University of Virginia Library

II
Organizing for Civilian Defense

More than a year before Pearl Harbor the people of Charlottesville
and Albemarle County learned through their newspapers and
radios that the Second World War differed from all its predecessors
in certain shocking respects. With a new kind of horror they paused
occasionally in the course of their relatively tranquil lives to ponder
the quick and cruel efficiency with which the Germans overwhelmed
Poland in 1939 and overran France in the spring of 1940. With
an awe akin first to disbelief and later to sympathy they discussed
the merciless destruction which German airplanes and bombs rained
upon Great Britain after Dunkirk in 1940 and through many nights
in 1941. Each additional and ruthless air raid left peace-loving
people figuratively holding their breath. Would England stand or
fall? They scarcely dared to formulate the question, for the fate of
civilization itself seemed to hang in the balance. And in the course
of those tense and harrowing days the grim realization that the fall
of England might well presage a shower of airborne missiles upon
our American homeland obtruded itself into many minds. There
were in every community some persons who could not with any
assurance convince themselves that the ultimate outcome of the issue
would be favorable and that men could preserve the democratic principles
and spiritual values which had been laboriously nurtured
through some two or three thousand years of progress against various
forces of barbarism.

Aside from any such philosophic fears, it was painfully obvious
in those days that modern warfare had become “total war” and that
it took its staggering toll among civilians as well as soldiers. The
property destruction which German raiders left under the slip streams
of their dreaded bombers throughout the British Isles was frightening,
but it was the suffering and deaths inflicted upon the bloody
but unbowed British people—men, women, and children—that
Americans found most heart rending. As Great Britain endured
these unprecedented aerial assaults without collapsing, American admiration
was unforgettably inspired by Prime Minister Winston

Churchill's tribute to the valiant pilots of Royal Air Force fighter
planes. Perhaps it was true, as he asserted, that never in human
history had so many owed so much to so few. But many a Nazi
flyer succeeded in penetrating the thin cordon of the R. A. F. and
in dropping his fire bombs and death-dealing explosives over densely
populated English cities. Therefore it was also true that Great Britain
was spared greater losses and possible subjugation because an effective
organization of civilian workers was developed to obviate and correct
all types of damage to property and life.

Gradually, too, the government and citizens of the United States
began to realize the necessity of preparing a large body of trained
volunteers to counteract whatever threats to national security might
materialize. No one knew whence or when some attack against the
nation might come, and speculation on this subject was almost a
daily concern among many Americans, especially residents of coastal
areas and urban dwellers, before as well as after that sunny Sunday
of December 7, 1941, when the Rising Sun of Japan shone with
such malevolent fury upon Pearl Harbor. For more than two years
after that date it seemed to be a reasonable probability that German
warplanes would somehow manage to attack at least a few strategic
centers near the Atlantic Coast in “token” bombing raids by suicide
pilots designed to bolster Nazi morale, if indeed they did not do
vastly more. Such considerations account adequately for the development
throughout the nation of a Civilian Defense organization
which was enormous in respect to the number of its volunteer enlistees
and the millions of hours they served without compensation.

This mobilization was one of the more amazing of all the civilian
activities of the home front. In Charlottesville and Albemarle
County one out of approximately every seven resident adults was
recruited to learn under its aegis a specialized duty and to give valuable
time to the performance of it. The roster of volunteer workers
included, with few exceptions, true patriots who did their “bits”
under conditions sometimes dramatic, sometimes monotonous, almost
always unpublicized. If there was a single man, woman, or child
anywhere in the community whose life was not directly affected or
temporarily altered at least once by the Civilian Defense effort, he
or she has not yet stepped forth to proclaim the fact that blackouts
and other manifestations of this inclusive program did not cause
him to pause and conform.

It was one of the greatest blessings enjoyed by Americans during
the war that their Civilian Defense forces were never confronted
with the actual test of the feared mass aerial incursions. Yet one
should not conclude from this fortunate fact that preparation for
enemy air raids represented a profligate waste of manpower, for
Civilian Defense proved to be the nucleus of home front activities

from which stemmed groups of trained workers willing to serve
in other valuable phases of civilian mobilization for total war.

In June, 1940, when the Battle of Britain was just under way,
an eleven-man Home Defense Council was organized on their own
initiative by Charlottesville and Albemarle County veterans of the
First World War. Their avowed aim was to prepare their city and
county for “the part they will be called upon to play in providing
adequate defense for our country” and to cooperate in every way
with any other defense councils which might be organized. Members
of this council included Edward V. Walker, J. Callan Brooks,
Robert Kent Gooch, Fred L. Watson, F. D. G. Ribble, Charles P.
Nash, Jr., William S. Hildreth, Ernest Breeden, A. Hewson Michie,
John S. Battle, and Colonel Henry B. Goodloe. This group, acting
for Legionnaires of the city and county, emphasized the fact that it
had no idea of excluding from membership those who were not vet
erans of the last war or members of the American Legion. Police
Justice J. Callan Brooks told members of the Charlottesville Kiwanis
Club on June 17 that the committee had been formed for the purpose
of combatting evils from within and without. Asserting that
America faced her greatest danger, he told his audience, “The skies
are dark and lowering, and we know not where the end will be.
We must meet force with force. What we do must be done at once,
and we must face the future with courage.” He pointed out, reassuringly,
“There is no cause to become jittery,” and he declared his
belief that in the end Hitler would meet “his Waterloo.”[1]

