Interview of Katherine Wilson on her service in the American Red Cross in Europe during WWII Dorothy Harrison: This is Dorothy Harrison of the Louisville Unit of Women’s Overseas Service League interviewing Katie Wilson from Cynthiana, Kentucky. Uh, Cynthiana is a good distance from Louisville, Kentucky. Otherwise, we would hope to have Katie Wilson as a member of our group, but it's just a little too far. Um, I think it's rather interesting the way Katie Wilson and I met. Um, we were both of us, uh, at the home of a mutual friend in Cynthiana because Katie had asked to meet me. I had written an article for the Sunday Magazine of the Courier Journal for June 4, uh, 8-, 1984. This was the 40th anniversary of the landing on Omaha Beach, and Katie had also landed on Omaha Beach, and so we, we felt that, uh, uh, we had something in common and indeed we did have. We were both there at, at, uh, the same time. I had landed on D plus 21. Katie had come earlier. I had heard that there were women that were arriving – that had arrived early, and I was so pleased to meet her. And I think her story is most worthy of being recorded, uh, and kept, uh, on file for future reference. There weren't very many women who got there very early. So Katie is an exception in this respect. Now, uh, Katie, um, I wish you would go ahead and tell us, uh, since we need to back off a little bit from the actual landing on Omaha Beach and tell, tell us a little bit how, how you got into the Red Cross. Katherine Wilson: Well, as you know, uh, 44 years ago yesterday, Pearl Harbor was attacked. At that time I was, uh, running the Armored Force Library at Fort Knox. And the – of course war was declared after Pearl Harbor, and all of my friends at Fort Knox were going to war. So I decided I’d better go to war too, and I didn’t know any other – better way to go than to join the Red Cross. So I joined the Red Cross and joined the Duke University General Hospital Unit, and, uh, over, a little bit over a year later, we sailed from New York to Scotland. Dorothy Harrison: [2:44] That was then in 1942? Katherine Wilson: That was in 1943… Dorothy Harrison: Forty-three. Katherine Wilson: …that we left. We trained at Fort Bragg, and, um, St. Elizabeths in Washington for over a year. And so we sailed, I think it was September of ’43, and we sailed on the Queen Elizabeth. Dorothy Harrison: How interesting. Katherine Wilson: And I don’t remember very much about the Queen Elizabeth, but I do remember that there were thousands of men onboard. They were sleeping all in the swimming pool, all over the pool tables. They were thick on the floor playing cards and shooting craps. There was just no place to walk. Finally I found 1 empty corridor, and I thought this is interesting. I'll explore a little bit. So I went down this e-, empty corridor, and all of the sudden this loudspeaker boomed out woman off limits, get back to your quarters. So I flew back to my quarters, and the rest of the time we spent pretty much in the bowels of the ship giving out cigarettes. And, as you know, there were only 4 brands of cigarettes then, but we were kept busy giving out cigarettes to the men in the bowels of the ship. We were all out on deck, um, part of the time, and I remember one thing about that. We could see by our watches that the boat was changing course every 7 minutes, and they explained to us that was so we wouldn't be hit by a torpedo, and every 7 minutes, it would change course entirely. I have no idea how long it took us to get to Europe. [chuckle] I've forgotten that entirely. Dorothy Harrison: On that zigzag course. Right. Katherine Wilson: A zigzag course. But anyhow, we landed in, um, Scotland, and started out on the night train for London, so we really didn’t get to see anything of Scotland. London was blacked out too, so we didn’t see very much of London by night, but we were there a few days before we were sent to this small town in Southern England called Malvern. And Malvern is one of the most beautiful towns I ever saw. Built on 7 hills. I've always wanted to go back, but I've never gotten there. But our hospital was set up out in a cow pasture, and the people there laughed at us for saying it was cold. They said well if we lived in a cow pasture in America, we'd probably be cold too. But here I was with 5 other girls in the Red Cross Unit, and most of our patients were coming from the campaign in North Africa, and nearly all of our patients were either syphilis patients or mental patients. And one day, this man came up to me and said do you know we have a lot of talent in this hospital? He said I've run into men that have been in shows on Broadway, and he said I've written musicals for Broadway. Well I just thought he was one of the mental patients. I didn’t pay much attention. And I said well, why don’t you write a musical, and we'll have a show. So sure enough, the next day he came, and he'd written, uh, written this show. And he said I've gotten the boys lined up now. When are going to put this on? I said well good, the sooner the better, that’s just fine. So the next morning came, and we were to have rehearsal. No man showed up. I [inaudible 6:08]. Dorothy Harrison: He'd recruited all the mental patients? [laughter] Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Yeah. I went to his ward, and he said I just don’t feel like getting up and dressing, but I got him out of that bed, and I dressed him. And we started that rehearsal, and he had recruited these men. Every morning I had to go and dress the man, but believe it or not, that was one of the best shows I had ever seen in my life. And they were so pleased with themselves that they wanted to lead the war and go in special service [laughter] and just entertain the troops, but the higher-ups didn’t think very much of that, so they were sent back to the front. Uh, that was my first and last brush with, uh, producing… [laughter] Dorothy Harrison: Yeah, for Broadway shows. [laughter] Katherine Wilson: …shows for Broadway. [throat clearing] Um, oh, and another interesting thing we learned there at Malvern was don’t try to do things like you did back in the states. We sat up for 3 nights, cataloging the library that the English people had brought in and contributed books, and we catalogued these books and classified 'em, had 'em all set to go, and then the patients began to roll in. We never looked at a book again. We said take it, bring it back sometime, take, bring it back sometime. You don’t need to, you don’t need to sign anything. So we learned a lesson right there. It was gonna be a little different over here. [throat clearing] Uh, one day we were invited into town to be bodyguards for l-, Lady Mountbatten because, of course, she was big on Red Cross, and we didn’t have any other transportation but our bicycles, and I had my best suit in the cleaners. So I didn’t have any place to change, and I just put on my clean suit over my other suit, and I was stuffed. It was a hot day, and I was boiling hot. So to this day, every time I read about Lady Mountbatten, I begin to get hot. [laughter] Dorothy