Bertie May Price Doyle: A Gold Star Mother

In studying military research, many times it's the male servicemen that receive all of the recognition in genealogy. With the accessibility of service records, it's easy to allow their experiences to shape the stories that are told and remembered. But no service man or woman exists in isolation. Behind every member of the military is a family who share in their loved one's sacrifices. For Bertie Price Doyle, that sacrifice took many forms during World War II.

Image courtesy of
Wikimedia Commons

The tradition of the gold star began in World War I. Families would display a flag or banner with a blue star on it for every serviceman they had away from home. For those who made the ultimate sacrifice by giving their lives for their country, the blue star would be traded out for a gold star. Since that time, many different organizations supporting "gold star" families have been established. Beginning with the Gold Star Wives, that support has since expanded to all immediate family members who lose someone in wartime conflict.

Charles "Charlie" Miller Doyle and Bertie Price Doyle had several sons who served in the military. Clarence Monroe Doyle was their oldest son to serve. He enlisted on the 27th of December 1940, just under a year before the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Charlie died in Wicomico County, Maryland in the summer of 1942, leaving Bertie to face the family's coming tragedy as a widow.

In April 1943, Clarence Doyle was declared missing in North Africa. Notably, this comes at the tail end of the fighting in that region. The Allies were making crucial ground on that front. A strategic fight to solidify the Allies' access to middle-eastern oil fields, control of North Africa would change the direction of the war. The fighting in Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, Libya, and Morocco resulted in overwhelming losses for Italian and German forces stationed in that region. The heaviest casualties for the Allies in the North African campaigns were with the British armed forces. American casualties make up one of the smallest percentages of the total lives lost in North Africa. Nevertheless, every single one of them was still felt to the families on the home front.

The Daily Times, digital images, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/title_838/the_daily_times/ : 2 March 2017) citing "Pocomoke Soldier Missing in Action" (Salisbury, MD) The Daily Times, 21 June 1943, p. 1, col. 8.

By June 1943, news of Clarence's disappearance had reached his home on the Maryland eastern shore. Here, my attention turns to Bertie. We've all seen the scenes in movies where government issued vehicles drive down country dirt roads in war time, where everyone secretly prays they'll go to someone else's house. A soldier goes to the door to deliver a telegram, announcing that a loved one is either missing, dead, or a prisoner of war. As I contemplated what it meant for Bertie to get this news, to be told Clarence was missing instead of dead, my heart broke for her. How long did she hold onto the hope that Clarence would still come home? When did she change her star from blue to gold?

I ask because as of July 1944, the newspaper at home was still reporting Clarence as missing, not wounded or killed in action. The fervency of that hope is tangible to me all these years later, that desperate determination that life should prevail over death and destruction.

The Daily Times, digital images, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/title_838/the_daily_times/ : 2 March 2017) citing "202 Easter Shoremen Killed, Wounded or Missing in World War No.2" (Salisbury, MD) The Daily Times, 18 July 1944, p. 1, col. 7.

Clarence Monroe Doyle was eventually declared Killed in Action, his death date given as 30 April 1943. Even if this is a rough estimate, this would place him at the final showdown between the German forces and General George Patton at the Battle of El Guettar and its aftermath. An artillery battle in the Tunisian desert, the scene would have been one of explosions, heat, sand, and blood. After a prolonged struggle against the superior firepower and experience of the German Panzer Division, the only thing that could help the Americans to turn things around was British reinforcements and a change in American leadership. Under the command of General Patton, the once superior German forces were gradually outmaneuvered, and squeezed into positions of disadvantage. Eventually, the Americans had them surrounded. Assuming that the date of Clarence Doyle's death is accurate, he died less than two weeks before the German surrender on 13 May 1943.

U.S. National Cemetery Interment Control Forms, 1928-1962, digital images, Ancestry.com (http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=2590 : 2 March 2017) for "Clarance M. Doyle," citing Interment Control Forms, A1 2110-B. Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, 1774–1985, Record Group 92. The National Archives at College Park, College Park, Maryland.