Nearly a year later but more than six months before Pearl Harbor,
in May, 1941, Governor James H. Price appointed Seth Burnley,
Dr. W. D. Haden, and Edward V. Walker of the city, E. L. Bradley,
A. G. Fray, and Dr. L. G.  Roberts  of the county as members
of the Northern Virginia Regional Defense Council, which consisted
of nineteen men who represented an area comprising twelve counties
and several independent cities.[2] Dr. Haden and Randolph H. Perry
became director and assistant director, respectively, of the Charlottesville
and Albemarle Civilian Defense Council, and with their
Advisory Committee they built during the last half of 1941 the
first general organization designed to protect the welfare of the community
in case of wartime emergency.[3] The Advisory Committee
consisted of Louis Chauvenet, Dr. L. G.  Roberts , E. L. Bradley,
A. G. Fray, Seth Burnley, and Edward V. Walker. Committee
and division chairmen included: Communications, J. P. Borden;
Education, James G. Johnson and R. Claude Graham; Recreation,
Miss Nan Crow; Utilities, Raymond Hunt; Disaster Division, Sterling
L. Williamson; Demolition, Jack Rinehart; Food and Clothing,
W. Towles Dettor; Medical, Dr. Harvey E. Jordan; Housing,
W. A. Barksdale; Transportation, E. G. Lee; Publicity, A. W.

Quinn and Charles Barham, Jr.; Civilian Defense Corps Division,
Bernard P. Chamberlain for the county and Charles P. Nash, Jr.,
for the city; Fire Protection, Berlin Eye and Charles R. Carter; and
Police, J. Mason Smith and M. F. Greaver.[4] Miss Mary Stamps
White of “Flordon,” near Ivy, was executive secretary for the Charlottesville
and Albemarle Civilian Defense Council, and Louis Chauvenet
served until the spring of 1942 as the secretary who kept
minutes of its meetings.[5]

During the summer of 1941 a Committee of Civilian Volunteer
Services, assisted by Miss White and Mrs. Milton L. Grigg, registered
all residents of the city and county who wished to volunteer
their services for Civilian Defense. Randolph H. Perry was appointed
by Gardner L. Boothe of Alexandria, Virginia, chairman of
the Northern Virginia Regional Defense Council, to head this committee
for the city, with Mrs. Lyttelton Waddell as co-chairman.
E. L. Bradley of Scottsville and Mrs. J. Gordon Smith of Greenwood
were named chairman and co-chairman, respectively, for the
county. It was stressed that many types of service were necessary
and that no one should fail to volunteer because of a feeling of inability
to perform specialized tasks. On July 12, the first day of
registration, a total of 2,995 persons in the city and county volunteered
their assistance, 2,150 in the county and 845 in Charlottesville.
By December more than 2,000 county and 1,300 city residents
had registered at the local Volunteer Office.[6]

In October, 1941, Charles P. Nash, Jr., and Bernard P. Chamberlain
were appointed co-chairmen in charge of forming a Civilian
Defense Corps in the city and county. This organization, which
later was renamed the Citizens Defense Corps, obtained its authority
from both Federal and state statute. When the 77th Congress approved
Public Law 415 in January, 1942, and the Virginia General
Assembly in February of the same year passed the Commonwealth's
Defense Act, legalizing the state Civilian Defense organization and
giving authority and responsibility for civilian safety to the duly
constituted officers of state and local governments, the Charlottesville
and Albemarle Civilian Defense Council was reorganized and
direction of Civilian Defense in the area was delegated to the governing
bodies of the city and the county. Seth Burnley, Charlottesville
city manager, became coordinator, but under him the organization
which had previously evolved remained almost unchanged.[7]
Even the name of the council was not altered, though corresponding
local councils in many other Virginia communities were renamed
after the fashion of the new State Office of Civilian Defense.

Throughout the autumn of 1941 local authorities proceeded to
organize and to strengthen agencies for the defense of Charlottesville
and Albemarle County, with special emphasis on some which
might render service to other areas of the state and the nation. One

