Military History Commons^™

Interview With William Brannen, Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections

Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections Oral History Collection

A part of the "Our Hometown Heroes" series. William Brannen interviewed by Linda Awe, November 13, 1999.

Interview With Elizabeth Ann Baughman, Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections

Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections Oral History Collection

Elizabeth Ann Baughman, née McKinnon, interviewed by Esther Mallard, April 5, 1988. Find this collection in the University Libraries' catalog!

Interview With Carl Atwell, Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections

Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections Oral History Collection

A part of the "Our Home Town Heroes" series. Carl Atwell interviewed by Linda Awe, November 13, 1999. Find this collection in the University Libraries' catalog!

Interview With Johnny Aldrich, Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections

Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections Oral History Collection

A part of the "Our Home Town Heroes" series. Johnny Aldrich interviewed by Dr. Daniel Good, November 13, 1999. Find this collection in the University Libraries' catalog!

Roxie A. Remley Papers, Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections

Finding Aids

This collection consists of the papers of Georgia Southern Emerita Professor of Art, Roxie A. Remley, from 1942-2020. Materials include professional and personal correspondence, journals, day calendars, photographs, and other unpublished materials related to Remley’s work with the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC), later Women’s Army Corps, Georgia Southern College, the Statesboro First Methodist Church, and other local organizations. Examples of Remley’s artwork and framed prints are included as well as materials originally belonging to Georgia B. Watson.

Find this collection in the University Libraries' catalog.

The Southern Baptist Convention And World War Ii, David Crum

Selected Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Democracy's Shield: Voices Of Wwii, Michael J. Birkner, Grace E. Gallagher, Rachel I. Main

Gettysburg College Faculty Books

Based on a body of 700 oral history interviews archived at Gettysburg College, Democracy's Shield relates the American military experience through the voices of those who served – from early awareness of the conflict in Europe and East Asia to the dropping of the atomic bomb, victory, occupation and homecoming.

The text is illustrated with images of artifacts from the library's Special Collections.

Table of Contents

Foreword
Introduction
Portents of War
Pearl Harbor
Draft Status and Volunteering
Exams, Induction, Training
Heading to the Front
Attitudes about the Enemy
Race, Gender and the War Effort
GI Joe
Aboard Ship
Up in …

When Numbers Lie, Brandon Johnson

Tredway Library Prize for First-Year Research

This paper breaks down officially-reported statistics surrounding Japanese-American internment in the United States. Specifically, his paper argues that numbers have a voice, hold power, and that the many discrepancies surrounding these statistics have far-reaching and lingering implications.

The Impact Of The United States Army Nurses Corps On The United States Army Fatality Rate In The Mediterranean And European Theater Of Operations During World War Ii, Joshua Benjamin Groomes

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

World War II was the most devastating war in human history in terms of loss of life. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, plunged the United States into war. Less than seven thousand military nurses were on active duty at the time of the attack. By the end of the war, there were over fifty-thousand active-duty nurses. The army nurses performed under fire in field and evacuation hospitals, on hospital trains and ships, and as flight nurses on medical evacuation transport aircraft. The skill and dedication of the Army Nurses Corps insured a 95% survival rate …

Italian Society During World War Ii, Shira Klein

History Faculty Books and Book Chapters

"This chapter showcases what life was like for ordinary Italians during the Second World War. Up to the 1980s, a typical textbook on Italian history told a narrative of victimhood and heroism, promoting the idea that most Italians had never wanted to join the war in the first place, and resisted both the Fascists and the Germans. It was Mussolini and his henchmen, according to this narrative, who led unwilling Italians into war. The Italian rank-and-file were anti-Fascist heroes and victims of the leadership’s repressive tactics, whereas the Fascist leaders were villainous perpetrators.[i] Since the 1990s, historians have shown that …

For Cause And Countries: Initial, Sustaining, And Combat Motivation In The Royal Air Force Eagle Squadrons, 1940-1942, Timothy Defazio

Master's Theses

Before the United States entered the Second World War, 245 American pilots pledged their service to the Royal Air Force (RAF). Organized into 71, 121, and 133 Squadrons, collectively known as the Eagle Squadrons, these foreign volunteers present an intriguing avenue of soldier motivation analysis. Employing the conceptual framework offered by John Lynn and James McPherson, this thesis analyzes three components of the Eagles’ motivation—initial, sustaining, and combat.

