Taken in March 1945, this photograph captures the feelings of soldiers William E. Thomas and Joseph Jackson with an artillery shell labeled “Happy Easter Adolph” and the extra shells cradled in an “Easter basket.”

Tuskegee Airman Luther H. Smith was in a German prison camp after being captured when his plane crashed. A German officer confronted Smith. “With utter contempt he said, ‘You volunteered to fight for a country that lynches your people.’”

“You might as well have hit me with a heavy stick,” Smith said. The next day, when the officer launched at him again, Smith had his comeback ready: “You people are just as bad. . . . Your German Jews, you lynch them. . . . I am black American. It is my home. I will fight for it because I have no other home, and by fighting for it, I can make America better.”

Despite all the racial problems and prejudices the Triple Nickles experienced — both on and off military posts — they were still as eager as ever to head overseas into battle. They were not alone in this sentiment.

The United States had joined forces to fight a war in which freedom was at stake. Germany’s Nazi Party, led by Adolf Hitler, was carrying out the worst hate crimes the world had ever seen. African-American journalist J. Saunders Redding wrote that blacks “in America know a lot about freedom and love it more than a great many people who have long had it. . . . This is a war to keep me free.” Joe Louis, the famous heavyweight champion boxer who served as a private in the Army during World War II, had his own thoughts about why black men volunteered to help fight: “There may be a whole lot wrong with America, but there’s nothing that Hitler can fix.”

Famous boxing champion and WWII soldier Joe Louis fought 555th member Ted Lowry.

There were also, of course, African Americans who became too angry or resentful to want to serve. Harvard graduate and history professor John Hope Franklin was just one example. He volunteered for the Navy and was rejected because of his color. “If I was able — physically, mentally, every other kind of way, able and willing to serve my country — and my country turned me down on the basis of color, then my country did not deserve me.” Other soldiers joined out of a sense of patriotism but were treated so badly that they lost their feeling of belonging to America. Private Bert Babero wrote, “I didn’t hesitate to come when I believed I was needed. . . . I honestly believed that . . . I comprised an important part of this nation and it was my patriotic duty. . . . My attitude now is greatly changed.”

And yet there were thousands who were passionate about defending their nation regardless of their status in American society — or in fact, in part because of their status. In addition to patriotism, a sense of adventure, and a chance for steady work — the same appeal the war held for many white soldiers — an underlying factor was the hope that their contribution to the war effort and their loyalty to the nation would be rewarded with better treatment after the war. This soldier’s feelings were echoed by many: “I just thought . . . when we got back home they would have to recognize us . . . and say ‘These people are A-number-one, so we’ll have to treat them as citizens.’” Another said, “I have to go. . . . Part of it is so I can say, ‘This is my country. I fought for it and you can’t deny me.’”

These men believed fighting for their country was a way to show loyalty and achieve the right to full citizenship, which was exactly the message that many of the black newspapers sent to their readership. Others disagreed, questioning why anyone without full rights would ever want to put his life on the line. One direct response to this was the creation of the Double V Campaign, with its slogan “Victory at Home and Victory Abroad.”

This 1943 Charles Alston cartoon was part of the Double V Campaign to convince blacks that by serving their nation during wartime they would also be taking strides toward triumphing against racism on the home front.

Paratrooper training is all about being combat ready. Biggs, itching to prove that the 555th had what it took, described the connection between training and combat: “Detailed and carefully rehearsed as it was, the parachute jump was still only a means to an end: the capture of an enemy ground position, a bridge, a road junction, an airfield, or a communications center.” The Triple Nickles were most definitely ready, confirmed by an inspection by General Ben Lear, whose opinion carried a lot of weight. During his time with the 555th, he told them they were “one of the finest group of soldiers I have ever seen.”

This group shot includes (front row, left to right): Edwin Wills, Richard Williams, Bradley Biggs, and Roger Walden. In the middle of the back row is Harry Sutton. The other paratroopers are unidentified.

The timing of their readiness was superb. At least that’s what the Triple Nickles thought.

