Published: November 09, 2009 11:05 pm      

Black Women’s Army Corps focus of Windsor Hall event

Free presentation looks at WWII contributions

CUMBERLAND — As part of Cumberland Goes To War, “Fighting For Freedom: Black Women’s Army Corps During World War II” by Janet Sims-Wood will be held today at 7 p.m. at Windsor Hall at Town Centre, 39 Baltimore St.

Black women were allowed to enter the military for the first time during World War II. The first contingent trained in Fort Des Moines, Iowa, where they were housed in segregated barracks, ate at separate dining tables and used segregated recreational facilities. Despite the hardships and discrimination, the women persevered and 36 of the original group graduated and were assigned to officers candidate school, cooks and bakers school, the transportation pool or the clerical school.

Sims-Wood will share the courageous example set by the first black Women’s Army Corps unit in Europe. Black women weren’t any more welcome in most branches than black men were until first lady Eleanor Roosevelt, at the urging of civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune, began agitating for a role for black women in the war overseas.

The 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, a unit of 885 black WAC members, was sent to England and charged with clearing up a huge backlog of mail sent to military personnel overseas. All that undelivered mail was hurting morale, Army officials said.

The job was expected to take six months, but the unit, known as the Six Triple Eight, worked round the clock in eight-hour shifts and finished the job — handling seven million pieces of mail — in three months. Later, they were sent to France for a similar assignment.

Sims-Wood is former assistant chief librarian in the Reference/Reader Services Department at the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center at Howard University and has taught at the University of Maryland in the Afro-American studies department. She received her bachelor of arts in sociology degree from North Carolina Central University, her master’s degree in library science from the University of Maryland and her doctorate in women’s studies/history/oral history from Union Institute Graduate School.

The free event is presented by Allegany County Library System and is sponsored by the Maryland Humanities Council and McCormick.

For more information on Cumberland Goes to War, log on to www.cumberlandgoestowar.com or call (301) 724-2453.