According to the documentation that accompanies his plot in Baltimore National Cemetery, it appears that his remains were returned and interred in 1948. Given the isolated onslaught of the campaign in Tunisia, I have a hard time envisioning any kind of organized burial for the men who died in battle. Many of them were incinerated or obliterated in tanks, with no remains to speak of. Many perished and remained where they fell in the desert, where their unidentifiable bodies are found by locals to this day. I'd be interested to read about any concerted efforts the United States made to identify remains in Tunisia after the war. But I find it difficult to imagine a scenario in which Clarence's actual remains return from Africa, as opposed to an honorary burial.

I don't know how much of this Bertie would have been told. But knowing that she carried this pain makes me a feel a powerful love and empathy for her. She was a gold star mother. I had no sense of what that meant before I did this research. Part of me will never understand. But when I was searching for images for this post and I came across The Freedom Wall memorial for World War II, my reaction to the image is overwhelming. One of these stars represents Clarence, and the pain of a family who mourned his passing.

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

One of these stars tells a story from my heritage that had been forgotten... until now.

Remembering the WWI Service of Lester Edgar Ince

The wait for Lester Edgar Ince's military service file has finally ended! I downloaded it and have done my preliminary examination to its contents. If you're waiting for these records to come available, you'll know when they have for your ancestor when this link appears on the page for their previously published attestation papers.

The compiled service file is published as a PDF, so you'll need Adobe Reader or some other PDF software to view it. They're free to download, but the process of doing so can take several minutes because the files are quite large. Lester's service file was a total of 180 images, and took between 3 and 5 minutes to download completely.

What you find in your ancestor's service file will depend completely on what their World War I service was like. What you'll find in the file of a decorated officer will vary greatly from what you find in the file of an enlisted man. Because Lester was a black man serving in a predominantly white unit, at a time when whether black men should participate in Canadian military service was hotly contested in society, it shouldn't have surprised me to see no awards of any kind in his file.

Instead his file consists predominantly of medical records. I can see that piecing together his military service will likely rely on creating a timeline of his injuries and hospital stays, and then filling in the action that would have caused them. For the average enlisted man, this process will likely be identical, and tell much of the same story.

The first of his injuries are reportedly shrapnel wounds on his thigh and leg, that were superficial in nature according to his treating physicians. Lester spent time in France, and was at Ypres, where a shell landed approximately fifteen feet from him. As a result he experienced prolonged "shell shock," which caused him great distress throughout the rest of the war. He struggled with noises, was easily irritated, had nausea and loss of appetite, and dizziness. He had disturbing dreams and woke frequently from sleep. He was unable to ride in vehicles without becoming incredibly uneasy, and encountered a great deal of anxiety now associated with post-traumatic stress disorder

Based on his treatment records, I'm also postulating that he experienced first-hand the chemical weapons engaged by the Germans. Lester was treated for severe conjunctivitis, likely the result of contact with poison gas. He also was tested and treated for syphilis, a common ailment among all participants in the European theater. Venereal disease became such a crisis among the British armed forces in Europe, state sponsored prostitution began. After the introduction of this program, all soldiers were required to use contraception. Those who developed any type of preventable disease faced disciplinary action. I'll be interested to take a closer look at the timing and implementation of those measures, to see how they coincide with the enforcement (or lack thereof) within his unit.

I am endlessly glad that I watch Jan Peter's Great War Diaries docu-drama while it was still on Netflix. Even though I watched it several months ago, the thoroughness with which it handled the subject of World War I is incredible. The context includes each of the fronts of WWI action, and civilian life with respect to each, as told through the words and diaries of those who lived there. By the time I finished the documentary, I had the distinct notion that the only way I could have gotten better insight into the war would have been to have spoken to Lester Ince myself. 

I look forward to studying his service file in the weeks and months ahead, especially in relation to a book I'm still reading on his unit. 

The Forgotten War: Researching Connections to the Korean War

As my husband and I have been watching M*A*S*H together on Netflix because I've never seen it, my thoughts have turned to my grandfather and the Korean War. Like most Americans, I know almost nothing about the Korean War. I've wanted to change that for a long time, but doing so poses some challenges I haven't known how to confront.

In addition to many Korean War era records being destroyed in a fire at the National Personal Records Center decades ago, many current privacy laws restrict me from requesting any information about my grandfather. He was discharged from the army on 9 December 1953, and the privacy laws mandate that his information will be restricted until 62 years past that date.

