Within two months of D-Day, Allied forces had broken out of their Normandy beachhead and, in August, Paris was liberated. Hitler, though, had been hoarding his forces for one final counteroffensive, which began Dec. 16 with an attack in the Ardennes Forest of Belgium that opened up a wedge in the Allied lines. During this Battle of the Bulge, the 101st Airborne Division was surrounded by the Germans, who asked its commander to surrender. ”Nuts!”
replied Gen. Anthony McAuliffe. By the beginning of 1945, the Allies were on the move again and crossed the Rhine River into Germany. On April 11, U.S. troops linked up with the Russian army, which had pushed into Germany. Hitler committed suicide in his Berlin command post and, on May 7, Germany surrendered and was divided by the Allies into zones of occupation-
prefiguring the Cold War`s division of Europe into East and West blocs. In the Pacific, U.S. forces liberated the Philippines in summer 1945, and began preparing to invade the Japanese islands. But on Aug. 6, an American B-29 bomber dropped a secret weapon, the atomic bomb, on Hiroshima. Following a second atomic attack, Japan accepted the Allies` demand for surrender, which was signed Sept. 2, 1945.
THE TROOPS MARCH HOME AGAIN As Allied forces swept east through France towards Germany in the war`s final months, Chicagoans, like most Americans, grew excited by the prospect that it wouldn`t be much longer before GI Joe came marching home, allowing millions to restart lives put on hold by the war.
There seemed to be a pronounced weariness at the end of this long conflict. Crowds gathered in the Loop when victory over Japan was announced. But the war`s end wasn`t officially celebrated by massive victory parades like those at the conclusion of World War I.
To those on the homefront early in 1945 who listened to war bulletins on their Philco Ford radios and watched combat newsreels at the local movie palaces, the war`s impending close meant different things.
For many single women without a boyfriend, or with a fiance in the service, it meant a chance to date seriously again. During the war, the shortage of men caused women, single and married alike, to rely largely on each other`s company to pass the time. According to Elaine Dreier, a graduate of Amundsen High School on the North Side, she and her friends had Tuesday night ”stitch and chatters,” parties for sewing and talk.
One of the common concerns in 1945 was where reunited couples would live. Home and apartment construction had come to a halt during the war, making for a huge housing shortage.
In some minds, the return of millions of men also raised concerns that the economy, which had been lifted out of the Depression by the war, might be plunged back into a serious slump.
George Dreier, Elaine`s husband, worked at a Buick plant in Maywood that was converted to make engines for bombers. ”People would talk about how there was going to be a lot more competition for jobs when the troops returned home,” he recalls. ”There was some worry about that.”
Between V-E and V-J Days, the mood of many Chicagoans was darkened by an event unrelated to the war. In June, the nude and strangled body of a woman was discovered at her North Side home. She turned out to be the first of several victims of local serial killer William George Heirens, a 17-year-old University of Chicago student.
But the prevailing mood about the war was one of great excitement. Anne Nedvedik, a Czech immigrant, was a case in point. Her husband Frank was a U.S. sailor in the Pacific theater. While his amphibious craft cleared beaches for marine landings, she was left raising their toddlers, twin girls, in a two-flat on South Harding Avenue that she shared with her parents.
During the final months of the war, she recalls, the radio was on constantly. When victory in Europe was announced in May 1945, it became clear the war in the Pacific wouldn`t last much longer. In preparation for her husband`s return, Anne Nedvedik washed the walls of their apartment.
Then, on Aug. 14, 1945, the long-awaited news was announced: the Japanese had offered to surrender unconditionally. The moment called for a celebration, and Nedvedik wanted to join the throngs of Chicagoans gathered in the city`s downtown restaurants and bars, dancing and singing and savoring the wonderful news. But her straight-laced Bohemian mother said no, she might become lost in the midst of all the excitement.
Instead of going downtown, she went, with her sister-in-law, brother and father, to a tavern two blocks from her home. She recalls drinking whiskey out of highball glasses, getting tipsy and deciding to leave without her father and brother.
Arriving home, she began opening windows, needing, she remembers, the fresh air. Her mother came downstairs, saw a daughter who had clearly celebrated a little too much, and expressed her worry that neighbors might see her through the window in this uncharacteristic condition.
Just then her father walked in and, turning to her mother, declared:
”Let her do it. Her husband`s been away for three years and he`ll be coming home soon. She can celebrate if she wants.”
”That,” Anne Nedvedik says with a smile, ”was a happy day.”
`I FOUND CHICAGO MUCH THE SAME`
Arthur Brazier served in India and Burma in the Army Quartermaster Corps, delivering supplies and munitions to fliers attacking Japanese positions. After the war he studied at the Moody Bible Institute to become a minister. He is pastor of the Apostolic Church of God at 64th Street and Kenwood Avenue and a bishop in his church`s ruling body:
I was born and raised in Chicago. When the war broke out, I was working as a wringer man in a laundry. I lived on the South Side, around 32nd and Ellis. At the end of 1945, when I came home, Chicago looked pretty much the way I had left it.
Of course, my old neighborhood was being razed for (the) Lake Meadows
(redevelopment project). The house that I had grown up in was boarded up. Other than that, I found Chicago pretty much the same.
After the war there were places you didn`t even apply for jobs. They weren`t there because you were black. There were signs. And there were newspaper ads: ”White Only.” You would see the signs on the factories:
”Only Whites Need Apply.” I remember them like I saw them yesterday.
When we got back, we docked in New York on Dec. 24, 1945, Christmas Eve. Went over to Camp Kilmer in New Jersey, then Ft. Sheridan in Illinois. I was discharged on the 27th. Got back to Chicago that night, about midnight. My family was overjoyed. My mother, my father, my sister, my relatives, we all lived together in an extended-family situation. They all ran out into the hall to greet me. Nobody went to bed that night
I walked around in my uniform for a couple of weeks. You could hardly buy clothes because we were just coming out of rationing.
When I got out of the Army I swore I would never go back to the laundry. So I got a job in a steel company as a spot welder. I had dropped out of school because of the Depression. Even if you had a college degree back in those days, if you got into the post office you were doing good.
The elite of black society were postal workers and Pullman car porters. These were good jobs because they were long-lasting jobs. You could support your family. So we got jobs wherever they were.
I learned a lot in the Army. It changed my outlook and gave me a better sense of discipline. I was running around a lot before that.
There were shortages all around and no jobs when we got back. But none of that dampened our great joy on being home. There was euphoria over winning a just and popular war. And we had survived a terrible war. Being that some of those young men we left with . . . we wound up leaving over there, the joy of us who made it back, well, it`s almost impossible to express.