Harrison: [8:10] What sort of a, what sort of a person was she, Katie? Katherine Wilson: Well she was beautiful I thought. She was real – she was frail and fragile, and I don’t think she was very well even then, but she was a beautiful person. [throat clearing] Um, while we were – I was riding around on my bicycle one day, I ran into another Red Cross girl that I had never seen before, [throat clearing] and she said do you know we are not going to get anywhere. We are not going to get to the war. These general hospitals are going to stay right here in England. Said why don’t we volunteer for an evacuation hospital. And I said okay, that’s fine. I would like that. So we volunteered to go with an evacuation hospital, so we would get to go across the channel. So then we were transferred to Maidenhead, uh, with the 44th Evacuation Hospital, and it was located 27 miles from London. It couldn’t have been better if you were on a guided tour. It was, uh, [throat clearing] um, downstream – or upstream, there was Bray, this darlin’ little town with the Hinds Head Inn, and, uh, this – and Marlow, eh, that we all know from Izaac Walton, and downstream was Eaton, the boys school, and Windsor Pal-, um, Castle where we visited often. And, um, we could go in to London. [throat clearing] The most scared I ever was during the whole war was in Paddington Station. When they let me go in one night at midnight, I landed at Paddington Station at midnight, and there was an air raid, and I had a drunk sitting next to me, so I decided I would, s-, uh, s-, just wait a while and let him get out of the way. So I waited on the train there for a while. When I got into Paddington Station, the air raid was in full swing. Everybody had disappeared. I couldn’t find – it was all blacked out, just barely little blue lights. I couldn’t find anybody, couldn’t find any taxis, couldn’t find anything I wanted around, just like a nightmare. Finally I found a door and got down into the [chuckle]… Dorothy Harrison: [10:22] Into the shelter? Katherine Wilson: …in-, into the shelter. But that was the most scared that I was in the whole war. Dorothy Harrison: [10:27] And with that nice glass roof over your head. Katherine Wilson: [laughter] Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: [10:31] Or what was left of it. Katherine Wilson: Oh. Um, [throat clearing] them, um, oh, eh, in our unit, it was a whole lot like MASH, and we had, um, a brain surgeon was just exactly like Hawkeye. He was always trying to entertain people. So when we would go to London on the train, he would, um, always pull some kind of a joke. He’d go back between the cars and yell out the wrong station, and the people would all begin to get off at the wrong station. Then he would just die laughing, you know, and say joke, joke, joke. This isn't the right one. And then one day, he got up in the middle of the aisle, and started taking off his pants, and we were just horrified and so embarrassed, but he had on another pair underneath, [laughter] but he was just always… Dorothy Harrison: He p-… Katherine Wilson: …doing things like that, and everybody was crazy about him, just like they are in Hawkeye. And while we were here at Maidenhead, of course, we weren't getting any patients because we were – knew we would have to go sail right after D-Day, and um, but we decided, Mary and I decided that we would fix the clubroom. And so we, um, took old sheets and dyed them every color of the rainbow and stuffed them with straw. We took old barrels and made chairs out of 'em. We had scrap lumber and the men made, um, furniture, and we had a real attractive clubroom by this time. Just as we got the clubroom ready to open, we were ordered out into the field to set up a hospital right across the river from Lady Astor. Lady Astor’s place, Cliveden, you know was on the River Thames. So we were invited over there one day for tea, and as we were walking up the path of this huge estate, a little man joined us, swinging his cane and, eh, just to make conversation, I said well, I just wonder if the ol’ girl’s gonna live up to her reputation. And the little man said, oh, you mean mother? It turned out to be Lady Astor’s son. But he wasn’t offended at all. He just laughed, and he gave us tickets to Parliament and said go on in and see if mother’s as bad as you think she is. So we went on in to Lady Astor’s for tea, and she was just like I'd heard. She took one look at us in our fatigues and our browns and boots, and we did look bad, and she said tell your parents not to ever worry about you over here, said you all would be safe anywhere you look terrible. [laughter] But she was a lovely hostess and a real pretty woman. Um, um, of course, um, D-Day came on June 6, 1944, while we were at Maidenhead, and after that we stayed pretty close in waiting for our call to follow in to, um, over to Omaha Beach. And, sure enough, the call came June 18th, and we were shipped right away down to Southampton, spent one night there, and then we boarded. Our unit boarded 2 LCIs. They were small boats. Um… Dorothy Harrison: [14:04] I think that means Landing Craft Infantry, doesn’t it? Katherine Wilson: Yeah, Landing Craft Infantry. And they were not cruise ships. [laughter] They were not of design for luxury. There were 2 holes, 1 in the front and 1 in the back, and they were really holes. There were 40 officers in one hole. And the nurses were in the other hole. And the bunks were 4 deep. And we set sail just about, uh, sundown, and as we went out – we were with 45 other ships in the convoy – small, not ships, they were smaller boats, and as we went out, it got rougher as we went, rougher and rougher and rougher. And all I can remember about my companion, Red Cross companion, Mary, on this ship, who was a Catholic, every time she could get her breath from vomiting, she would say, oh Jesus, Mary and Joseph, oh Jesus, Mary and Joseph. To this day, whenever I meet Mary in New York, I say oh Jesus, Mary and Joseph. [laughter] But then, [throat clearing] uh, we did sleep in the hole, and the next morning we went on board because we were supposed to be near to land, and we really were close to land. I don’t remember what we had for breakfast. All I remember was the pea soup. They kept passing pea soup around, and I was so intrigued with these little cans because they had fire in the middle. You could strike a match, and they would heat themselves, and I thought oh, this is great, and I would drink that pea soup and get sicker and sicker, and everybody on that ship was deathly sick. But when we got close to shore, [throat clearing] they told us that we wouldn't land for a long time, and finally our – the enlisted men’s LCI got close enough to let down their ramp, and they waded ashore. But we just were buffeted back and forth by the waves. And, uh, it was midafternoon when they finally told us that we were gonna have to make an emergency landing. We heard that there were enemy planes, and we thought oh, this sounds exciting, but we didn’t see any enemy planes come. But finally they did put us out on this, um, landing, uh, pier, and