of the strongest and most perfectly-organized medical defense units
in the country evolved under the leadership of Dr. Harvey E. Jordan,
Dean of the University of Virginia Medical School and local Chief
of Emergency Medical Services. Nurses of graduate and practical
status, hospital beds, first aid stations, blood donors, hospital equipment,
hospital staffs, doctors, dentists, laboratories, ambulances,
bandages, dressings, and four Emergency Field Units, composed of
four doctors, four nurses, and four orderlies each, were available to
Charlottesville's medical unit, which was cited by Dr. Albert McGowan,
Chief of the Medical Service, American Red Cross. “Your
organization is to be complimented on the speed in which it has become
a workable body—a speed which puts it far ahead of similar
organizations everywhere, which have been slow in getting down
to business,” he told Dr. Jordan. In order that a list of possible
blood donors might be compiled for an eventual emergency, city
and county residents were urged to have their blood typed at the
local Civilian Defense office. Under the leadership of Mrs. Oron J.
Hale and the medical supervision of several cooperating physicans,
fingers were pricked, a drop or two of blood was smeared on a slide,
and the University Hospital classified each slide by blood type. Donor's
names and blood types were then incorporated into a master
list at the University Hospital, from which donors of needed types
could be summoned should an emergency arise. Mrs. Eleanor Howard
was the first blood donor to have blood typed at the local Defense
office. By September, 1942, many of these volunteers whose
blood had been subject to call in an emergency had actually given
it in advance of any disaster. As is related elsewhere in this volume,
a liquid plasma blood bank was built up at the University of Virginia
Hospital. The official publication of the State Office of Civilian
Defense pointed to this emergency reserve with pride as the one
“which is said to be the largest blood bank in the State.”[8] This
liquid plasma reserve locally maintained is not to be confused with
the Red Cross Mobile Blood Donor service, which later visited
the community to obtain blood for transformation into dried plasma
and shipment overseas.

As a growing need for organization to meet any eventuality
spurred residents of Charlottesville and Albemarle County, together
with other United States citizens, to occupy themselves more and
more with plans for home defense, many persons of this more
favored locality felt it incumbent upon them to offer a refuge for
any Britons who might be able to leave their embattled island.
Few adults would or could take advantage of such an offer, but
numbers of English families entrusted their children to Americans
“for the duration” in the hope that they might be spared suffering
and all-too-possible death from German air attacks. Mrs. Wayne
Dennis, president of the local chapter of the American Association

of University Women, headed the movement in this vicinity.
Twelve local homes had been opened to refugee children by June,
1940. In July a niece and a nephew of Queen Elizabeth of England
arrived at “Mirador,” near Greenwood, estate of Ronald Tree,
British member of Parliament, and the former home of the famous
Langhorne sisters. The children, Simon Bowes-Lyon, eight, and
Davina Bowes-Lyon, ten, son and daughter of Queen Elizabeth's
brother, the Honorable David Bowes-Lyon, were accompanied by
three young cousins, Francis, Anne, and Jeanne Nichols, and their
grandmother, Mrs. H. H. Spender Clay, a sister of Lord Astor,
husband of the former Nancy Langhorne.[9]

In May, 1941, W. Glenn Elliot, director of the Army-sponsored
Virginia Aircraft Warning Service, announced the appointment of
110 organizers throughout the state, including H. P. Campbell of
Charlottesville and N. McG. Ewell of the University. The new
appointees fell to work at once in an effort to enroll 18,000 volunteer
observers in Virginia before June 15. During the summer
and fall of that year Civilian Defense heads urged volunteer registration,
appealing to civic clubs and other groups in the vicinity in
an attempt to swell the roster of those who were willing or able
to give time and service as airplane spotters in case of need.[10]

By the time of Pearl Harbor C. Venable Minor had been appointed
by the Aircraft Warning Service as its area supervisor for the city
and the county. Soon he found in Henry McComb Bush an active
assistant. Together they led the work of more than 1,300
airplane spotters for the duration of the need for this part of the
Civilian Defense program—the phase of it which would, if enemy
raiders were sighted, set in motion the wheels of other Civilian Defense
machinery.

The Japanese bombs which dealt destruction and death at Pearl
Harbor on December 7, 1941, shocked many Americans on the
mainland into a realization that the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans
no longer constituted impregnable defenses for their homes and their
persons. Civilian Defense quarters in Charlottesville—located in
the Early Building on Fifth Street, N. E., and later moved to other
offices in that vicinity—remained open all day on December 8, and
a new drive for aircraft spotters was opened.[11] Recruitment of
volunteers for this necessary but uninspiring service was no easy
task. Other Civilian Defense workers had more active duties to
perform and could look with satisfaction upon the more tangible
accomplishment of their assigned tasks. In contrast, members of
the Aircraft Warning Service were expected simply to stare for tense
hours on end, straining every nerve and muscle in an effort to see,
starting in alarm at every bird which appeared over the horizon.
Moreover, members of other service groups could look forward to
some slight relaxation on holidays, but throughout the city, county,

and nation aircraft spotters stood their ground on Christmas Eve,
Christmas Day, New Year's Eve and Day, and for many weary
months to come. At the University student fire and air raid wardens
planned to keep twenty-four-hour vigil of the Grounds for the
duration of the war.[12] On December 17, 1941, Charles P. Nash,
Jr., as head of the Charlottesville Civilian Defense Corps, announced
air raid warning signals for the vicinity. The alert or preparatory
signal was given at this time by winking of the city's street lights
and by radio announcements, with telephone warnings for defense
organizations and essential industries, while action warnings and
the “all clear” were signalled by the fire house siren, the Barnes
Lumber Company whistle, and the whistle at the University power
plant. Two blasts repeated five times at one-minute intervals constituted
the action warning, while one blast repeated five times at
one-minute intervals announced the “all clear.”[13]

These same signals had been announced to the city as a blackout
warning on December 9, when they appeared in a conspicuous position
on the front page of The Daily Progress. Despite early
precautions, Charlottesville and Albemarle County did not experience
a blackout until March 2, 1942, when the area began to participate
in the all night, every night partial blackouts or dimouts demanded
by Director James M. Landis of the United States Office of Civilian
Defense in a zone reaching 300 miles inland from all coasts. In
preparation for the period of semi-darkness Mayor W. D. Haden
issued specific instructions for all residents of the city, covering activities
of industrialists, owners of business buildings and apartment
houses, and private families.[14]

Although a lunar eclipse took place and snow fell on the night
of March 2, The Daily Progress of the next afternoon quoted local
defense authorities as having said, “Charlottesville's first night of
partial blackout was distressingly bright despite the efforts of nature
to correct man's indifference,” and added that Civilian Defense
Coordinator Seth Burnley had declared this initial effort to be “practically
a 'downright failure.' ” The paper went on to describe the
scene of the night before and to issue a warning to residents of the
city. “Large neon beverage-advertising signs flickered through the
falling snow. Numerous store fronts remained lighted as usual until
automatic switches darkened them near midnight. All of these
lights which could not be extinguished promptly if a complete blackout
were necessary should be turned out when employees leave the
building. The partial blackout is not ended. It will continue tonight
and every night until further notice. If voluntary blackout
is impossible, Mr. Burnley believes that an ordinance will get
results.”[15]

The following day, March 4. City Sergeant and Air Raid Warden
Jack Martin explained to home owners that they need not darken

their homes but should only stand ready to do so should the need
arise. On the same day an enterprising Charlottesville firm advertised
“black-out cloth” in The Daily Progress. “Buy yours now
while the supply lasts,” area residents were counseled. “An ideal
black-out fabric,” it was described. “Dark gray color—a 200 watt
bulb will not show through. It's 30-inches wide and moderately
priced, too!” By March 11 the paper could report, “After nine days
of partial blackout, Charlottesville is learning how to comply with
the regulations which resulted in so much confusion.”[16]

Charlottesville's air raid defenses had been augmented during
the past month by the installation of special telephonic warning
apparatus at city police and telephone headquarters and by three
new air raid sirens. For about two months a room on the third
floor of the Monticello Hotel was used as the local control center;
thereafter a basement room in the post office served in great secrecy
as the spinal cord through which the telephonic nervous system
transmitted all local Civilian Defense impulses to various arms of the
air raid defense service. Faithful volunteers manned the switchboard
there and watched the yellow, blue, red, and white signal
lights which were connected by direct wire with the interceptor
center of the Aircraft Warning Service in Norfolk, Virginia. If
enemy aircraft had been sighted at sea or by airplane spotters of the
Ground Observer Corps or if a practice raid were to be held, the
Norfolk office would notify all localities potentially concerned by
flashing the yellow or caution light. This signal served only to
warn key personnel; the public never knew how often or when this
inaudible alert was flashed. When any community was more specifically
endangered by the proximity of real or imaginary bombers,
a blue light indicated that they were within range. In the earlier
evolution of a system which improved as it developed, the blue
signal was also inaudible to the public, but it meant that the local
control room telephoned many additional Civilian Defense workers
to go to their posts. Soon the blue warning was sounded as a
steady one-minute blast of the sirens for all to hear and served to
send all air raid wardens and other volunteers scurrying to their
respective duties, while the public prepared to douse all lights and
traffic proceeded slowly. The theoretical arrival of hostile planes
within ten minutes' flying time from the locality resulted in the blue
light turning to red and in the fluctuating wail of sirens which put
all Civilian Defense volunteers to work and immobilized the public
under whatever shelter could be found. All lights were then to be
blacked out or extinguished, all traffic should be halted, and the
switchboard of the control room received and transmitted hundreds
of calls in keeping in touch with defense personnel. When immediate
danger had passed, the blue signal was restored lest planes return
and was again sounded by the sirens. The public learned of

the final white light or “all clear” signal, which would permit a
revival of normal activity, only through announcements broadcast
by the local radio station, which was always in close communication
and full cooperation with the control room.[17]

During the early spring of 1942 some residents of Charlottesville
were agog over rumors concerning a mysterious airplane. The
legend stated, approximately, that an unlicensed plane flying in a
suspicious manner was noticed by a spotter on Observatory Mountain.
The wary look-out telephoned a warning to the interception
center, and Army planes, sent up to “blow 'er down,” forced the
wicked-looking craft to land in the Potomac. Investigators then
discovered that the plane contained maps of Waynesboro and Radford,
Virginia, railway trestles, highway bridges, and equipment
and cameras for photographing vital and strategic industries. A
columnist of The Daily Progress pointed out acidly that in rumor
and detective stories investigators always know when cameras and
other supplies are to be used for illegitimate purposes, just as they
know when a plane is flying in a suspicious manner. The true
story, as reported in the same column, was at once more
drab and more credible. An airplane flown by a Gordonsville, Virginia,
pilot crossed over a line marking the western boundary of the
coastal defense areas. A spotter reported the violation of regulations
to Norfolk. An aerial traffic officer ordered the flyer to “pull over,”
checked his credentials, bawled him out for his carelessness, and sent
him home.[18]

