In 1989, Cathy and I returned from Germany and were stationed in the Washington DC area, at a small post called Arlington Hall Station. I was talking on the phone with Dad one day and mentioned Arlington Hall to him. There was silence for a second and then he said “Arlington Hall? Hmmmm….I think I’ve been there”. I answered back “I dunno Dad, it’s pretty podunk, I doubt that you were here. You’re probably thinking of Ft Meyer or maybe Ft Belvoir.” He didn’t say anything more at the time.

A few months later, Mom and Dad were visiting and we were driving around town. I took them past Arlington Hall, so they could see where I worked. As we stopped at the gate, Dad looked around and then said “Yep, I was here. It must have been 1944…. No, I think it was late winter or early spring of ‘45. I was here with two WACs (two members of the Women’s Army Corps).” What?!? Dad started telling the story…

After being shot three times in Sicily in 1943, he rehabbed in North Africa for several months. Due to the severity of his wounds, he wasn’t returned to combat and eventually shipped back to the States in 1944. There, he was stationed at Camp Butner, North Carolina. Dad was able to secure weekend passes pretty easily, and made his way to Washington DC at least a couple of times.

Sometime in March or April of ‘45, he had a pass, and again caught the bus to DC with a buddy. In DC, they became separated, and Dad made his way to a bar near the Capitol. As he was having a drink, he met two young women who were members of the Women’s Army Corps (WACs) and they started talking. Dad danced with each of them a couple of times. After a while, he suggested to one of them that they go for a walk, and she agreed, telling her friend she’d be back in awhile.

Now what both of them were really looking for, was a bit of privacy. Something you may not have noticed if you are just a tourist to DC, is that there is a lot of greenery surrounding our nation’s Capitol. Dad escorted the young lady to the Capitol, where they found some privacy among the bushes and became “more intimate”. I’ll leave the rest to your imagination, just as Dad did for me.

Eventually, they returned to the bar, and rejoined the other young woman. The night wore on, and after more dancing, the WACs had to return to their barracks. Leaving the bar, Dad flagged a cab and the three of them hopped in. The driver asked “where to?” and one of the WACs answered “Arlington Hall”. They eventually arrived at the Gate, and due to security, the cab wasn’t allowed to go any further.

Dad got out of the cab, and the girl that had stayed at the bar got out first, while the other stayed in the cab. Dad and she talked for a bit, and then they kissed goodnight. After girl #1 walked through the gate, girl #2 got out of the cab. She and dad had a somewhat more extended goodby, before she too walked through the gate, and gave him a wave goodby. The next day he caught the bus back to North Carolina and as with most WWII liaisons, they never saw each other again…

At the time, I dug around a bit, but couldn’t find out much about WACs at Arlington Hall. I found a reference to the “28 Acres of Girls” at Arlington Farms, but nothing about Arlington Hall. It’s only recently that I learned more about the women stationed there.

It turns out there were around 1,000 WACs stationed at Arlington Hall during the war, and they were there for one purpose. They were part of a classified, Top Secret effort, focused on codebreaking of the German and Japanese codes. Most of the women were cryptanalysts focused on the Japanese Imperial/Diplomatic Code known as “Purple”. The women were sworn to secrecy, on pain of death if they revealed anything. If anyone asked what they did, they were told to say that they were secretaries and doing menial work. As one lady said later, “If we went out in public and were asked what we did, we were to say we emptied trash cans and sharpened pencils.” One group agreed that “if anybody ordered a Vodka Collins when they were out at a bar together in Washington, that would be their signal that a stranger was showing too much curiosity about their work, and they were all to disperse to the ladies’ room and then flee.”

During the war, women made up well over half of all codebreakers in the US. When the war ended, the number of WACs stationed at Arlington Hall was severely reduced, but they didn’t disappear altogether. The work they did at Arlington Hall Station eventually morphed into our current National Security Agency (NSA).

The reason that I couldn’t find anything about this back in 1989, is that much of their work was still classified. It wasn’t until almost 60 years after the war ended that details of the Arlington Hall “Code Girls” were declassified and became public. Not surprisingly, the involvement of the women was minimized in previous accounts of WWII codebreaking efforts.

So, that’s the rest of the story about Dad and the two WACs. As most of you know, I love it when family history intersects with big history. I laugh a bit thinking of dad looking for a private spot in the bushes surrounding the Capitol, and then kissing both ladies goodnight back at Arlington Hall. He passed away before most of the information on the “Code Girls” became public, or before I found out anything about them. I wish I could have a conversation with him now to get his retake on that night. I’m sure Dad’s interest was purely in the women themselves, and I doubt that anyone felt the need to order a Vodka Collins. If he only knew….

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Addendum:

* Note: WACs – the Women’s Army Corp – prior to integrating women into the Army in 1948, WACs were an auxiliary active duty unit. The WACs were first formed in 1942.

If you want more info on the Code Girls, or Arlington Hall Station, try the following books and websites:

⁃ The book, “Code Girls”, published in 2017, by Liza Mandy is excellent and I can’t recommend it enough. The quote in the text about the Vodka Collins signal was from this book. Special thanks to my cousin, Janice Connel, for introducing me to the book.

⁃ http://lcweb2.loc.gov/master/pnp/habshaer/va/va1500/va1560/data/va1560data.pdf provides more info on Arlington Hall in general, including the time both before and after WWII.

⁃ https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/10/10/the-secret-history-of-the-women-code-breakers-who-helped-defeat-the-nazis-215694 is a Politico article with info on Women Codebreakers during WWII in general. It also quotes from Mandy’s book.