Strengthening wartime connection to home 

During World War II, due to the rapid movement of United States troops from post to post, letters and packages from home began to stockpile in warehouses and airplane hangars. 

So encompassing was the war effort that most families were connected in some way to a soldier serving overseas. Those on the home front wanted to contribute in their own way and, from this desire, a unique battalion was born. 

On May 15, 1942, the Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps (later dropping Auxiliary from the name) was formed—eventually giving women full military benefits. 

Of the more than 150,000 women who served, 855 predominantly Black women served as the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, or Six Triple Eight, from 1945 to 1946. 

Northern Kentucky author Sheila Williams was inspired to write her historical novel, No Better Time (HarperCollins, $30), by the stories her cousin, Dorothy Turner, shared of her time serving with the Six Triple Eight. Adopting the motto, “No mail, low morale,” Dorothy and her counterparts took seriously their monumental task of processing the stockpiled mail. 

Though some women saw the opportunity as an adventure, life in the military was not easy. The country they so freely wanted to serve was still one segregated by both race and gender. High ranking personnel didn’t always welcome their involvement or even their presence, resulting in far less than equitable quarters and job assignments. For example, at Fort Riley, the women’s barracks were rustic and heated by coal-burning, potbellied stoves while German POWs spent their incarceration in buildings with central heat and hot water. 

Finally, in 1945, after protesting their dehumanizing assignments, the Six Triple Eight shipped out to England and eventually France to process an estimated 17 million pieces of mail, some of which had been sitting for over two years. Williams remembers Dorothy’s comment about the importance of a soldier’s only connection to home: “You could see the last time this man received mail. And you were determined to find him.” 

Despite being from all walks of life across the country, the women who served in the 6888th became such a strong sisterhood that they formed the National Association of Black Military Women. Williams says, “It is this sisterhood that spoke loudest to me when I wrote this book … I was taken with the way that the WACs looked after each other … and the sharing of secrets and advice.” 

Mail vs. female 

According to the National Museum of the United States Army, one general said it would take six months to process the backlog of undelivered mail, yet the Six Triple Eight managed to do it in three. 

In 2021, President Joe Biden signed the Six Triple Eight Congressional Gold Medal Act to recognize the battalion for the completion of their mission at the end of World War II, and their pursuit of racial and gender equality in the face of significant social and political barriers.