CRANSTON GIRL, MUSCATINE MAN, ON HONOR GUARD
Lieut. Virginia Misel WAAC, and Ralph Kneese See FDR
Muscatine, Ia. -- Lieut. Virginina H. Misel, Cranston, in the WAACs, and Pvt. Ralph Kneese, Muscatine, Camp Robinson, Ark., had honor positions when President Roosevelt visited their camps recently.
[excerpt]
Lieut. Misel, commander of the 18th company, Ft. Oglethorpe, Ga., had written her parents: "We were told that Col. Hobby was to be here two days and my company would lead the review. In the evening there was a reception at the officer's club at which we met Col. Hobby and her personnel of the war bond writers.
"The next day my company was ordered to Park headquarters to act as an escort to some one, we didn't know who. We were told that we had been carefully selected for capability and dependability. Half an hour later we were told to escort the commander-in-chief. Later we led another parade which President Roosevelt reviewed.
"There was a complete circle of FBI men around the post since Friday and no one could leave without permission. When the president arrived 100 soldiers were on guard and 10 FBI men on the side of his car with about a dozen open army cars with men with machine guns. We were only four paces from the presidential car and as the band played the national anthem, presented arms."
Source: Quad City Times, April 25, 1943
WOUNDED IN ACTION.
PVT. RALPH OTTO KNEESE—Clay Kneese, Grand Hotel, was advised on Dec. 22, that his son, Pvt. Otto Kneese, had been wounded in action in France on Nov. 17. The seriousness of Pvt. Kneese’s condition was not disclosed. Pvt. Kneese was a sharp-shooter with an infantry division and had been in France for several months.
Source: Muscatine Journal and News-Tribune, Dec. 29, 1944
Ralph Otto Kneese was born Apr. 8, 1924 to Clay and Louise E. MacLaughlin Kneese. He died Nov. 23, 2001 and is buried in Saint Andrews on the Hill Episcopal Church Garden, Canton, NC.
Source: ancestry.com