It was now the end of December 1944. While all this training was taking place for soldiers around the country, the war was raging overseas. Six months earlier, Great Britain and the United States had launched the most massive amphibious assault ever. About 5,000 ships traveled across the English Channel, carrying more than 150,000 men and 30,000 vehicles to the coast of France. From the air, more than 13,000 paratroopers dropped behind enemy lines. The Allies liberated French villages from the Germans and took back Paris. They were winning the war. But on December 16, 1944, the Germans launched a surprise counterattack of 250,000 men that cut a path more than eighty miles wide into the Allied lines.

The U.S. fought back with more than a half million men — including the all-black 761st Tank Battalion, which fought under General George S. Patton. Like the Tuskegee Airmen and the Triple Nickles, the 761st was created as an “experimental” specialty unit.

Tank driver Claude Mann of the 761st near Nancy, France, November 1944

Huge numbers of replacement soldiers were needed. General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Allies’ supreme commander, put out a call for urgent help. Lieutenant General John Lee wrote the appeal after consulting with Eisenhower and General Davis, who was now working under Lee. Lee’s letter invited black soldiers with infantry training to volunteer for “the privilege of joining our veteran units at the front to deliver the knockout blow.” It also stated that black soldiers would be allowed “the opportunity of fighting shoulder to shoulder” with white soldiers and promised black soldiers an assignment “without regard to color or race to the units where assistance is most needed.” The letter went so far as to say that black soldiers would “share the glory of victory,” something black leaders had been asking for throughout the war.

By the time the black soldiers were sent to the front lines, however, Eisenhower had gotten push-back from other generals, so he recalled Lee’s letter and replaced it with a modified version. Instead of putting white and black soldiers directly together, smaller all-black platoons were integrated into white units. As a result, some living and recreation facilities were integrated. It was a big step forward, even though it included a step back. Perhaps most significant, the experience changed the minds of some white soldiers. The following story from the famed Battle of the Bulge — which likely represents other similar stories — illuminates how.

On March 13, 1945, a company from the 99th Infantry Division was in serious trouble. The Germans surrounded them. Casualties were high. The number of living dropped every hour. The wounded — including their commander — lay bleeding, unable to be evacuated. Ceaseless gunfire had trapped them all. Then, in the distance, the company heard men coming. Cautiously they looked and listened for signs that the approaching men were American and not the enemy. But even when they saw the telltale American uniforms, the faces they saw confused them for a moment. Only two were white. The reaction that came next stuck in the mind of one of the black soldiers walking toward them, Harold Robinson: “They were all southern boys, but they sure were glad to see us.” Although the trapped white soldiers couldn’t risk giving their exact location away by shouting, they couldn’t contain themselves completely. They cheered and waved anyway, as quietly as they could.

As David P. Colley writes in Blood for Dignity, his book about the black soldiers who fought at the Bulge, the trapped soldiers were “seeing something American soldiers had not seen for more than 150 years. . . . The last time blacks had served shoulder to shoulder with whites in infantry units was in Washington’s Continental Army.” In the end, the directives issued first by Lee and then by Eisenhower were, after all, just words on a page. The reality of the battlefront was something else entirely. When the bullets were flying and white soldiers needed backup, it didn’t matter one bit what color their replacements were or how close together on the field they stood.

Just inland from Omaha Beach in France after the D-Day invasion, an African-American platoon gets ready to eliminate a German sniper holding up an advance.

A white southern sergeant from a different unit later spoke about the profound effect the integration experiment during the Battle of the Bulge had on him: “I said I’d be damned if I’d wear the same patch they did. After that first day, when we saw how they fought, I changed my mind. They’re just like any of the other boys to us.” In fact, opinion surveys given by the Army Research Branch (ARB) showed that before the Battle of the Bulge, only 33 percent of white soldiers had a positive response to including blacks in their companies. Afterward, a whopping 77 percent felt favorably about the idea. Brigadier General Davis said that the decision to integrate in the Battle of the Bulge was “the greatest since enactment of the Constitutional amendments following the emancipation [of slaves].” He wanted the ARB’s opinion surveys made public to prove that integration would not cause mass disruption, but those who favored military segregation — including Army Chief of Staff General George C. Marshall and Secretary of War Henry Stimson — said no. Marshall argued that “the conditions under which the platoons were organized were most unusual” during that time, and therefore were not a good measure of success.