Later that spring, however, local and railway police combed the
city and county in an unsuccessful search for saboteurs after an attempt
was made to wreck a train on the Southern Railway within
the Charlottesville city limits near the crossing at Shamrock Road.
Although the train ran unharmed over the obstruction which had
been placed under the tracks, members of the crew noticed the jar
that was caused and notified the railway office, which began investigations
immediately. All employees of the Chesapeake and Ohio
Railway Company were put on the alert against sabotage at the
same time, as a bulletin from the superintendent of its Clifton Forge
Division stated that information “from important sources indicated
that the C. and O. had been singled out for sabotage attempts.”[19]

Throughout the first months of 1942 city and county officials
strove to accelerate Civilian Defense coordination. Both the City
Council and the County Board of Supervisors appropriated funds
for use by local defense authorities, enacted blackout and air raid
regulations, and added legislation designed to prevent the possession
of explosives which might be used for purposes of sabotage. Charlottesville's
three new sirens were tested, to make sure that they could
be heard by all residents of the vicinity, the post office in common
with other places of business and public assembly displayed a chart

showing employees of the building where to go in the basement in
case of an air raid, and sand was distributed through residential
areas of the city for possible use against incendiary bombs. Coordinator
Seth Burnley urged that home owners store buckets of this
sand in the attics of their houses and that they attempt at the same
time to clear attics of inflammable materials.[20]

Private individuals were no less busy than government officials
and defense authorities. Men, women, and children took classes in
such training courses as first aid, aircraft spotting, protection against
incendiary bombs, bomb demolition, and recognition of poisonous
gasses. Cub Scouts learned the names and locations of all important
streets in the city and the locations of hospitals, post offices, police
and fire stations, and railroad and bus depots in preparation for a
possible emergency. Women who would have been afraid to light
a firecracker learned theories of dealing with incendiary bombs, and
men who would have stared helplessly at a splinter in Junior's
finger spoke with authority of “square knots” and “pressure
points.” Householders provided themselves with sand, long-handled
shovels, water buckets, coils of rope, fire extinguishers, and other
defense equipment. Despite the fact that these and other preparations
were the subject of some jesting and levity and did, indeed,
have their humorous aspects, they must be regarded as manifestations
of the firm and cheerful determination to protect their homes
and families against any danger and to win an eventual victory over
all that menaced them which most Americans displayed during the
entire conflict. If they served no other purpose, these home protective
outfits provided psychological armor, so to speak, during harried,
sorrowful days and restless, dream-filled nights. Many an
American, having listened to the late news broadcast from bombtorn
England, reassured himself with thought of the sand and shovel
in his attic as he tossed upon his pillow in the darkness. Many a
woman with a husband or sons involved in conflict staved off loneliness
and dread by throwing herself into defense activities at home.
Residents of Albemarle County and Charlottesville participated in
defense activities on state and national as well as local levels. Randolph
H. Perry was chosen by W. Glenn Elliot, state director, as
one of twelve members of a statewide advisory board for the Virginia
Aircraft Warning Service. Dr. Garrard Glenn. professor of
law at the University, was appointed by the War Department as
one of six lawyers on a fourteen-man Board of Review to report on
applications for quick amortization of defense facilities.[21]

On March 20, 1942, residents of Charlottesville and Albemarle
County awaited the area's first test blackout. Mayor W. D. Haden
ordered full cooperation with municipal and Civilian Defense authorities
in case of blackouts in a special proclamation which announced
regulations for blackouts and penalties for their violation. The Daily

Progress published a series of articles giving information as to procedures
to be followed and the names, duties, and telephone numbers
of Civilian Defense personnel. Local banks reported a problem in
conforming with blackout regulations, since clauses in some insurance
policies require that a light which shall be visible from the street
be left burning above the door of the vault office. A compromise
was finally effected by use of a low-power bulb.[22]

At 9:02 P.M., March 20, the city's three sirens, abetted by
steam whistles atop the Barnes Lumber and University power plants,
wailed the signal for total blackout. Within five or ten minutes
afterward, defense officials surveying the city from the Monticello
Hotel roof were complimented on the Stygian darkness which had
enfolded the city by Midwestern visitors standing beside them. “So
black were blacked-out Charlottesville, Crozet, Scottsville, and
Farmington that Charlottesville's city manager and defense coordinator,
Seth Burnley, jokingly declared this morning that the Army
planes scheduled 'to look us over couldn't even find us,' ” The Daily
Progress reported on the following afternoon. City and defense
officials were high in their praise of the cooperation accorded them
by area residents, and even crime appeared to be blacked out, as only
one arrest, that of a man who appeared to be intoxicated, was made
during the entire night.

