T. Harry
Williams Center for Oral History Collection
INTERVIEWEE
NAME:
Erbon W. Wise COLLECTION:
4700.0636
IDENTIFICATION: [1920- ]
INTERVIEWER: Tara Zachary
PROJECT: World War II
DATES: December 27, 1995 FOCUS DATES: 1940's
ABSTRACT:
T
924
Date
of birth and family information; educational background of parents; graduating
from highschool and entering college at Louisiana State Normal College
[Northwestern State University of Louisiana]; enlisting in the Army Air Corps;
hearing about the bombing of Pearl Harbor; being sent to Officer's Candidates
School and commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Army Finance Corp; duties
as a Finance Disbursing Officer; England at the start of American involvement;
loss of planes and lives during the early part of the war; the Memphis Belle;
meeting Prime Minister Winston Churchill; landing in England aboard an assault
landing craft; Utah Beach; entering Paris prior to official liberation;
reactions of the French people; spending the winter in the French countryside;
ending the war in Wurtsburg Germany and meeting the Russians; soldiers
reactions to V-E day; coming home after the war; commanding reserve units in
Lake Charles Louisiana; becoming the Adjutant General of the State of Louisiana
in command of the National Guard for Louisiana; being named State Director of
Selective Service during the Vietnam War; promotion to Brigadier General and
Major General; protests against the Vietnam War; involvement of the National
Guard with hurricanes; meeting President Johnson and showing him hurricane
(Betsy) damage; opinion of General Patton; memories of Utah Beach including a
Colonel who dangerously broke down under stress; staying at the Savoy hotel in
England upon arrival; staying with English families before equipment arrived;
starting a tabloid paper in Sulphur Louisiana after the war; meeting Charles
Degaulle former President of France; practical joke and misunderstanding
involving watermelons.
TAPES: 924 TOTAL PLAYING TIME:
1.5 hours
#
PAGES TRANSCRIPT: 37
RESTRICTIONS: None.