Having a good three-day weekend? I’m hoping so, even with the rain we’ve had today. Now, I realize that most people don’t stop and think exactly WHY we have this particular holiday.
But maybe this story will remind you.
The McKinney family of Big Bay sent three of their children off to serve during World War II.
Edward was in the Army Corps of Engineers in the South Pacific. William was a member of the 9th Infantry Division in Europe, while Alice “Pauline” McKinney was a WAC, a member of the Women’s Army Corps, doing everything from office work to washing vehicles in the motor pool.
In October of 1944 Bill’s unit was engaged in battle in Western Germany. He was wounded outside of the town of Schevenhutte and died a day later. Upon hearing the news, his sister wrote home, telling her mother
“Bill’s death sure was a shock to me. I didn’t expect it at all. Don’t worry, Ed & I will both come home safe and sound.”
When the Germans surrendered in 1945 Pauline was stationed on Africa’s Gold Coast. She was enjoying her assignment overseas.
In a letter home she also told her mother that “I met a very nice sailor from South Carolina. Dances like a dream and seems to be a gentleman. Now that is the kind of man I could fall for. If there wasn’t a war going on.”
Two days after she mailed that letter Pauline McKinney boarded a C-47 headed for a new assignment. The plane in which she was riding crashed into the Atlantic shortly after taking off, killing all aboard. The 18 WACs on the plane were the only members of the Women’s Army Corps to be lost while overseas.
Bill McKinney is buried in the Henri Chapelle American Military Cemetery in Belgium. Pauline is listed on the tablet of missing in the Carthage Military Cemetery in Tunisia.
Brother & sister are both remembered on the family headstone in the Big Bay Cemetery. The McKinneys were the only Marquette County family to lose both a son and a daughter in World War II.
And that’s just one reminder of why we have this three day weekend.
I’m Jim Koski, and that’s another slice of “Life in the 906.”