A few lights, however, remained unextinguished. Two persons
refused to comply with air raid wardens' requests, and a light,
thought to have been burning for years in the attic of the Elks'
Home, was discovered and finally darkened, while a group of boys
on a side street dealt in a summary fashion with a forgotten bulb
by putting out its gleam with a sling shot. Both the local newspaper
headquarters and the County Office Building had to be told
that their lights were showing, but both remedied the situation
quickly. Red lights continued to shine from a radio tower, and
unofficial sources explained that they were a precaution to prevent
the expected Army pilots from colliding with the steel spire. Officials
estimated the cooperation of Charlottesville citizens at approximately
ninety-nine per cent, while the blackout in Scottsville was
one hundred per cent effective. Charlottesville officials cited as a
typical example of the efficiency of air raid wardens the action of a
Negro warden, Norman Byrd, who found three danger flares burning
beside an open excavation on Sixth Street and doused them all,
standing watch at the site until the blackout ended, when he relit
the flames.[23] One man, charged with deliberate violation of the
city's blackout regulations, was sentenced to serve ninety days in
jail and to pay a fine of $100, and other residents of the city were
warned that infractions of regulations would be punished to the
limit of the law.[24]

Shortly after this trial blackout, Charlottesville's City Manager-Civilian
Defense Coordinator Seth Burnley was advised by the State
Office of Civilian Defense that the Army, in preparing itself for
“token” coastal attacks, might at any time order complete darkening
of all communities within striking distance of the waterfront.
Area residents were counseled to “keep cool” and to carry out the
same procedures observed in practice blackouts. The original three
air raid sirens bought by the city, which had been delivered early
in March, 1942, had been installed atop the Monticello Hotel, north
of University Circle on Rugby Road, and in the Fry's Spring area.
Some residents complained that they could not hear the sirens, and
Civilian Defense officials tried one or two apparently unsuccessful
experiments in the placement of them to assure that their sound
would carry better to the reaches of the city limits. Within five or
six weeks the problem was solved when a fourth siren of great volume
was delivered and installed on the Monticello Hotel, replacing
a strong one which in turn was substituted for the weaker one in
the Fry's Spring section.[25]

Charlottesville's first daylight test air raid, staged on May 29,
1942, was less successful than the March blackout and revealed a
number of weak points in the city's defenses. The realism of the
“raid” was heightened when four Civil Air Patrol planes dropped
missiles on the objectives of the mock attack. The four pilots were
Roy Franke, W. P. Kilgore, C. B. Lewis, and Arthur Eidelman.
This ingenious experiment was thought to be the first use of artificial
missiles in a test air raid drill anywhere in the nation. Upon
the “bombs,” which consisted of long streamers weighted with small
bags of sand, was written information concerning the objectives
bombed and the resulting amount of damage which was supposed to
have been done. Girl Scouts in uniform, labeled with tags indicating
their “injuries,” served as casualties. A surprise squadron
of planes operated by student pilots which accompanied the “raiders”
lent verisimilitude to the scene. Civilian Defense personnel were
alerted for action, and all residents of the city were supposed to be
on guard against “incidents” which would be announced by the
streamers from the circling planes.

Although the defense organization, for the most part, performed
smoothly, the general public acted exactly opposite to the approved
procedure for air raids. Men, women, and children lined the streets
and watched the planes drop their “bombs.” Traffic on Main Street
moved east and west unchecked, despite the fact that wardens in
charge of the Route 29 entrances to the city had halted all automobiles
from the time of the alarm until the “all clear” signal. Residents
made little effort to perform any fire-fighting maneuvers when
messages dropped from the planes declared their homes to be on fire.
The first report which reached the control center came from a woman

who said that her house was full of smoke. Firemen who rushed
to the Oxford Road address actually found a small fire in a sofa.

“Injured” and “dead” Girl Scouts performed their roles with
enthusiasm and some histrionic ability. One girl, lying on a truck,
laughingly refused a photographer's request that she turn her head
a little forward for a picture. “I can't,” she replied, “my back is
broken.” Another, told to lean on her arm for the same photograph,
answered sadly that she could not lean on the designated
arm, as it had been torn off by a bomb! Although the test was less
successful than defense officials had hoped it might be, Defense Coordinator
Seth Burnley pointed out that much had been learned
from the maneuvers.[26]

Residents of Albemarle County and Charlottesville participated
with other Virginians in the first statewide blackout on the night
of June 17, 1942. Local defense authorities had reason to be pleased
with area observances of rules and regulations, and state officials
pronounced the entire operation a success. Two months later, on
August 18, city and county residents for the last time received in
advance definite information about hours of a blackout period and
air raid test. Subsequently it was necessary for them to be on the
alert day and night for the sound of the community's sirens, which
would come without previous warning. Linwood Chisholm, nine-year-old
Negro boy, received minor injuries when he ran into the
street in the course of the August 18 blackout and struck the side
of an air raid warden's car. He was treated for bruised knees at
the University Hospital. Sterling L. Williamson, assistant Civilian
Defense coordinator, expressed surprise that there were no other
casualties, warned pedestrians against remaining on the streets during
blackouts, and stressed the fact that the lighting of matches on the
streets by smokers constituted a violation of the regulations.[27]

As the first year of America's participation in the war drew to a
close, the State Office of Civilian Defense announced in November,
1942, that local test air raids and blackouts were no longer considered
to be necessary and that future blackouts would be arranged on a
wider basis than previously. J. H. Wyse, state Civilian Defense coordinator,
promised that the duration of the next statewide blackout,
which was to come as a complete surprise, would not exceed
sixty minutes. He warned that this blackout would be a rigid test
of the effectiveness of the protective measures of Civilian Defense.

