Local women remember service with pride

Among the Veterans Day services in the U.S. capital today, one will be near the entrance to Arlington National Cemetery, at the Women in Military Memorial. The service will be dedicated to the nearly 2 million women who have served in this country's defense.

One who served is U.S. Navy Capt. Alicia Foley -- a retired Navy nurse. Her 26 years' service included the National Medical Center at Bethesda, Md., and the Naval Air Station in Jacksonville. Foley, 84, recently visited that memorial aboard a Volusia Honor Air flight from Daytona Beach.

But today she will probably spend the day with other retired military service friends at John Knox Village, who are among the few who know that along the way Foley earned the Bronze Star while serving in Vietnam.

And former Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Jean Morgan Williams of Port Orange will probably celebrate her service with the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3282 of Port Orange. The 85-year-old cannot be a full member -- only auxiliary -- because during World War II, she filled a military job stateside to free a male sailor to serve overseas.

Here are their stories:

CAPT. ALICIA FOLEY

Foley, who served as assistant chief nursing during the Vietnam War, shared an inside joke with her chief nurse about why their shared quarters in Vietnam were positioned on the hospital's perimeter.

Foley"We were senior nurses, and I thought if the Viet Cong took one look at us, they'd turn on their heels and run back into the jungle," Foley quipped during a recent phone interview.

But there was nothing funny about serving in Da Nang during that deadly war.

Foley, who attended Mary Immaculate Nursing School (Jamaica, N.Y.,), earned her bachelor's degree from St. John's University and her master's at Columbia University, joined the Navy in 1958 and volunteered for Vietnam combat duty.

In Da Nang she treated patients with everything from malaria and dysentery to war wounds, a good deal of the time under incoming enemy fire. Bunkers were filled with snakes and conditions were difficult. Her job was among the toughest.

"We would have a whole hospital full of patients after the Viet Cong attacked hard," she said. "To make room for the new admissions, we had to evacuate our patients to the Philippines or Japan. We patched up our patients and kept them alive so they could fly. It was like relocating an entire hospital every other day."

Foley said her job included keeping track of those who were leaving, identifying the empty beds and planning the staffing. Foley, who lives now with Parkinson's disease, is modest about her military decorations, which include a Bronze Star with Combat V, earned for valor for the constant performance of duty during her tour in Vietnam.

JEAN MORGAN WILLIAMS

Her father was upset when, as a 20-year-old Ohio State University accounting student, Williams talked her mother into signing for her to enter the Navy WAVES (Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service) during World War II.

Williams"I just wanted to get the war over and get married," Williams said. Her future husband, Preston Williams, was an aviation cadet who had shipped off to China, Burma and India flying B29s. She thought if she served, the war might be over faster.

The Cincinnati native shipped off to Hunter College in New York's Bronx.

"They made you do everything the same as men -- march, stand in the chow line, go to school," Williams said. "I thought my father was strict, but the Navy was really strict."

The WAVES were stationed in a hotel guarded by men.

"We had to log in and out so they would know where we were," she said. "If we went to the movies, they got your name and number, and when you got back, they would call to make sure you got right to your room."

One night she baby-sat for friends who didn't come home until after midnight.

"On weekends we could stay out until 12, but this was a weeknight, and I could only stay out until 10 p.m.," Williams recalled. "I was crying when I got upstairs to my room when they called and I said, 'I couldn't leave their child alone.' They said 'Just forget it.' "

She served at the Bureau of Supplies and Accounts in Cleveland, where she was stationed after basic training.

At the war's end, Williams' late husband of 49 years got out of the military in February 1946. She served until May that year.

audrey.parente@news-jrnl.com

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