But in case you're just now joining me, you should know that that I'm incredibly lucky and the universe loves me to bits. When it comes to genealogy, I always seem to be the person who is descended from the group of people whose entire existence was erased, except for the one piece of information I needed.

And, as it turns out, my grandfather's service in the Korean War is no exception.

At 17, my grandfather Raymond Doyle joined the Army in 1947. He served for the duration of the Korean engagement, being discharged in December of 1953. Looking at his military headstone application and the Veteran's Affairs BIRLS index, that's all I would be able to gather. And I'm not sure I can expect much more from whatever the NPRC can give me.

But that's okay. Because even if they have nothing at all, I have an ace up my sleeve.

My grandmother knows I value old papers and photos, and gave me a huge haul of stuff right before I moved out west with my husband. Included in the swag was my grandfather's resume--a good portion of which lays out his military career.

Raymond Richard Doyle (Middle)
circa 1947-1953, Korean War

My grandfather seemed to understand that the military was a great place to get free training and education, and took advantage of every opportunity to better his prospects. He was trained at Fort Holabird, a counter-intelligence facility where he specialized in Industrial Security Management. He became an Administrative Specialist, eventually attaining the rank of Sergeant Major.

As a non-commissioned officer, I'm assuming he would have qualified for additional training opportunities while stationed overseas. Not only did he complete a leadership training course while in Tokyo, he also received a Certificate of Administration from Keio University in Japan. 

If these are the only facts I ever have to work with, I'm hoping they'll be enough to piece my grandfather's experience back together. And a great tool fill in the details are radio broadcasts from the early 1950's. These are available in great abundance on the Internet Archive. You can explore what they have generally via their Korean War, 1950-1953 subject tag. Some specific items include:

• Radio Broadcasts: see broadcast 68 and 69 on this list
• Books: What's Happening in Korea? by Richard Morris
• Photos: While the submitter of these photos is named as Margie Burke, the nurses are not named or labeled. If your relative was a nurse in the Korean War, checking for photos of Korean War nurses may help you to find photos you've never seen before
• Video: stock footage, home front reels, training reels
• Operation Guides: Specific to each branch of service. This guide outlines the operation and actions of the U.S. Marine Corp.

Researching Korean War veterans and their service isn't a popular pursuit, especially in comparison to other conflicts like the Civil War or World War I and II. This plays a large role in how the Korean War came to be known as the Forgotten War. As this generation of veterans continues to pass away, it's important to record and preserve their memories while they are still with us, and we can do so. Once they pass away, there may not be a second chance to obtain that information.

My grandfather died when I was 5, and I never got the chance to ask him about his military service. I think it's safe to say that it isn't possible to understand the civilian life of a veteran without understanding their military service. 

So, we wait; for answers to come, and privacy laws don't restrict those with the greatest right to know those stories. Because in a situation where I have no choice but to work without records, I can choose to proceed anyway with patience and determination. 

As genealogists, we always have that choice.

Awesome Finds, Big Ships, and the Great War

Lester Edgar Ince Sr is one of those ancestors I have on the back burner. I've had him there for some time, but it always amazes me the way breakthroughs can still happen in ways you didn't expect.

HMS Ariadne, provided by Wikimedia Commons

According to the 1911 Canadian census, he immigrated from Barbados (then the British West Indies) to Canada some time around 1900. I have not yet located him on the 1901 census, which could be because he immigrated after the census was taken. The absence of proof makes me question when exactly he immigrated to Canada, and how I can prove it.

To answer that question, I need to understand more of how he spent his life before moving to Canada, as well as the policies controlling immigration between the British West Indies and Canada. 

One new find has given me what I need to begin painting the picture of his life before immigration. He served in the Royal Navy aboard the ship HMS Ariadne, and his service record provides me with some crucial missing information.

Discovery, digital images, The National Archives - Kew, (http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/D6795093 : 27 October 2014), Entry for Lester Ince, citing ADM 188/551/362251

Check out that Place of Birth. Lester was born in the parish of Saint Peter!

Barbados is divided into regions called parishes, and all local records in Barbados are organized according to parish. Anyone who does research in the Caribbean knows that if you don't have a parish, you are out of luck. No parish = No happy dance!

Gettin' that parish!

And I can tell you from personal experience, these Royal Navy records do not always include parish information. This was pure luck. Finding someone's parish usually is.

I also find it interesting that Lester was a jeweler, especially since his father's occupation on his marriage record was given as a cooper. How does the son of a barrel maker become a jeweler? You know there's an interesting story at the other end of that question.

As for policies limiting immigration between the British West Indies and Canada, both countries were territories of the United Kingdom. From what I can tell, they all held British citizenship. There was no legal requirement for British subjects to be naturalized upon immigration to other British territories. This makes tracing his or anyone else's entrance from the Caribbean into Canada a unique challenge.

Nova Scotia Historical Vital Statistics, digital images, Nova Scotia Archvies, (https://www.novascotiagenealogy.com/ItemView.aspx?ImageFile=1821-16&Event=marriage&ID=69164 : 27 October 2014), Entry for marriage of Lester Ince and Ethel May Pinheiro, citing Halifax County, Nova Scotia, "Registration Year 1909, Book 1821," p. 16, line 228.

In 1909, Lester Ince married Ethel May Pinheiro. They lived with her parents, and gave birth to five children in the harbor area of Halifax, Nova Scotia. 

Soldiers of the First World War: 1914-1918, digital images, Library and Archives Canada, (http://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/military-heritage/first-world-war/first-world-war-1914-1918-cef/Pages/item.aspx?IdNumber=487849 : 27 October 2014), Attestation papers for Lester Edgar Ince, citing RG 150, Accession 1992-93/166, Box 4688 - 18 [Page 1 of 2.]

After the outbreak of World War I, Lester Ince Sr. enlisted for military service. He was not the only black man to do so, but was one of the few who were chosen. He was assigned to the 60th Battalion of the Canadian Expeditionary Forces. Colored regiments were formed after he enlisted, and there is no record to suggest he served in a colored regiment.

The records that would shed more light on his military service are available at Library and Archives Canada in Ottawa. All of the World War I service records are in the process of being digitized and published online. They anticipate finishing with the project some time in 2015.

But thanks to Ancestry.com, I recently discovered a passenger list that is shedding some light on the end of Lester's military service in World War I.

Canadian Passenger Lists, 1865-1935, digital images, Ancestry.com, (http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=1263 : 27 October 2014), Entry for L. E. Ince entering Halifax, Nova Scotia on 14 November 1917, citing Library and Archives Canada RG 76-C, T-4756

Note that L. E. Ince's number (458117) matches the number on his attestation papers. This is the same man married to Ethel May Ince, of 54 Gerrish Street in Halifax. Although the list title says it's of medically unfit men, that's an oversimplification. Browsing through the list reveals men being sent to Canada for non-medical reasons. The reason for discharge given for Lester Ince is "Dis. of A.G." I have been searching for over an hour for some clue as to what that is, or 1Que Reserve unit, or Military district 6, or classification 3.

Ancestry.com gives the arrival date of the Olympic in Halifax, Nova Scotia as 14 November 1917. One notable fact about the Olympic is that it was a massive ocean liner, a sister ship to the Titanic.

RMS Olympic, image provided by Wikimedia Commons

I think it is safe to assume Lester Ince arrived in Canada alive, given that no note is given on the passenger list of his death. So the question becomes, what happened to him between November 1917, and when the 1921 census was taken? Why didn't he return to his family? And if he did return and left, why and where did he go?

I have a feeling that I won't have all of the answers until I see his full service file. But of course, you never know. I said that before, and I have this much more information without it. Sometimes patience done properly has its rewards.

Our Southern Journey: Vicksburg National Military Park

Anyone who follows me on Twitter knows that I recently had a very long road trip with my husband. We traveled from San Antonio, Texas to our home in the Dover, Delaware area--a trip which took us through 7 states and lasted 60 hours total.

It was a trip that began as a compromise and ended as a test of our ability to work together. Because the primary purpose of going to San Antonio was to pick up his truck, part of my condition for spending the money was that we would do genealogy stuff on the way home. We planned to stay the night in Vicksburg and visit the battlefield, stop at two cemeteries in Tennessee, stop at another cemetery in southern Virginia, then make our way home. Our anticipated arrival time at home was late Tuesday evening.