Viewed in context, the Eagles’ decision to join a beleaguered air force reflected a commitment to ideological principles, as the desires to defend England and curb German aggression figured largely into their …

Reframing The Sacred: Valkyrie And The Basis Of Resistance, William S. Skiles

Journal of Religion & Film

The film Valkyrie (2008) is a thriller that explores the religious basis of the July 20, 1944 plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler in the last year of the Second World War. While the political motivations are clearly stated in exposition and dialogue, the religious motivations are shown through a series of images, symbols, and dramatic uses of the word “sacred” (heilig and its derivatives). The filmmakers focus on Colonel von Stauffenberg’s struggle against the Nazi conception of the sacred, revealing his Christian sense of the sacred as a basis for his resistance. The religious elements in the film provide …

Review: War Stories By Gabrielle Atwood Halko, R.C. Miessler

All Musselman Library Staff Works

War Stories, a digital project created by Gabrielle Atwood Halko of West Chester University, seeks to frame the narrative of World War II (WWII) through the stories of children, particularly children in internment or under occupation. Halko starts with the assumption that visitors to the website are unaware of these stories, and the site largely frames itself as an educational tool that aggregates primary and secondary sources related to children during WWII. [excerpt]

Ralph Rogers Wheeler Papers: Finding Aid, Bethany Latham

Finding Aids

This collection contains photographic prints, newspaper clippings, conference programs, photocopies from various sources, military records, booklets, original essays, and more most likely compiled by Ralph Rogers Wheeler (1918-2004), an Alabama native. Items relate to Wheeler’s life and especially his military service and time as a Japanese prisoner of war. Beginning in 1942, he was first housed in a prison camp in the Philippines, and then sent via ship to a prison camp near Osaka, Japan. He was rescued in 1945 after Japan’s surrender. Supplementary materials appear to be related to research he did into Bataan and Corregidor, as well as …

The Logistics Considerations Of The Landing Ship Tank And Its Evolution As An Auxiliary Repair Ship In World War Ii, Joel H. Berry Iii

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This study reveals how the US Navy’s Landing Ship Tank (LST) of World War II functioned in logistics support roles from the outset of its wartime participation and to a greater degree than many military planners ever envisioned. The ship’s simple design proved so versatile that, within one year of the first LST, the Navy began converting dozens of the ships to Landing Craft Repair Ships (ARL) and other auxiliary classes supporting myriad naval logistics tasks. Both the standard LST and the ARL made significant logistics contributions to the war effort well beyond amphibious assaults.

Octofoil Newsletter Index For Issues January 1947-January 2024, Richard B. Kann Jr.

The Octofoil

This index records the Ninth Division stories, and the names and pictures of the 39th, 47th and 60th Infantry Regiments found in The Octofoil, the official newsletter of the Ninth Division Association.

The second edition expanded to include the 47th and 60th Infantry Regiments.

The third edition includes important edits to the first 52,000 of the total 106,165 entries.

Matthew Ridgway And The Value Of Persistent Dissent, Conrad C. Crane

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

Army General Matthew Ridgway’s actions throughout his career provide a valuable example of the appropriate time and place for serious dissent by military leaders. Ridgway demonstrated the importance of selectively and pragmatically expressing open disagreement in response to operational decisions a military leader deems unnecessarily risk American lives and economic resources

"We May Not Be Goliath But We Have David’S Sling": Media And The Perception Of The New Zealand Home Guard, 1940-1942, Noah Szajowitz

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

This thesis focuses on New Zealanders’ perception of the Home Guard through a specific lens of culture demonstrated through wartime printed newspapers across New Zealand. These newspapers allowed for a public forum for New Zealander’s thoughts on the Home Guard, enabling a national debate on the purpose of the Home Guard over the course of the Second World War. Critically, these print newspapers and public opinion drastically influenced the direction of the Home Guard, illuminated the problems the Home Guard faced, and often received a response from the New Zealand Government. The Home Guard’s initial difficulty with recruitment, the impressment …

Memory, Identity, And World Ii In Australia: Liz Reed's "Bigger Than Gallipoli", Christopher T. Lough

Student Publications

This paper is structured as a review of Liz Reed's 2004 study Bigger Than Gallipoli: War, History, and Memory in Australia, an analysis of the Australian government's public commemoration of the Second World War from 1994-95. Critiquing certain aspects of Reed's methodology, I bring in some of Jill Ker Conway's insights on Australian identity from her 1989 memoir The Road from Coorain, as well as other scholars of historical memory and political theory. While Reed makes some important insights on the merits and deficiencies of political nostalgia, I argue that her book represents a missed opportunity overall.

Warhorses Amongst War Machines: The German Army's Use Of Horses And Cavalry During World War Ii, Katherine V. Mcfarland

Senior Theses

This thesis explores the role of the horse as used by the German Army throughout the Second World War. Contrary to the propagandic image of a mechanized Germany and of the blitzkrieg, the reality of warfare at the time remained primarily dependent on the horse, as man and beast continued to engage in conflict side by side. Horses served a variety of uses within the German forces, from mounted cavalry to hauling artillery, with disasters and successes throughout the war. Employing vast numbers of horses, the Germans allocated extensive resources, and often found themselves relying on the animal when vehicles …

Donde Las Nubes Se Unen Al Mar = Where The Clouds Meet The Water, Kimberly E. Contag

MSU Authors Collection

Donde las nubes se unen al mar (2021) es la traducción de la narrativa histórica Where the Clouds Meet the Water (2004), un libro que explica la saga de Ernesto Contag Ziehe y su familia durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Ernesto y su familia fueron deportados de su patria ecuatoriana a la Alemania de los Nazis en 1942. La narrativa histórica que se lee casi como novela se basa en la investigación en bibliotecas, hemerotecas y archivos en tres continentes y en los documentos originales de los sobrevivientes de este canje político internacional de inocentes.

Donde las nubes se unen …

Parameters Winter 2020, Usawc Parameters

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

No abstract provided.

Before Barbarossa: The Nazi Occupation Of Western Poland, September 1,1939-June 22, 1941, Lauren R. Letizia

Student Publications

The Nazi invasion and occupation of Western Poland was a vital first step to the development and fulfillment of the genocidal processes of the Holocaust. The utilization of mass arrests, executions, and shootings led to the persecution and death of hundreds of thousands of Poles and Polish Jews prior to the invasion of the Soviet Union and inception of the Final Solution in the summer of 1941.

The Good War?: Reinterpreting The Second World War In Contemporary Musical Theatre, Leana Sottile

SURF Posters and Papers

For years, American musicals have contributed to the mythologization of the Second World War and upheld ‘Greatest Generation’ nostalgia in mainstream war memory. For example, Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific is effectively silent on the brutality and dehumanization of the Pacific Theater and exoticizes the experience of service members. In the past five years, the New York theatre scene has seen three shows that portray the Second World War more accurately and less romantically: Allegiance, Bandstand, and Alice by Heart. While none of these shows ran for longer than a few months in New York, in that short …

So Others May Live: The Price Of Healthcare In Combat, Robert Del Toro

War, Diplomacy, and Society (MA) Theses

“Medics carried more responsibilities than dry feet, salt tablets, syphilis, and puncture wounds,” U.S. Army Medic Ben Sherman stated after reflecting on his tour in Vietnam. On the battlefields of North Africa, Italy, France, and Vietnam, the medics of the U.S. Army Medical Department faced the difficult duty of preserving life while death surrounded them. Their patients were not strangers but, men they had grown close to, they were comrades and family. Analyzing the memoirs and letters of forward medical personnel from the Second World War and the Vietnam War, this thesis analyzes how a medic’s care went beyond the …

Desegregation Through Entertainment: Rodgers And Hammerstein’S South Pacific As An Instrument Of Military Policy, Leana Sottile

Voces Novae

In the aftermath of the Second World War, the 1949 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific became a staple of mainstream popular culture. However, the musical also served a specific function within the American military where its usage by the United Service Organizations and Department of Defense was widespread. This case study examines how South Pacific arguably served a way to ease the blow of desegregation on the military by other means, in this case, entertainment. This was achieved by combining the show’s progressive views on racial tolerance with the prevalent wartime nostalgia and romanticism in the piece. All of …

All Hands On Deck: German U-Boats And The Civil-Military Defense Of The Gulf, 1941 - 1943, Richard Brunies

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

During the Second World War, Germany unleashed a relentless U-boat campaign against shipping in the coastal waters of the United States. While most of this campaign was fought in the Atlantic Ocean, merchantmen in the Gulf of Mexico also received their fair share of U-boat attacks. The presence of the U-boats in the Gulf was brief but endangered vital merchant shipping, and the U.S. armed forces had to meet this threat. In nearly all aspects of defending the Gulf Coast and improving antisubmarine warfare, civilians participated with a will. Civilians were involved in reporting U-boat activity, monitoring coastal waters, reporting …

Pride Of Missouri: The Adventures Of Missouri Farm Boys In 1940s World Conflict, Haley K. Heil

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

In collaboration with the Museum of Missouri Military History, an exhibition for the 203^rd Coast Artillery Battalion (Anti-Aircraft) housed in the National Guard Headquarters exhibit case will be on display March 2020 through April 2020 in Jefferson City, Missouri. The exhibit will show the Missouri men deployed for military service, newspaper articles the men wrote, and objects the men brought back from the time of service. The paper is a historical narrative essay about the mobilization of the 203^rd Coast Artillery Battalion (Anti-Aircraft) during World War II, and from the research, a physical exhibit and an online exhibit …

A Red River City During War: Shreveport, Louisiana's Experiences During World War Ii, Katelyn N. Woodel

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This project provides research that details Shreveport, Louisiana’s experience during World War II. A physical exhibit at the Spring Street Museum and a digital exhibit display Shreveport’s World War II history, based on research conducted for this thesis. Based on a combination of archival collections, and Shreveport Times articles, the project tracks Shreveport communities and the contributions to war efforts from the broader community and local industry. Shreveport’s involvement in World War II began with the Louisiana Maneuvers in 1941. Support for the war continued with heavy metals manufacturing such as the production of shells at the J.B. Beaird Company …

Collegiate Codebreakers: Winthrop, Women, And War, Marlana Mayton

Graduate Theses

During World War II, college-aged women from across the nation filled United States Army and Navy secretive cryptanalysis facilities to help win the war. For many women, colleges facilitated involvement in codebreaking. Through information gathered in oral histories, this thesis primarily explores war related programs at American colleges and the young women that became cryptanalysts. Academic institutions, like Winthrop College, became the nuclei for colligate codebreakers. They acted as early crypt education centers, through the offering of cryptology classes, functioned as recruitment centers, and operated as essential training hubs. While in school, young women were saturated by a climate of …