Subject: Countering Widespread Ignorance About the National Guard
From: Cub Driver
Date: 3/5/04 2:02 AM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:


Well it was called the "Guard" and it was statewide. But isn't the
National
Guard a statewide service? ,. All I know is that guys went into the
"Guard" and
never went to war and everyone hated them for it..Please explain further.

He's referring to the State Guard, which replaced the National Guard
when it was--well, nationalized.

Primarily the State Guard did ceremonial stuff. Massachusetts had one
(not every state did) and I remember these "old guys" from WWI popping
their buttons at a Memorial Day parade in Concord MA. They would of
course also have provided some of the traditional services of law
enforcement that in peacetime go to the National Guard.

Anyone who went into the State Guard of WWII (well, I suppose there
were some officers--there always seem to be!) would have been
disqualified from active duty because of age or physical condition. So
"everyone hated them for it" is either a mis-remembering or a
misunderstanding. It was the equivalent of the Home Guard in Britain.

There was an armory at St Aidan's School in Brookline MA that was
outfitted with rolling-block Springfield rifles from the Civil War. I
don't *think* it dated from WWII--more likely WWI--but anything is
possible. One of those 45/70s found its way from St Aidan's collection
into mine. I used it for deer-hunting and plinking rats.


Well I guess that makes sense. Remember that we were in high school when we
violunteered for the Air Corp, barely 17 years old. We took the primary
entrance exams (I still remember some of the questions).We couldn't be called
to active duty until we were 18, there was a law against it or something, so we
had to wait it out. That wasn't easy since we were getting war news every day
and were eager to go.While we were eager to go, there were those kids among us
who hung back. They had all kinds of plots to keep from being called. One was
to go out to Long Island and get a job in a war plant. Grumman and Fairchild
were out there. GoIng into the "guard" was another. Once we found out that a
kid went into the "guard" instead of volunteering with us for either the Army
AIr Corp or the Navy V-12 program that kid didn't have a friend in the world.
We had had representatives from both the Air Corps and the V-12 programs come
out to talk to us urging us to volunteer for their forces, They came out in
full uniform covered with wngs and ribbons telling us all we could for our
country if we flew with them. To a bunch of high school kids it was all to
glamourious for words.. No one was left unimpressed. We couldn't wait to go.
Well we went soon enough but our eagerness never waned from the time went in to
the time we went into action. We all shared the same fear that the war would
end before we got there. Except for the kids who went into the "guard" or those
who got defferments doing war work. But they were never one of us. And never
would be.


Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer