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| Photograph of Sgt. Helen Gill Moon. Supplemental materials. World War II Veteran Surveys, RG 237. Tennessee State Library and Archives |
Common belief is that United States women in the military during World War II served in protected positions away from combat. In practice, however, this theory proved difficult to maintain. Sometimes the combat came to the women. The World War II Veteran Survey collection at the Tennessee State Library and Archives contains personal examples of women who were closer to combat than comfort. One of those women was Sgt. Helen Gill Moon, who served with the Women’s Army Corps in England and France.
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| Page 1, Helen Gill Moon veteran survey. World War II Veteran Surveys, Record Group 237. Tennessee State Library and Archives |
Helen Gill enlisted in the Women’s Army Corps in 1943, after working in a civilian job as a Dictaphone operator and secretary. She likely had no idea at the time of enlistment that she would serve overseas by the end of World War II. When the Women’s Army Corps was created, women were originally limited to positions within the United States and its territories. As the war continued and the need for soldiers grew, many high ranking officers, including General Eisenhower, specifically requested WACs to serve overseas to fill noncombatant positions, allowing men to move to the front lines. Gill rose to the rank of Sergeant working in the Public Relations Office for the U.S. Headquarters in Europe. One of her primary duties in the P. R. O.’s newsroom was taking quotes of bomber pilots returning from their bombing runs. In her survey, Gill recalled hearing these “emotionally affecting” reports as the pilots would relay the casualties sustained as being one of the most vivid experiences of her service.
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| Page 2-3, Helen Gill Moon veteran survey. World War II Veteran Surveys, Record Group 237. Tennessee State Library and Archives |
Sgt. Gill came even closer to the combat in 1944 when Germany developed the V-1 guided missile, dubbed the “buzz bomb” because of the buzzing noise the bomb made before falling silently to the ground. In her survey, Gill explains that the WACs were required to stand outside in the streets for their daily formations until a buzz bomb injured several women. She recalled watching a department store in London “turn orange and crumble, and be knocked down by the blast” of a German rocket.
WACs were not the only serving women who saw combat. The veteran survey collection is full of stories about nurses who worked in field hospitals in all theaters of operation and in all climates, from deserts to jungles. Some even lived in mud floor tents and sheltered their patients with mattress from strafing gunfire. You can read about their service and many more in the World War II Veteran Survey collection: http://tsla.tnsosfiles.com.s3.amazonaws.com/history/state/recordgroups/findingaids/WORLD_WAR_II_VETERANS_SURVEY_1996.pdf.
The Tennessee State Library and Archives is a division of the Office of Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett
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