we found out later that it was because a hole had been ripped in our boat. There was the Liberty ship on one side and a Victory on the other, and they – the waves had rammed them up against us until the – there was a hole ripped in the side and we had to land, so we got ahead of a lot of the other boats. But it was midafternoon when we landed on Omaha Beach. And I felt like I had jaundice because it was rain, and it – everything looked yellow. I don’t know why, but everything just looked yellow. And there was every kind of a boat and landing craft wrecked on the beach, and we saw pieces of what we thought were bodies, but I think they must have just been garments because, after all, it had been 13 days since the – since D-Day. Dorothy Harrison: [17:15] Let's see, if you were – if you landed – if you spent one night on the boat, then you landed on D plus 19, did you? Katherine Wilson: Yeah, D plus 19. Dorothy Harrison: Okay and, and… Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: No, not D plus 19. [17:24] On the 19th of June? Katherine Wilson: The 19th of June [inaudible 17:26] 13. Dorothy Harrison: [17:26] Uh, sub-, subtract 16, that would be the 13th… Katherine Wilson: Thirteenth, the day after. Dorothy Harrison: …of, um… Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: …of d-, D-Day. D-Day [inaudible 17:33]. Katherine Wilson: Anyhow, they told us that our pier was destroyed by the waves right after we landed, so I imagine it took the other boats a long time to land. Uh, [throat clearing] we were taken right away about 8 miles inland to a place called La Cambe, Cambe, I guess it was, and [throat clearing] so they set up our hospital, and on one said of us, they had set up an airstrip, and on the other side was an artillery battery. [throat clearing] Across the road was a cemetery. Of course, we were kept pretty busy with casualties, but in between times, we'd run across and watch 'em bury these bodies. And nearly all of 'em were from the 29th Division and from Virginia, and we were perfectly furious. We thought are they gonna let Virginia fight this whole war? We didn’t realize that there were other things going on all around us, [chuckle] but we thought the whole war was being fought, and sure enough, they said that there were hundreds of boys from one town and half of 'em were killed… Dorothy Harrison: Good gracious. Katherine Wilson: …in the landing. And I don’t know why they would let so many from the same state come in on the first wave like they did. [throat clearing] But, um, [throat clearing] here we were in Normandy, and the hedgerows were really murder. Uh, one wounded man said here I am wounded. They're sending me back home tomorrow, and I've never even seen a German. He said they get behind those hedgerows; you can't see a thing; you're just fighting blind. And the tanks would go up, eh, they said these hedgerows had been there ever since the Roman, um, campaigns, eh, way back in history, and [throat clearing] there was dirt all piled up and then these huge hedges growing up above that, and the tanks would try to get over, and they'd get stranded right on top of these hedges. And [throat clearing] of course, they were just sitting ducks, so [throat clearing] there was one little man they claim was a private, and he'd been an engineer back home, and he concocted the idea of putting some sort of a blade on the tanks, and they were able to get these blades, and then the tanks were able to cut through these hedgerows, so the casualties weren't quite as bad after that. But… Dorothy Harrison: I remember that. Katherine Wilson: You remember that? Dorothy Harrison: I remember that… Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: …it came out in Stars & Stripes… Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: …as a matter of fact. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. And, um, of course, uh, the, the tankers were terribly burned, uh, on – in the face, and, uh, I remember the doctors would wrap bandages around their heads until they were nearly as big as bushel baskets. No place for the eyes, no place for the nose, but they'd leave 1 hole for the mouth, and we had to feed these boys through this hole. We'd stick in a straw and feed 'em through this hole. And we were just crushed. We said oh, they’ll never – they’ll just be disfigured for life. But they'd take those bandages off, and sometimes they wouldn't even have a scar, and we were just amazed how well they did look. One little tanker we were crazy about, and we said you must belong to that 3rd Division, must be a swell outfit, and I never will forget what he said. He said we ain't so awful good; we just ain't got no more sense than to do what they tell us to do. And I think that was really true. Dorothy Harrison: True. Katherine Wilson: They, they, they did what they were told to do. Um, about this time, Cherbourg was captured, and you know the importance of Cherbourg was that it had a good harbor. And there was so terribly much destruction of all the supplies trying to bring 'em in those artificial harbors that they had. They'd put down that concrete thing that Churchill concocted, but that still – we still had terrible waves. But Cherbourg was finally captured, and when we had a lull in our work, we were allowed – Mary and I were allowed to go to Cherbourg. So they took us down in a jeep, and as we drove into town, here was this man’s restroom that – like the ones they had in Paris, you know – here was the handsomest man I've ever seen in my life with his head and shoulders showing only, and he waved [inaudible 21:49] as we passed by, and here he was [laughter] in the little restroom, and we went on in to town, and finally in an hour or two we went to the headquar-, Army headquarters and who should we see sitting back of the desk than the same officer that we’d seen in the men’s room, and he was so embarrassed he turned every color. He was more embarrassed than we were. He didn’t think he’d ever see us again, I guess [laughter] when he waved to us from the restroom. I don’t remember anything else about Cherbourg, except on the way back, we had a gas alert, and we never were gassed, but we had gasmasks with us, so we put on our gasmask, and we arrived back in the hospital covered with gladiolas. They must have had a bumper crop that year because in Cherbourg they had sh-, gave us all these bunches of gladiolas. Here we landed with gasmasks… Dorothy Harrison: And gladiolas. Katherine Wilson: …on and gladiolas all over. So I'd like to have had a picture of that. And the next place we moved was [throat clearing] [the backing of 22:51] Saint Lo. [throat clearing] Of course everybody’s heard about Saint Lo, and we were stationed at Bricqueville right in back of Saint Lo. Dorothy Harrison: [22:59] How is Bricqueville spelled? Katherine Wilson: B-R-I-Q-U-E-V-I-L-L-E. Dorothy Harrison: Yeah. Katherine Wilson: Bricqueville… Dorothy Harrison: Yeah. Katherine Wilson: …a little village. And, uh, here we were for a whole month because, um, the enemy was dug into a cliff and was just almost impossible to