The first months of World War II in Johnston County

By Benjamin Sanderford

It was January 1942, one month after Johnston County folks found themselves plunged into the Second World War.

The news coming out of Hawaii was comforting. Smithfield natives Sgt. W. Garland Stephenson, U.S. Army, and J.D. Lancaster, U.S. Navy, were both reported safe. So too was Navy electrician Willard Zadock Holland of Kenly, who had been declared dead following the Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor.

The news from abroad, however, was mixed. The Soviet Red Army had thwarted the German attempt to take Moscow, but it was hobbled in exploiting its victory by the incompetence of the Russian dictator, Joseph Stalin.

Closer to home, German submarines were wreaking havoc on American shipping in an effort to cut the United States off from Britain. Meanwhile, Japanese forces were driving British-led troops down the Malay Peninsula, threatening the vital port of Singapore. The Japanese had also landed an army in the U.S.-administered Philippines. Thousands of Americans were now in harm’s way.

This gave the belt-tightening at home a sense of urgency. The Office of Price Administration imposed a rationing regime to ensure that all nonessential resources were available for military use. Johnston County was allotted a total 118 tires for all types of vehicles for the month of January. Early February saw the rationing of sugar to one pound per person per week while the Victory Garden campaign encouraged farmers to grow more food crops.

All these measures entailed sacrifices from Johnston County people, but they were willing to make them. The Junior Class of Benson High School voted on February 12 to forego the school’s annual Junior/ Senior Banquet and contribute all available personal funds to buying defense bonds. Princeton students, for their part, launched a “Victory Campaign” to collect waste materials, particularly tires to meet the military’s rubber shortage.

The first week of March passed quietly, but that was shattered on March 7 when a munitions truck exploded at the Selma entertainment complex of Catch-Me-Eye. The blast killed seven people, destroyed nearby buildings and made a fireball that could be seen from Raleigh. In the panic of the moment, many believed that the Japanese were attacking. Across the Pacific, Japan was about to launch real attacks that would bring the war home to Johnston.

The fall of Rangoon, British Burma, to the Imperial Japanese Army caused anxiety for the family of Joseph N. Peedin, who had been stationed there with the “Flying Tigers.” Fortunately, his mother in Smithfield received a cable from him on March 13 assuring her that he had been safely evacuated to Kunming, China.

Maj. Edwin Broadhurst of the U.S. Army Air Force also had to leave his base that same month. The Smithfield airman boarded the last plane to leave the Dutch colony of Java, in modern Indonesia, before Japanese troops conquered the island. Broadhurst landed in Australia without incident, no doubt hoping that this country, America’s chief partner in the Pacific, would not be the next to fall.

Others were not so lucky. The Navy Department reported on March 16 that Charles William Sullivan of Selma was missing in action. By May 1, word reached Smithfield lawyer J.R. Barbour that his sailor son, Stewart Gordon Barbour, was a prisoner of Japan.

Bad news came on swift wings that spring. April 9 witnessed the surrender of 15,000 American and 60,000 Filipino soldiers on the Bataan Peninsula, most of whom were then forced to endure the Bataan Death March. It was the largest military capitulation in American history, and it was not the only calamity to befall the Allies.

The loss of Singapore on Feb. 15 resulted in nearly 85,000 British, Australian and Indian troops being led into Japanese captivity. Allied forces had been completely expelled from Burma by the end of May, driving a wedge between India and China. Simultaneously, in eastern Ukraine, Stalin ordered an ill-advised attack on strong German forces that cost the Russians 280,000 casualties. There were now scant Soviet forces to block Germany’s drive to the Caucasus Mountains.

These disasters illustrated the need for more men to join the armed forces, a need that Johnstonians were ready to fill. The draft boards of Smithfield and Selma sent 93 men to Fort Bragg on March 30 alone. These unmarried men were joined in April by husbands whose wives were in the workforce. All of Johnston’s people, married and single, male and female, black and white, soldier and civilian, would be needed to turn the tide of war.

Benjamin Sanderford, a resident of Clayton, studied social science at UNC Greensboro. He can be reached at benwsanderford@gmail.com.