 

MANY PHOTOGRAPHS showing black units were left out of the record and, like these, were not shown until decades after the war. In 2009, William G. Dabney, the last known survivor of the 320th Antiaircraft Barrage Balloon Battalion, traveled to France for the 65th anniversary of the D-Day invasion. He said, “It makes you feel bad, when you don’t get the recognition like the white soldiers, that they threw your name in the garbage.” Another D-Day veteran, Paul Parks, recalls, “They didn’t film us. They didn’t interview us.”

Lieutenant General George Patton awards the Silver Star to Private Ernest A. Jenkins. October 1944.

Members of the 761st Tank Battalion check equipment before leaving for combat. September 27, 1944.

Former corporal Charles Sprowl of the 490th Port Battalion, now 90, asks, “Where were we in The Longest Day or Saving Private Ryan?” referring to two famous films about D-Day. “Where were we in the history books?”

About the Battle of the Bulge, 761st Tank Battalion Private Floyd Dade remembers, “We had to prove to the world and our own people that we could fight. They even said we couldn’t even operate the mechanized equipment. But we were the best.”

Members of the 92nd Division pass ammunition near Massa, Italy. November 1944.

The USS Mason was the first Navy ship to have a largely African-American crew. March 29, 1944.

Marines during the Battle of Peleliu in the Pacific. September 15, 1944.

Efforts are ongoing to recognize and honor some of the black veterans who have gone unnoticed. Historians and scholars are still looking for photographs and other artifacts that can document missing history and help make up for lost time.

 

Because of all of this, as well as the fact that the 82nd Airborne and the 101st Airborne had lost a lot of men and that the 555th was ready for combat, the Triple Nickles had good reason to believe it was finally their time to go. Biggs’s comment summed up their feelings: “At last, we thought, we were going to tangle with Hitler.”

Their orders never came.

In fact, as soon as the Battle of the Bulge was over, so were the military’s moves toward integration. The black soldiers were sent back to their previous assignments, many of which were labor assignments. Photographers and reporters documenting the war — accidentally or purposely, or some of each — did not include the black soldiers’ participation on the battlefields. Some of the units were even overlooked for recognition for their service — another step backward after the promise of sharing “the glory of victory.” The performance of the 761st Tank Battalion during the Battle of the Bulge, for example, had led Major General E. H. Hughes to recommend them for a Distinguished Unit Citation. Citations were given to twelve of the white units that had fought with the 761st, but Eisenhower would not sign the citation for the black unit.

Instead of facing Hitler, the 555th was given yet another round of specialized training. Even though men were needed overseas, somehow the black soldiers did not seem to be needed quite as much. While white soldiers trained and were shipped overseas, black soldiers trained — and then trained some more. This happened with the 92nd and 93rd Infantry Divisions, too, although both eventually saw some combat.

Instead of being part of the replacements after the Battle of the Bulge, the Triple Nickles continued to be fine-tuned into elite paratrooper fighting machines.

Finally, in April 1945, an order was sent. By this time, though, the war in Europe was winding down. Biggs later assessed the situation: although morale was high and they were ready, “the German armies were collapsing. . . . The fall of the German capital was only weeks away. It seemed unlikely that any more paratroopers would be needed.”

So where were they going?

To Pendleton Air Base in Pendleton, Oregon, for what their orders called a “highly classified” mission.

The Triple Nickles left Camp Mackall on May 5, 1945. As they made their way west on a train trip that took six days, there was much conversation among the men. Some wondered what they would do in Pendleton. Others thought they were getting ready to ship to the Pacific to fight the Japanese, where the war was still going strong. Morris was one of them.

He was humble but confident. “We assumed we were going to join General MacArthur in the Pacific theater,” he said. “We were so happy.”

The train clattered across the countryside. As they got close, they stopped for supplies and fuel. Morris and some of the men walked to a general store. A few white loggers were sitting around a potbellied stove, chatting.

“Well, you got here at last,” one of them said.

Morris responded, “You were expecting us?”

“Oh, yeah, you colored soldiers, paratroopers, are going to fight forest fires for us. You’re going to be smokejumpers.”

“How do you know?” Morris asked.

“Well, we read it in the New York Times.”