get 'em out, and they were terrible casualties here, and the strain was tremendous. We even ran out of blood at one time. We had 8 operating tables going day, and night and extra surgical teams had to be brought in to mand the different, uh, uh. Here I might say that the, the biggest man in our outfit had to be sent back because he would automatically jump under the operating table when there would be – when they were bombed. Dorothy Harrison: Bombed. Katherine Wilson: And he was brave, and he was so ashamed of himself. Dorothy Harrison: But it was an involuntary action. Katherine Wilson: But it was just a reflex, and his other partner, uh, he – one was named Bud and the other was named Ned, Ned would take over for Bud, and so Ned never would tell on Bud, but finally Bud had to ask to be sent… Dorothy Harrison: To be moved. Katherine Wilson: …to be moved because he was so ashamed when he would jump under the operating table [chuckle] and leave it all to Ned. Uh, uh, here it was [throat clearing] at Saint Lo that you remember, uh, General, um, Roosevelt, General Theodore Roosevelt was killed, and he was the only general that came in with the first wave of men on Omaha Beach. He requested it, and, uh, so they, they let him come. He wasn’t killed on the beach, but he was killed here at Saint Lo. And here it was that we had Strom Thurmond as a patient. Do you remember Strom Thurmond is the… Dorothy Harrison: Oh, yes. Katherine Wilson: He’s a senator, of course, from South Carolina, and he told us that he was gonna be s-, senator when he got back, and we just laughed at him, and he thought – we thought he was an ol’ blowhard. And the nurses said oh, he’s a fanny pincher. He just, they didn’t like him very much. But sure enough, he really must have been a lady killer because I heard not long ago from somebody in South Carolina that he’s now married to a beautiful young wife and has a whole bunch of young children, and he's over 80. Dorothy Harrison: Good gracious! Katherine Wilson: But the nurses called him a s-, a fanny pincher. [laughter] Dorothy Harrison: A fanny pincher. [laughter] Katherine Wilson: Yeah. [throat clearing] As, um, as the Red Cross people probably know, our job was divided in 3 main parts. We had a receiving tent and the wards and the recreation tent. And in the receiving tent, uh, we would follow doctors around, and they would tag the men on the stretchers that we're going on the operating table and tell us not to feed them or give them coffee. And so then we would bring coffee and sometimes food to the others, and we had a terrible time. The ones that were going o-, on the operating table said we don’t care; we want coffee; we want food, [chuckle] but we couldn’t give it to 'em because we had orders not too, [throat clearing] but that was the hardest part of it. Um, then on the wards, we went through the wards every day where the bed patients were, and, uh, our job there was to write letters for 'em and to give 'em cigarettes and candy and writing paper and paperback books, and, and help the ones that couldn’t write at all and do every-, anything that the nurses wanted us to help 'em with. I remember one boy was brought in on a stretcher and had a – and he was from Texas, and he had a dog on his chest, and we tried to feed him, and we said look, we'll bring a plate for the dog, just put him over here, he said no, this dog is gonna stay on my chest until I leave here, and he fed him out of his plate. and, sure enough, when he left, that dog was on his chest. He said the dog had saved his life, that the dog could tell when a bomb was coming and had, uh, pulled him back… Dorothy Harrison: He made a noise or… Katherine Wilson: …and he made a noise so he got back in his foxhole. So he left with the dog on his chest. Uh, [throat clearing] and then a recreation tent, uh, we tried to make it as attractive as we could. We brought those old bright pillows that we’d made out of sheets and dyed and stuffed with straw, and we used those, and we had a radio. [throat clearing] Didn’t have television then. Um, we had radio and records and paperback books and card tables, and of course, we had to play bingo, which I've never especially liked, but we did have the Zippo lighters, and they loved those. And then as we got on in to Germany, the bingo even was more fun because they would bring in loot from the Germans. Dorothy Harrison: [27:45] And th-, you made those the prizes? Katherine Wilson: Yeah, we made those the prizes, and we had fabulous prizes then. [throat clearing] We sent one boy back to the front with a raccoon coat on, and he had a thermos bottle under one arm and a cane in the other hand, and we knew he threw 'em in a ditch the minute he got out of sight, [chuckle] but he tried to make us think that he just loved those prizes. Uh, [throat clearing] let's see. I believe I stopped right – oh, in the recreation tent, um, we always had a stove in the middle of our recreation tent and one of the favorite forms of entertainment, which made it pretty easy for us, was letting the boys make fudge. We had a great big kettle, and we always had plenty of sugar and plenty of milk and plenty of chocolate, so we would mix up the chocolate, and they would sit around that stove and stir and stir and stir, then they’d beat the fudge and then they'd wait for it to cool, and then they cut it and they'd pass it through the wards and loved that. They never got tired of it. Um… Dorothy Harrison: And I'm sure that’s understandable because we didn’t have, uh, very much sugar. Katherine Wilson: Very much? Oh. Well we did. Dorothy Harrison: We were allowed… Katherine Wilson: We had just plenty of sugar. Dorothy Harrison: Sugar. We were… Katherine Wilson: We didn’t have nuts, but we – they sent 'em from home sometime to us, the nuts, and we'd put nuts in it. Dorothy Harrison: We could, uh, we, we were allowed 2/5 or maybe it was 3/5 of a teaspoon… Katherine Wilson: Hm. Really? [Inaudible 29:14]. Dorothy Harrison: …of sugar per cup of coffee. And it was never… Katherine Wilson: Hm. Dorothy Harrison: … never enough for the, uh… Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: …for the boys, and they would s-, if they complained, we'd explain about the, the allowance, and they'd say oh, well then… Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: …just your finger in it, sugar, that'll sweeten it up. [laughter] Katherine Wilson: Oh, well we just had plenty. And I remember one time especially when they were stirring their fudge, we came in and said oh, Edwin G. Robinson is over in the receiving tent, run over, and they said hell no; we've got to stir this fudge; we've seen plenty of men. [laughter] They said if it's an – if it was a woman we’d go. [laughter] Dorothy Harrison: We’d go. Well that… [chuckle] Katherine Wilson: Uh, [throat clearing] another thing, uh, eh, I used to draw, and they would sit by the hour and let me sketch their faces. They loved that. Another thing they liked was dressing them up in evening dresses. Were you told that you had to take an – 1 evening dress. Dorothy Harrison: No, uh, we were