Allow me to break down our mistakes from the beginning:

Mistake #1--Budget enough drive time, especially when driving through Texas

Because of weather, we decided to drive through Austin and onto Dallas instead of Houston. This was our first mistake. Never, EVER drive through Austin. For any reason. The traffic was horrendous--entirely stop and go for absolutely no reason. There was no construction, no weather, it wasn't even rush hour. For lack of a better explanation, people in that area just don't know how to drive on a highway. We lost a lot of time driving through Texas in general.

Mistake #2--When you go to Vicksburg, don't forget to see it all

Vicksburg battlefield has over 1,300 monuments and markers throughout the park. We had no idea when we showed up that this meant that each of our ancestors' regiments were represented by different monuments, along with the monuments for the both states, monuments for the commanding officers, and monuments for the surrender. Not to mention a live artillery demonstration. And a gift shop. We only discovered all of this once we arrived, and still missed the Iowa monument and the live artillery demonstration. Had I not asked the park ranger at the help desk about all there was to see, we would have missed most of the things on this list.

View from the Confederate line over the Mississippi River at Vicksburg National Military Park

Confederate line marker for the 61st Tennessee Infantry Regiment

Me beside the monument for the 61st Tennessee Infantry monument at the Vicksburg National Military Park

The Tennessee memorial at Vicksburg National Military Park

Being able to stand on the very line where John M. P. Clark fought was a special experience for me. It was the very same feeling I had at Antietam and Gettysburg--like my ancestors who fought there were right beside me as I was walking through the place. My Civil War veterans have become special people to me, and I love them more now than I did before I made these trips. I feel a sense of kinship with them that simply having their names on paper or in a database didn't provide for me before. I needed to walk on the ground they hallowed and understand their suffering before I could appreciate them the way I do now. 

 One of the highlights from the museum was this fiber optic map, which helps to give a look into how the battle played out.

Vicksburg National Military Park was an amazing stop on our journey through the South. As far as national parks go, it left nothing to be desired and gave us exactly the insight we were seeking. But it was only the beginning to what became a very long trip.

To be continued...

Thomas Gardner Bartlett and the Grayson Cavalry

Thomas Gardner Bartlett was a Civil War soldier who was organized as part of the 8th Virginia Cavalry, Company C. They called themselves the Grayson Cavalry after their home county of Grayson, Viriginia, and were mostly assigned to the Army of Northern Virginia.

8th VA Cavalry's operations were largely centralized around western Virginia and eastern Tennessee. They also participated in the Shenandoah Valley campaigns of 1864. Specifically they were a part of Jubal Early's campaign to sweep the Shenandoah Valley and remove the Union forces.

And, as an item of interest, Thomas got to do all of this--on a horse.

(Which is to say, I never knew that a cavalry meant being on horses until I looked it up in conjunction with this research.)

The documents in Thomas Bartlett's file reveal that he served throughout the war as a teamster.

He was away without leave from 26 June-15 September 1864, and was wounded on the 19th of September, as it appears, almost immediately following.

This document states that he was among Prisoners of War who were surrendered by General Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House. However, the National Park Service website says that his regiment had already cut through the Union lines and disbanded, and weren't surrendered at this time. The site also says that the 8th VA Cavalry participated in the Appomattox Campaign. I wonder if he had been previously captured and was then released with the surrender. I have no other documentation to clue me in as to when or where he was captured. But I do know that he survived the war and it was victory he and his family never forgot.

As you can see at the top of his headstone, he has a round emblem with a cross in the center. It's called the Southern Cross of Honor. It is a spin-off of the Confederate Medal of Honor, an official wartime medal for honorable military service to the Confederacy.

The United Daughters of the Confederacy created the Southern Cross of Honor specifically to mark the Confederate soldiers and veterans who served honorably in the Civil War. The symbol was later adopted by the U.S. Veteran's Administration, and may only be used on the headstones issued to Confederate veterans.

I am not sure if Thomas did something which brought his service some sort of special recognition, or if this symbol can simply be allotted to any veteran from the Confederacy. I would love to find out more. At any rate, he risked his life to protect his homeland, which I'm sure was always near to his heart because the Shenandoah Valley really isn't far from where his family was living, waiting and wondering if husband and father would come home alive.

Thanks to the good people at Fold3.com, I have these documents. They've helped me to form new questions for further research to know this man and the powerful history woven endlessly throughout his life.