America at war! (1941–) – Part 3

Burns cause death of former singer

New York (UP) –
Marion Harris, blues singer and stage star of the 1920s who died shortly after her badly-burned body was discovered in her hotel room last night, apparently had fallen asleep while smoking a cigarette, police said today.

Miss Harris, a petite blonde whose husk singing of popular ballads earned her the soubriquet of “the little girl with the big voice,” was found on a flaming mattress after a hotel employee detected smoke and traced it to her room.

Miss Harris, 48, was the wife of Leonard Urry, a British actor. Previously she had been married to Rush Hughes, the adopted son of author Rupert Hughes. They were divorced in 1928.

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Editorial: Unity means victory

Editorial: Take a look at building

Editorial: Easing the way for ‘G.I. Joe’

Edson: Tugwell manages to get in hot water again

By Peter Edson

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Ferguson: More on equal rights

By Mrs. Walter Ferguson

Besides the National Woman’s Party who favors the proposed Equal Rights Amendment?

All those, say its advocates, who believe the time has come when women who are being asked to share equal responsibilities should be dignified by “real citizenship.”

All those, say its enemies, who are against organized labor, the reactionaries, the sheltered women who wish to wipe out all protective legislation for the working women.

Somewhere between these extremes one must search for facts.

Its friends argue that the amendment will not deprive mothers and children of their legal protection because that will be forthcoming anyway. On the other hand, women who are not mothers, and those who will remain in industry after the war must not be deprived of an equal wage and an equal political authority with men.

It is not privileges they want, the equal righters contend, it is the rights which are guaranteed to every citizen under the Constitution. When those are bestowed, protective legislation can follow. Until they are bestowed, there is no such thing as protective legislation, they argue.

So, while the amendment has many enemies, it also has many champions. Among organizations supporting it probably the most powerful is the General Federation of Women’s Clubs. Hundreds of leading men and women have endorsed it. The list includes Pearl Buck, Margaret Culkin Banning, Mary E. Woolley, Helen Hayes, Raymond Gram Swing, Irving Fisher, Carl Sandburg, James Truslow Adams, Rupert Hughes and Struthers Burt.

Does democracy mean that men and women are equal under the law? If not, what is to be the future status of American women?

Background of news –
Yes, there’ll be an invasion

By Col. Frederick Palmer

Crosby in G opera? Well – could be!

And though Bing denies it, Rise claims he has a classic voice


Errol Flynn gets it again; this time it’s egg to head

Little steel for civilian use expected

Supplies built up for invasion


Rules drafted for control of inflation

Prompt action urged on reconversion

Ernie Pyle V Norman

Roving Reporter

By Ernie Pyle

With 5th Army beachhead forces, Italy – (by wireless)
Once on shore, our supplies for the Anzio beachhead are taken over by the Quartermaster Corps (food and clothing) and the Ordnance Department (ammunition).

The Quartermaster Corps traditionally is seldom in great danger. Up here on the beachhead they are blowing that tradition all to hell.

The Quartermaster Corps has been under fire ever since the beachhead was established, and still is. Its casualties from enemy action have been relatively high.

Around 70% of the Quartermaster troops on the beachhead are colored boys. They help unload ships right at the dock. They drive trucks. They man the supply dumps. Hardly a day goes by without casualties among then. But they take this bombing and shelling bravely. They make an awful lot of funny remarks about it, but they take it.

We drove out to one of the ration dumps where wooden boxes of rations are stacked head-high in piles for hundreds of yards, as in a lumber yard. Trucks from the waterfront add continually to the stock, other trucks from the various outfits continually haul it away.

Our ration dumps are not at all immune from shellfire. This single one has had more than 100 shells in it. Many of the soldier-workmen have been killed or wounded.

Ration dumps seldom burn

Ration dumps seldom burn, because you can’t burn C-rations. But early in the beachhead’s existence, they hit a dump of cigarettes and millions of them went up in smoke.

Our local dumps of ammunition, food, and equipment of a thousand kinds are now so numerous that a German artilleryman could shut his eyes and fire in our general direction and be almost bound to hit something.

Our dumps do get hit; but the fires are put out quickly, the losses are immediately replaced, and the reserve grows bigger and bigger.

The boss of the Quartermaster troops is a former newspaperman – Lt. Col. Cornelius Holcomb of Seattle. He worked on The Seattle Times for 12 years before going into the Army. He is a heavily built, smiling, fast-talking, cigar-smoking man who takes terrific pride in the job his colored boys have done. He said there’s one thing about having colored troops – you always eat like a king. If you need a cook, you just say, “Company, halt! Any cooks in this outfit?” And then pick out whoever looks best.

The colonel himself has had many close squeaks up here. Just before I saw him, a bomb had landed outside his bivouac door. It blew in one wall, and hurt several men.

Another time he was standing in a doorway on the Anzio waterfront talking to a lieutenant. Stone steps led from the doorway down into a basement behind him.

Bomb hits in front of door

As they talked, the colonel heard a bomb whistle. He dropped down on the steps and yelled to the lieutenant, “Hit the deck!”

The bomb hit smack in front of the door and the lieutenant came tumbling down on top of them. “Are you hurt?” Col. Holcomb asked. The lieutenant didn’t answer. Holcomb nosed back to see what was the matter. The lieutenant’s head was lying over in a corner.

Soon a medical man came and asked the blood-covered colonel if he was hurt. Col. Holcomb said no. “Are you sure?” the doctor asked. “I don’t think I am,” the colonel said.

“Well, you better drink this anyway,” the doctor said. And poured him a water glass full of rum which had him in the clouds all day.

In the Quartermaster Corps, they’ve begun a system of sending the key man away after about six weeks on the beachhead and giving them a week’s rest at some nice place like Sorrento.

A man who goes day and night on an urgent job under the constant strain of danger finally begins to feel a little punchy or “slug-butt,” as the saying goes. In other words, he has the beginnings of “Anzio Anxiety,” without even knowing it.

But after a week’s rest, he comes back to the job in high gear, full of good spirits, and big and brave. It’s too bad all forms of war can’t be fought that way.

Pegler: Mrs. Roosevelt and gas

By Westbrook Pegler

Maj. Williams: Three-arm war

By Maj. Al Williams

Biggest air battle in history –
Air combat loses glamor in cold huts of 8th Air Force in England

Sad moment comes when men are lost
By Ira Wolfert, North American Newspaper Alliance

Chicago Tribune calls WPB unjust

CANDIDLY SPEAKING —
Nothing but truth

By Maxine Garrison

Tobin pitches one-hit game to beat Phils


Chandler joins service Friday

They’re never too little –
Songwriting Yank stretches, wins his bars

Orphan composer now air officer
By Si Steinhauser

In Washington –
Merger is proposed of price and wage acts with agencies curbed

Congressmen urge consolidation and limits on OPA, WLB powers

Völkischer Beobachter (April 25, 1944)

Jeder Wunsch Moskaus wird erfüllt –
US-Kriegsschiffe für die Sowjetunion

Drahtbericht unseres Lissaboner Berichterstatters

Roosevelt macht den Engländern Kummer –
Liebesbrief für Kanada