not. I did but… Katherine Wilson: We were, we were told that we should take 1 evening dress, and even the nurses were told that they should take 1 evening dress. Well the minute we landed on Omaha Beach, we knew that we would never need an evening dress. So the nurses all brought their evening dresses and dropped 'em on us, [throat clearing] and we used 'em for the boys to dress up in for costumes, and they would put on shows and dress up in these evening dresses and parade through the wards and, of course, we didn’t know anything – you didn’t hear much about gays in those days, and they all just got a big kick out of dressing up in those evening dresses. That was one of their favorite things. [throat clearing] Well after we finally got past Saint Lo and where we were from a month, we went next to Percy. It was a little village and I remember – the only thing I remember about that was there was this farmhouse across the road and one of the doctors came in one day and said the farmer across the road is inviting me over for dinner; will you go with me, so we went over there for dinner, and sure enough, the barnyard was right up against the house like the in – you know they all were, you know, in Normandy, and, um, but in the house, it was clean as it could be, and they had the wonderful dinner, just course after course, and this doctor was trying to be, um, gr-… Dorothy Harrison: Gracious. Katherine Wilson: …gracious and trying to speak French, and the children were studying English, and they could speak English, but he was trying to speak French, and he was trying to say we are happy – I'm happy to be there, and he said je suis jolie… Dorothy Harrison: [laughter] I am… Katherine Wilson: …I am beautiful. And so… Dorothy Harrison: Or gay or happy. Katherine Wilson: …after that, we – after that we called him beautiful. Dorothy Harrison: Yeah. Katherine Wilson: Called him Jolie [chuckle] after that. I don’t know whether it was Domfront but I think it was where in the courthouse square we saw them shaving the heads of any – the women who had collaborated with the Germans while the ger-, while the Germans were in the town, and they were actually shaving their heads off [to punish] [inaudible 31:11]. Dorothy Harrison: I can remember seeing them with their… Katherine Wilson: Uh-huh. Dorothy Harrison: …kerchiefs on afterward. Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Yeah. That, of course, that was the most horrible thing you could do to a French woman. Uh, [throat clearing] then we went on to Senonches, I guess is [inaudible] [announce 32:24] that, and here we were set up in an orchard. Dorothy Harrison: [32:27] How do you spell that? Katherine Wilson: S-E-N-O-N-C-H-E-S. Senonches. Just a little village. But it was close to Paris, and here we, uh, had some spare time. When-, whenev-, whenever the other hospital would jump over us, then we would have a little time, uh, before we moved again, and, uh, and when we were close to Paris, they let us go in. And we had – we were always armed with plenty of cigarettes, and so we could trade, eh, get anything nearly for cigarettes. Dorothy Harrison: Yes, I remember. Katherine Wilson: And, uh, we could get almost anything we wanted for cigarettes, but most everybody got Chanel No. 5, especially the men. They were crazy about taking th-, that perfume to their wives. Um, after we, um, we crossed over – and then we crossed over into Belgium, and the first place I remember was Saint-Hubert and the, uh, Argonne Forest, and here the snow has began because I think that was around the 1st of December, and the snow was knee deep when, eh, when there wasn’t snow, there was mud knee deep. And we never had, uh, floors in our tents like they do in the MASH on television. Ours were – we just had dirt floors. So the minute we s-, set up a hospital, we looked for our haystack, and we'd run and get straw and put all over our floors [chuckle] so we sink – wouldn't sink into the mud. But nobody ever had a cold until we got into heated buildings in Germany, and then people. Dorothy Harrison: That, that is exac-… Katherine Wilson: It was the strangest thing. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: Yeah. That is exactly the same experience we had. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [34:00] Now, by the way, I want to k-, keep my timeframe, uh, right. This is the winter of 1943/44? Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: Yes. Okay. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. First of December. [throat clearing] And, um, oh [throat clearing] uh, where we, uh, the Belgians seemed to like us real well, uh, in this part of Belgium, but then we went on to Malmedy, and Malmedy, you know, means, uh, you told me wrong, and, uh, at Malmedy they didn’t like us. You could tell they didn’t. It had been, uh, occupied. It was a German town really, and it had been taken during the First World War, so they were really German at heart. But Malmedy was the weakest point in the whole front line, and they said that it was a calculated risk, but we never understood why they left it unguarded like that because there were 3 million drums of gasoline, uh, stored there at Malmedy. [Inaudible 35:01] decided to come through at Malmedy. Um, here’s where we had our only casualty. Um, one thing I remember about that was the Massacre of Malmedy that everybody’s heard about. It was 3 miles from our hospital. And the Germans captured this unit, um. There were 150. It was an engineering unit, and they, uh, formed these men into, um, square and got in the middle and just mowed 'em down with machine guns. Dorothy Harrison: Guns. Katherine Wilson: And but one little man was not hit, and he – there may have been others, but this is the only one we know of, and he rolled over on the ground and crawled down the bank into a little creek and got in the – under the water, and he said he breathed through a reed… Dorothy Harrison: I've heard of that, and I… Katherine Wilson: …until the Germans were g-… Dorothy Harrison: Gone. Katherine Wilson: …gone. So then he got out and walked to our hospital, and by that time he was nearly frozen because it was really cold weather. And I think it was about the next day then after that that, um, eh, uh, one-, in the morning we heard gunfire, heavy gunfire, heavy guns, but we thought they were our guns, and they nearly knocked us out of bed. We were not up, but the – our bunks actually shook, and, um, all of the sudden the head nurse came in and said, eh, we are having – we're under attack. The Germans are breaking through. We have to retreat immediately. Don’t take anything… Dorothy Harrison: Just go. Katherine Wilson: …except what you can get in your pockets. So we got up and put on our fatigues and left. Uh, there were not enough trucks in the motorpool because they were – had, um, um, taken part of them to move this gasoline, so our doctors had to start out walking, and they put us in a 2-1/2-ton truck and we rode all day until we got to Spa. Then at night, uh, they put us in a barn, and I remember we sat around on this dirt floor in this