sloan’s parking garage and after a long day of shopping we’d exit the garage, turn right on Broadway and head out of town on Highway 70. I don’t think she ever learned to drive anywhere else in Nashville except to the hospitals.

Elnora loved her grandchildren, her flowers in her beautiful yard and reading a good book or watching an old movie on TV. She used to say she watched all the old black & white movies because when she was growing up she didn’t get to see any of them. They didn’t have the money for movies.

Later in life she bought her own car and drove it where she wanted to go. This might have been taking her grandson to Walmart in nearby Dickson or driving to Dover to the UDC meetings. When my sister moved to Mobile, Alabama, and I moved to Florida she made her final road trip. Since my father’s health was poor, she drove by herself. This adventure took her to Chattanooga to my brother’s house, down through Georgia to our home in Florida for a short visit, and then across the panhandle of Florida to Mobile to stay with my sister. She was seventy-two years old when she made that trip. I always thought she was so brave for making that long drive alone.

Only a few years later, Alzheimer’s had taken its toll. She came to Florida to stay near me. Her strong constitution and vibrant spirit remained almost to the end — just a month short of her eighty-fifth birthday.  This post is dedicated to her loving memory.