The blackout, which came without warning on December 3, was
termed “highly successful” in Charlottesville. Shortly afterward
Civilian Defense officials appealed to Charlottesville citizens to use
their telephones only in case of necessity during blackouts, as the
local telephone company reported that 6,456 calls came into the
office during the last blackout, of which fewer than 1,000 could
have been calls made by wardens in the regular performance of their

duties. One observer at the telephone office related, “At the first
signal, the entire telephone board lighted up,” and a number of individuals
talked constantly during the entire test, according to operators.
An editorial in The Daily Progress pointed out that thoughtlessness
was responsible for so many calls at a time when lines
should be kept clear for necessary reports of defense officials or to
summon aid in case of an emergency.[28]

As the need continued for twenty-four-hour aircraft warning
service, Albemarle County and Charlottesville opened a drive for
new airplane spotters. Area Supervisor C. Venable Minor outlined
the plan of the service and explained its work. “Despite its weaknesses
the Aircraft Warning System of this county is not a makeshift
plan,” he said. “It has been well thought out and is modeled, with
necessary modifications, after the method which has proved most
successful overseas in warning against attack from enemy planes. It
differs from some of our other types of defense work in that its value
is dependent upon its readiness before the raids occur and not during
or after an emergency.”

Minor emphasized the preventative aspects of Aircraft Warning
Service. “During or after is too late,” he pointed out. “It has no
fixed quota to fill, no goal at which to aim except to be always on
the alert to report to the Army Filter Center anything that flies
which doesn't flap its wings. There is no implication here that aircraft
warning duty is more important than any other defense duty,
but it is just as important and in all likelihood it is more tiresome
and has less glamor attached to it.”

By way of assisting in the recruitment of spotters, one city retail
store displayed in its window a replica of an air raid warning station,
complete with imitation pine wall, old desk, lantern, telephone,
flag, and the usual instructions to watchers, telling them not to talk
to strangers, to speak clearly to the control center, and to be on time
so that previous shifts would not have to work overtime. This
window was left illuminated each night until ten o'clock, with an
outside switch to facilitate extinguishing the lights in case of a
blackout.[29]

Throughout the first two years of the war these members of the
Ground Observer Corps kept watch at twelve to fifteen posts in
Albemarle County and Charlottesville, including Miller School,
Crozet, Covesville, Red Hill, Greenwood, Talcott, University Law
Building, Garth Road, Stony Point, the Henry M. Bush estate,
Earlysville, and Scottsville. A post at Shadwell was discontinued
before the relaxation of Aircraft Warning Service activities, and one
at Monticello was installed in 1943.

Whereas elsewhere in the nation, according to stories prevalent in
current conversation, buzzards and hawks were transmuted into
enemy aircraft by the vivid imaginations of spotters stationed in

lonely places and were duly reported to Aircraft Warning Service
authorities, the only recorded instance of such an occurrence in this
area involved an aural rather than a visual error. A story circulated
that Raymond Uhl, chief spotter at the post atop the law building,
flashed a warning reporting a plane. The Army called back, and
Uhl confirmed his report. But as he replaced the receiver he sighted
the potential raiders—three of the University's motor-driven lawn
mowers coming across the Grounds in V-formation.[30]

The city of Charlottesville gave up its Christmas lights in December,
1942, as the national Office of Civilian Defense announced the
curtailment of such decoration because of “the use of critical materials,
consumption of electric power, and possibility of attack, as
well as to eliminate potential fire hazards.” No attempt was made
to discourage decoration in private homes, provided that any lighting
conformed to applicable dimout regulations.[31]

In the same month Miss Mary Stamps White, executive secretary
of the Civilian Defense Council and chairman of the Volunteer
Special Service Corps of the local chapter of the American Red Cross,
left the country to serve overseas as a Red Cross worker. Commenting
on Miss White's varied and extensive wartime activities, an editorial
in The Daily Progress remarked, “There are in each community
a few who are ready to meet an emergency as it arises or even
to anticipate it. Such a person is Mary Stamps White, who soon
will leave this city to join a Red Cross Club Unit that probably will
take her into or close to the actual battle fronts in some theatre of
this War of Wars. Service is as much a part of Miss White's life
as eating is to the average man or woman. She seems to thrive on
service alone, asking nothing in return but more opportunities to
serve.” To many residents of the community she seemed to typify
the dauntless spirit of the locality and the nation. She was succeeded
in turn by Mrs. Trent Terry, Mrs. Ella Plunkett, and Henry
McComb Bush, the last named of whom took office in September,
1943, and continued to hold it through some two years until the
organization gradually disappeared after V-J Day.[32]

In the early part of 1943 renewed efforts were made to secure
volunteer air raid spotters, as replacements for others whose services
had been lost. All who considered joining in this phase of Civilian
Defense work were reminded that the local ration boards would
readily grant priorities for automobile tires and allot sufficient gasoline
to enable volunteers to make their regular trips back and forth
to observation posts. But these later days of the war brought to
the Ground Observer Corps a more significant development in the
form of aircraft recognition schools. Several local residents went in
turn to Richmond, Virginia, to attend classes of this sort and returned
to instruct the personnel of their respective posts. Other
spotters studied the distinguishing features of hostile and friendly

airplanes in classes taught in Charlottesville and Scottsville. A meeting
of spotters from all parts of the county was held in Scottsville,
where United States Army personnel stressed the need for continuation
of spotter vigilance. Thomas Jefferson's home entered the war
in January, as an aircraft warning observation post was established
at Monticello.[33]