barn, and the doctors had gotten there. They must have gotten a ride somehow, but they had all gotten there. And we sat around in a circle, and everybody got out the things out of their pockets that they had rescued, that they had brought with them. The doctors had nothing but perfume. They didn’t even have a toothbrush. They had just brought perfume that they had bought in Paris and had not had a chance to send back home. And we didn’t have – the Red Cross had nothing but Zippo lighters. Dorothy Harrison: Zippo lighters. [laughter] Katherine Wilson: That’s what the men loved in the foxholes because the, you know, the wind didn’t blow 'em out. So we had nothing. We just kept bringing out Zippo lighters. [laughter] I don’t know how many we had in our pockets, but we were not going to let them get away. Um, then, um, eh, this air motorpool was then ordered to go back and rescue another hospital, and they were captured by the Germans. Most of them… Dorothy Harrison: [38:15] The hospital or the motorpool? Katherine Wilson: Eh, eh, the mo-, just the motorpool… Dorothy Harrison: Pool. Katherine Wilson: …that went back in trucks. But then another American unit came along and rescued them, so only one of our men was killed. The others all got back all right. Dorothy Harrison: All right. Katherine Wilson: And that was our only casualty really during the war. Um, then we retreated all the next day until we got to Huy, and at Huy… Dorothy Harrison: W-, how do you spell Huy? Katherine Wilson: H-U-Y. And there we joined another hospital because we had lost all of our equipment, had to leave it all behind, so we joined this other hospital at Huy, and it was set up in a convent, and the nurses had all gone, eh, to the basement to live because they were bombing a bridge nearby, and they were afraid to live up there. Anyhow, so we lived in nun’s cubicles. And I had a l-, I remember each one of us had a little tiny bed and 1 chair in this cubicle, and that’s all we had. I don’t remember anything else about. We – except the patients began, the wounded began to pour in and pour in from the Battle of the Bulge. And, uh, we were there Christmas day. And there were so many men lying around on stretchers that, uh, the only way we had of feeding them was out of huge lard cans. We had these big lard cans full of turkey [chuckle] and we’d carry 'em around, and the boys would reach in and get turkey out of the lard cans and eat it. Dorothy Harrison: By the way… Katherine Wilson: Hm. Dorothy Harrison: Uh, excuse me, but I think we have – I, I think I mis-, mis-said something back here. I asked you whether this was the winter of ‘43/44, and it wasn’t. It was the winter of ‘44/45. Katherine Wilson: Yeah, ’44. Dorothy Harrison: Forty-four to five. Katherine Wilson: Yeah, that’s right, ’44. Dorothy Harrison: That’s right. Excuse me. ‘Cause this was the time of the… Katherine Wilson: Yeah, that’s right. Dorothy Harrison: …Battle of the Bulge… Katherine Wilson: Yeah, ’44. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: That’s right. Katherine Wilson: Um, [throat clearing] while we were at – oh, and you know it was here at the Battle of the Bulge that you probably all read about General McAuliffe, uh… Dorothy Harrison: And his Nut [stage 40:22]. Katherine Wilson: …eh, at Bastogne. Yeah. Um, they were trapped for 5 days at Bastogne, and, uh, the Germans, eh, sent them word that they – said, uh, surrender now or you'll every one be killed. And General McAuliffe sent back a messenger with one word – nuts – and the Germans didn’t understand w-, said what does that mean, and he said it means go to hell. So sure enough, about that time, General Patton broke through and rescued them at Bastogne. Um, you know most of the fighting took place in that triangle between Malmedy and Bastogne and Spa, and, uh, after we got back to Huy, uh, Malmedy was taken back, most of it was, was pretty safe, so, uh, some of our men were ordered to go back and try to retrieve some of our hospital equipment. Dorothy Harrison: Because you were absolutely helpless. You couldn’t function. Katherine Wilson: Yeah. We couldn’t do too much with this other hospital. So, um, Mary, the other Red Cross girl, decided she would go with them. Dorothy Harrison: [41:29] What was Mary’s last name? Katherine Wilson: Mary Maher. Dorothy Harrison: [41:31] Mary Maher? Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: [41:32] M-A-R-R? Katherine Wilson: M-A-H-E-R. Dorothy Harrison: M-A-H-E-R. Katherine Wilson: So she decided that she would go back and retrieve some of our personal possessions and did I want to go, and I said no, thank you. I don’t care about those little ol’ perfumes and material things. I can get some more later. I'm not going back under fire, and I didn’t go. And she came back, and she must have been scared to death. I told her. I said if you see my paratroop boots, that’s all I care about. They were real hard to come by. So we did love our paratroop boots. She got back. She had thrown things into these sheets and tied the sheets at the corner and throw them in the truck. I had only one paratroop boot, a bunch of perfume, and she really – it didn’t do any good to go back really because she didn’t get anything that amounted to anything, but she was braver than I was. Um, uh, after the [throat clearing] our first army took over, um, Belgium and took Malmedy back, we went on across into Germany. And our 1st Division under General, uh, Hodges was the 1st Division to cross the Remagen Bridge over the Rhine, and we followed them and went on in to Germany. Uh, the hospital I remember best in Germany was Nordhausen, and then I think the reason I remember that so well was because that’s where the buzz bomb factory was, and were allowed to go down into the buzz bomb factory. It was a mile underground, and there were 2 parallel tunnels, huge tunnels connected with other tunnels, and, uh, that’s where – and they had thousands of slave laborers. They weren't under there when we went because they’d all been freed by that time. And, uh, they were under there. They were half starved, and they were never allowed to come above ground. They were just kept under there to make those buzz bombs. And we'd been seeing those buzz bombs. They were V-1’s and V-2’s going over our heads for months, and we were glad to see the factory. And all I can remember is just, eh, mountains of what looked like this angel hair. I guess they must’ve stuffed 'em with that. [chuckle] I don’t know what it was. But then we also visited a concentration camp there, and it was, it was smaller than Auschwitz, but it was a just like it had all those terrible places in it. And, um, another interesting, funny little thing that happened – they sent me over to an army unit to pick up stovepipes, and the major that I contacted was named Major [Pignet 44:15], Major [Pignet McElroy 44:17], and he said where are you from, and I said oh, Cynthiana, Kentucky. Um, you never heard of such a place. And he said oh, yes, I'm from there. I said oh, no, you're not. He said oh, yes I am. When I was a little boy, my father