Back during World War II, Eunice Lewis wanted to do something after hearing of the news that her former husband was captured overseas.
So, she joined the Women’s Army Corps (WAC).
“My husband was captured by the Japanese and there was no hope for his return very soon, anyway,” she said. “So I entered the WAC.”
She went through basic training in Iowa and also achieved the rank of sergeant. She was in WAC from 1942 to 1946.
Lewis stated she that at 97 she is the oldest living World War II WAC member.
WAC began in 1941, with the honorable Edith Nourse Rogers, Congresswoman from Massachusetts, introducing the first bill to establish a women’s auxiliary. On 14 May 1942, Congress approved the creation of a Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC). Two days later, Oveta Culp Hobby was appointed the first director of the WAAC.
Five training centers opened within a year. The first was at Fort Des Moines, Iowa, the second at Daytona Beach, Fla., the third at Fort Oglethorpe, Ga., the fourth at Fort Devens, Mass., and the fifth at Camp Ruston, La.
As an auxiliary of the Army, the WAAC had no military status, therefore Rogers introduced another bill in 1943 to enlist and appoint women in the Army of the United States. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the bill on July 1, 1943 and 90 days later, the WAAC was discontinued and in its place was the Women’s Army Corps (WAC). Col. Hobby continued as director of the WAC.
More than 150,000 American women served in WAC during World War II. Members of the WAC were the first women, other than nurses, to serve within the ranks of the United States Army.
“I did the last will and testaments, and that is actually the saddest thing, anybody had to do,” Lewis said. “You write the last will and testament, because you knew some of those boys would not get back...hardly any of them came back. I did thousands of last will and testaments.”
Lewis would type the forms and mostly worked in the office.
“I enjoyed my time in WAC, it took me off of every day chores,” she said.
Her husband eventually did come home and she later resigned from her duties with the WAC.
WAC did go on during Korean War and the Vietnam War, but later was discontinued.