In February Charlottesville sustained another daylight air raid
test. Area blackouts held throughout the spring and summer went
smoothly in both the city and the county, with defense officials generally
pleased with the tests. A number of Charlottesville residents
were guilty of violation of blackout regulations on several occasions,
with the result that arrests were made and fines imposed. Among
these were three local merchants.[34]

Difficulties in hiding lights during blackouts continued to harass
individuals and defense authorities in this vicinity as elsewhere in
the country. George T. Starnes, professor of economics at the University
who served as an air raid warden, reported one knotty problem
in a letter to Chief Warden Jack Martin after a blackout in
April. “Dr. [Jesse W.] Beams tells me they face a real problem at
the Physics building,” he wrote. “When they have to turn off the
current it spoils some very valuable experiments and they have to
start all over again. To hear him talk they are winning the war
over there at the Physics building and I would prefer not to prolong
the war if we can at all avoid it! He says it will cost them
$200.00 and frequently more every time they have to turn off the
juice. Do you have any suggestions as to what might be done to
help them? I suggested that they black the place out but he said
it was impossible to do so.”[35]

In July, 1943, ground observers of the Aircraft Warning Service
were relieved of twenty-four-hour duty, although they were notified
that they must be ready to resume such operations on short notice.
This dispensation was made “on the basis of present enemy capabilities
for air attack.” Vigilance was not abandoned, however,
and tests continued to be made during the remainder of the year,
both by day and at night.[36]

Aircraft spotters throughout the vicinity received honors and
awards for their faithful service rendered during long and often
lonely vigils. Mrs. Harrison Taylor was presented with the Merit
Award Medal, the highest which the Army awarded for airplane
spotting service by civilians, in recognition of her work at the Shadwell
post, where she manned the midnight to 6 A. M. shift unaccompanied,
at all times and in all kinds of weather. A supervisor's
pin and a badge emblematic of 500 hours of service were awarded
to C. Venable Minor, Aircraft Warning Service area supervisor,
while approximately 1,300 members of the Charlottesville and Albemarle

County Ground Observer Corps received service awards in
September, 1943.[37]

Blackouts and air raid tests continued in Charlottesville and Albemarle
County during the winter of 1943 and the spring and early
summer of 1944. In August, 1944, however, the city and the
county, together with other sections of central and western Virginia,
were exempted from participation in future blackout tests.
Civilian Defense organizations were not demobilized, despite this
relaxation of duties, but were ordered to hold themselves in readiness
for calls to duty if they were needed and to keep their equipment
in shape for any emergency. Issuing the stand-by order, John
J. Howard of the State Office of Civilian Defense congratulated Charlottesville
and Albemarle defense workers on their accomplishments.
“I want to take this opportunity to thank you for the splendid
work accomplished by you and the people of Charlottesville,” he
wrote in a letter to Coordinator Seth Burnley.[38]

In December, 1944, the Charlottesville and Albemarle County
Civilian Defense Council was alerted for the last time, as Governor
Colgate W. Darden, Jr., asked that all such councils remain on
guard against a possible enemy attempt to launch V-2 robot bombs
from off-shore vessels against residents of the eastern United States.
No such attempt was made, however, and the alert ended without
action. The community had had its last blackout, its last air raid.
All possibility of danger from Europe ended with Germany's capitulation
on May 8, 1945, when Charlottesville's sirens were sounded
as a signal of victory. On May 17 Mayor Roscoe S. Adams issued
a proclamation rescinding all city regulations for the conduct of
blackouts in Charlottesville, three years and four months after Mayor
W. D. Haden had promulgated the regulations on January 5, 1942.[39]

Throughout the entire duration of the conflict Charlottesville and
Albemarle County had reason to be proud of area residents as a
whole and of individuals and groups throughout the community.
Civilian Defense in England included participation in actual conflict,
fighting fires, administering first aid to the wounded, demolishing
bombs, clearing rubble, saving lives, and preserving property.
It constituted an actual defense of the homeland. Civilian Defense
in America consisted of the routine performance of tiring and frequently
irksome duties not actually demanded by immediate emergency.
Its volunteers were motivated only by the knowledge that
the practice might, on some occasion, prove useful. Civilian Defense
in America rarely seemed heroic to those who took part in it or to
those who were defended. Yet who can say that the raw stuff of
which heroes are made was lacking in these members of the various
Civilian Defense corps? They were called and they answered. They
did all that was asked of them. Of what group anywhere can more
be said? They manned their posts and walked their beats unswervingly

through rain and snow, through heat and cold, despite the
fact that they knew they probably could waver in the performance
of the task without bringing direct harm to a single individual. With
only a sense of duty to urge them on, they continued their work
until victory had been assured. Surely, though no bomb more
deadly than a small sand-filled sack fell on the city, though no plane
more alien than one from a nearby county was spotted, though no
unusual danger lurked in the blackouts, the Civilian Defense workers
of Charlottesville and Albemarle County belong to the gallant
company of those who have been tested and have stood the test.