preached there, and it turned out that my mother had babysat with him. Dorothy Harrison: Goodness gracious. Katherine Wilson: So he invited me to stay for lunch, and he said we're gonna have Crepe Suzettes. We have a wonderful German cook, and you'll enjoy it. So I had to sit and wait while he interviewed this German woman, and they were talking in German, and he was – she was furious. And afterwards, I said what was she – what was the matter with her? And he said oh, she was telling me that the Poles were stealing her pigs and wanted me to do something about it right now, and I told her, I said wait until we defeat you, then we'll protect you. [chuckle] Dorothy Harrison: Very good. Katherine Wilson: But [throat clearing] this was, um, oh another interesting place, uh, thing about this that makes me remember this, uh, hospital was because our prison camps with our boys were being freed, and, uh, the first ones that came into our hospital were so pitiful, uh, nearly all of 'em had lost 100 pounds. Dorothy Harrison: Good gracious. Katherine Wilson: And they would show us pictures of themselves before and after. You'd never recognize them. And the doctors told them that they could eat all of the chicken they wanted that night. They could eat a whole chicken if they wanted, but they would be sick, said, you know, your stomachs are drawn up, you'll be sick, but they went on. Most of 'em went on and ate that chicken and, sure enough, they were… Dorothy Harrison: Sick. Katherine Wilson: …sick all night. And I can remember 'em standing around, just huge groups standing around this water spigot washing their teeth. They hadn't washed their teeth, I guess, for all the time they were in the prison camp. So they loved that. And we didn’t have enough pajamas to go around, so we gave half of them the pajama tops and the other half pajama pants, so here they were [laughter] running around in half a pajama suit, and they really, really were a funny sight. Uh, this was really our last serious work in hospital. Um, in all, we had 22,000 wounded pass through the 44th Evacuation Hospital, and 9,000 of them – on 9,000 surgical operations were performed. Um, after our real work let up, uh, a notice came that one of us could go to the French Riviera. Did you ever get to go down there? Dorothy Harrison: Yes, I did. Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Well, I guess we drew straws. I don’t know what happened, but I got to go, and I didn’t have any clothes, of course, any resort clothes, so… Dorothy Harrison: [Inaudible 47:04]. Katherine Wilson: …they brought in some, uh, confiscated draperies from a german house, and the nurses helped me, and we made shorts and bathing suits out of this different colored drapery, and they were just really gorgeous, but you would have had a good time at the French Riviera then no matter what you had on because there were 50 men to every girl. [laughter] Dorothy Harrison: Yes. Katherine Wilson: You were bound to have a good time. Dorothy Harrison: I remember. Katherine Wilson: And everybody was sort of celebrating. I remember one dignified old colonel was wading in the fountain in front of the hotel, and everybody was just going crazy, and it was really fun. Uh, on the way back, I flew back to Brussels and but there I was stuck in a hotel with a bunch of real highbrow English women and in uniform, and I never will forget them. At dinner one night, one of 'em said, uh, we will – we'll never be able to get any help anymore and said you're solders have ruined our working class by telling them all that their our equals. So they were a little bit snooty. Dorothy Harrison: They were. They were. Katherine Wilson: But I enjoyed meeting them anyhow. Uh, [throat clearing] then, uh, from Brussels, back to Germany, I took a troop train, and that was really an experience. It was on this troop train that we celebrated V-E Day. That was May the 8th. And, uh, the boys all said to us, now we'll serve your dinner. You don’t have to do a thing. We'll serve dinner. So they put down a piece of tin in the aisle of the train and built a fire in the aisle of the train and got out their K-rations and cooked 'em and served our dinner. So [inaudible 48:46]. Dorothy Harrison: Why that’s amazing. I've never heard of a… Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: …of a, alfresco on a train. [laughter] Katherine Wilson: Well they did. And then after dinner, you would have thought, you know, enlisted men would be so rough and tough, they began to repeat poetry, these long narrative poems. I've never heard anything as beautiful in my life. I sat there and cried. Some of 'em are real sad, you know, and I was just sick that I couldn't contribute, that I didn’t know even “The Cremation of Dan McGrew.” I couldn’t even do that. But I never will forget those soldiers knowing all that narrative poetry. And one little sergeant told me, we were talking about Malmedy and the breakthrough, and he said, you know, our outfit probably saved your lives. Uh, he said, uh, the officers, a lot of them were off in Brussels on leave, they thought the war was over, and said, uh, when the Germans began to came through, said my sergeant took gasoline and spread over miles of the road, just went up and down and spread this gasoline and set fire to it and said that held 'em back for a long time. And he said another little, uh, sergeant in my outfit turned a sign at the crossroads in a different direction and said the Germans all went the wrong direction. Dorothy Harrison: Wrong way. Katherine Wilson: And said we probably saved your lives. Dorothy Harrison: They probably did. Katherine Wilson: Yeah. And we just thought here Churchill, uh, you know, we hear how he concocted this concrete harbor and how Mountbatten laid – had the idea of laying the gasoline pipes under the channel, you know. Dorothy Harrison: Yes. Yes. Katherine Wilson: And that’s the way we had plenty of gasoline all during the war and they get credit for all those big things, but our little me, a lot of 'em didn’t get credit for the things they did. And, uh, this – but this time, the war was over, and so our, um, uh, Chaplain [Walthour 50:43] took us on a trip to the Bavarian Alps and the Austrian Tyrol, and we went to Nuremberg and Munich and Oberammergau, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, the ski resort, and Rendsburg, Salzburg, and Berchtesgaden, but Berchtesgaden, you know, was where Hitler was and his Eagle’s Nest during D-Day. They didn’t even wake him up because they didn’t think it was anything but a diversionary attack. He wasn’t even awakened until noon. But anyhow, he wasn’t there, of course, at the end, he was back in Berlin. But we went to the Eagle’s Nest up on top of this mountain. There was no road to it, but we had to go up in an elevator, and the first thing we saw was this huge coffee table in the middle of the floor, and the 101st Airborne had built a bonfire in the middle of this coffee table and here was the big charred place. Dorothy Harrison: Charred place. Yeah. Katherine Wilson: That was the main thing I remember about it. Of course, it was glass all around and beautiful view of the Alps. But then there was a hotel and a restaurant halfway up to the Eagle’s Nest, and here we stopped for lunch. And we looked over at the next table, and they had the most beautiful crystal and linen you’ve ever seen, and we said well, why is it that we didn’t get this kind of treatment. And about this time, in walked General Eisenhower and his whole retinue, all dressed in their summer whites, and they were perfectly gorgeous. And this little Jewish nurse, uh, with us was real emotional, and she’d had too many drinks. She jumped up, and she said I'm going over and tell them how beautiful they are and how proud I am of being on their side. We had to grab her and hold her by main force to keep her going over and… Dorothy Harrison: From interrupting. Katherine Wilson: …and interrupting Eisenhower. Uh, the trip home was pretty uneventful, but we were all seasick except the General’s wife in our state room, and we made her take the [inaudible 52:44] because we didn’t care anything about protocol, we were so seasick. This was a smaller boat than the Queen Elizabeth. Uh, and in the midst of all seasickness though, an officer came around and drafted me to go around with him into all of the state rooms or into the boys’ bunks and confiscate the dogs they’d taken aboard. So I knew there were dogs because when we boarded, we would see dog’ tails sticking out from under their coats and out of their duffle bags. You know, they'd picked up dogs all along the way and loved… Dorothy Harrison: And they loved them. Katherine Wilson: …loved 'em and gotten attached to 'em. So I went around with this officer, but my heart wasn’t in it and I never found a single dog and neither did the officer. Dorothy Harrison: Aww. Katherine Wilson: I don’t think his heart was in it either. Dorothy Harrison: He’d been ordered to do that so. Katherine Wilson: Yeah, been ordered to. But this is not a very fitting climax, but like the old song, now you may this is the end, you may hope this is the end, well it is. [laughter] Dorothy Harrison: Well, thank you, Katie. That is a marvelous account. Katherine Wilson: Oh, well I [inaudible 53:47]… Dorothy Harrison: I'm sorry I gotta stop there and the… Katherine Wilson: …[inaudible 53:50]. Now you end up – you finish up this [stuff 53:53]. Dorothy Harrison: Well as I, I, um, as I said, when – before we began this interview at all that there was a series of questions, which I could have asked, but as a matter of fact, you have answered them all in the course of your account. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [54:09] The, um, I notice that, eh, eh, during your, your, um, story, you, um, mentioned the fact that you were feeding, um, patients the burn patients through… Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: …straws, a, a hole in the, in the bushel basket… Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: …of bandages, and so I presume that, eh, eh, in an evacuation hospital that, um, your recreational duties were many times set aside to be… Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: …assistants to…? Katherine Wilson: It was. Yeah. Whatever the nurses asked us to do, we did. Dorothy Harrison: You did. Katherine Wilson: Because, uh, there were other things a lot of times more important than the recreation. Dorothy Harrison: Of course, there were and particularly in a, in a, in an evacuation hospital. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [54:54] And then I also wanted to, um, ask you where your evacuation hospital was on, on Omaha Beach? Was it at strip A1? Do you remember? Katherine Wilson: No. No, I really don’t. M-, m-… Dorothy Harrison: [55:10] Eh, was it the, was it, was there, um, an airstrip near it? Katherine Wilson: Uh, well after we – we were 8 miles back in our hospital when they had the airstrip. We had our airstrip on one side and the artillery on the other and the graveyard across the road, but right on the beach, I don’t know whether there was any airstrip or not. Dorothy Harrison: Yes, there was an airstrip there. It was A1. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: And, um, but I thought when I arrived that it, it was the only, um, airbase that was, uh, in that vicinity. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Well this was… Dorothy Harrison: [55:45] So I'm very interested to know that there's another airstrip?’ Katherine Wilson: Well this was a sort of, um, I guess it was just a makeshift sort of thing. Dorothy Harrison: Mm-hm. Katherine Wilson: But, uh, they were landing planes there because I know we, we thought we were in a pretty vulnerable place between the artillery battery and the, and the airstrip. Dorothy Harrison: Yes. Yes. Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: [56:04] Uh, and you say you were about 8 miles from Omaha Beach? Katherine Wilson: I think it was about 8 miles inland. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [56:10] Uh, that – you must have been fairly close to the frontlines then because I remember that when we arrived on the D plus 21, it was the day that Cherbourg fell. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: Uh, that they said that the depth of the front was, of course, um, un-, uneven but that it was approximately… Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: …um, 8 to 9 miles… Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: [56:31] So you must have been very close at that particular point? Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [56:34] Um, now just, eh, to finish up this tape and we seem to be getting again close to the end, um, you were born and brought up in Cynthiana? Katherine Wilson: Yes. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [56:48] And may I ask what the date was? Katherine Wilson: [laughter] Born in 1908, January 10th. Dorothy Harrison: Tenth. January 10, 1908. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [56:57] And you went to school in Cynthiana? Katherine Wilson: Uh-huh. Dorothy Harrison: [56:59] And w-, did you got to the university or college? Katherine Wilson: I went to University of, of Kentucky. Dorothy Harrison: Kentucky. [Inaudible 57:04]. Katherine Wilson: Went to Western in Oxford, Ohio, first year. Dorothy Harrison: Alright. Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: [57:08] And then, um, when you came back, you did, uh, what? Katherine Wilson: When we came back, Mary and I weren't quite ready to settle down, so we took a job on the Moore-McCormack ships. She was on the Argentine, and I was, was on the SS Brazil. And we had gift shops on these ships going to Buenos Aires. Dorothy Harrison: [57:30] So you traveled again? Katherine Wilson: So I did that for 8 voyages. Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: Very good. And... Katherine Wilson: Yeah. Dorothy Harrison: …that must have been a very interesting, uh, experience. Now, I think we are… Katherine Wilson: Mm-hm. Dorothy Harrison: …at the end, and so we'll say farewell for this particular tape. Katherine Wilson: Goodbye. /lo