The Real "War Babies:" Roanoke and the World Wars

It was April of 1917 when U.S. President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare war on Germany and move America to a war footing not seen since the Civil War, more than half a century earlier. If most Americans were unclear about what the impact would be, equally Roanoke College was uncertain as to how life on campus would be affected as well. 

Roanoke College President John A. Morehead preached calm and caution to his boys. Through the academic year of 1917-18, Morehead advised his charges to follow their consciences, but that there was nothing wrong with staying in college, where they could continue their studies “until ripe for the largest possible usefulness.” 

Meanwhile on campus, the College organized a voluntary military training program and hired a local retired military officer to conduct military drilling and provide instruction. Fifty-four students signed up. By the spring of 1918, as the war intensified in Europe, the U.S. government announced a more formal program for colleges to help. Roanoke was quick to apply and received permission to organize a unit of the Student Army Training Corps, the SATC.

By the fall of 1918, campus life had changed dramatically. The College accepted 121 men into the program, about half of the student body, and instruction and training began in earnest. Four U.S. Army officers and an Army surgeon provided direction, and Roanoke College faculty offered other instruction. The Sections was transformed into their barracks, and the Commons was retitled as the mess hall. The Roanoke College unit was officially a company of infantry with compulsory service, and a commission as an Army officer was the expectation upon completion of the program. 

And then it was over. Allied advances by the late summer and into the fall would turn the tide on the western front, and on Nov. 11, 1918, an armistice was signed. Amidst the celebrations across America, the College company got the word that it would be demobilized at the end of the semester. 

In all, 448 Roanoke College alumni and ex-students saw service in the war. Along with the SATC, 312 served in the Army and Navy, and 15 more in non-military service. Two men were killed in combat and four more died in the service. Ten Maroons received decorations. 

By the spring of 1919, the College struggled to make ends meet. With the demise of the SATC, most of those students elected not to return to school and, as a result, enrollment plummeted. Then President Morehead accepted a call from the Lutheran Church to help with refugee aid in Europe in the aftermath. Biology professor George Peery was tapped by the Board of Trustees to provide leadership while the president was away.

As if the College’s fragile state wasn’t enough, it got worse in the fall of 1919. In the world’s worst-ever pandemic, the influenza outbreak would kill as many as 100 million worldwide, including 670,000 Americans. The College would not emerge unscathed. The flu swept through Salem in the fall and authorities ordered people to shelter in place. The College converted the Ciceronian Debate parlor on the third floor of Miller Hall into an infirmary and did its best to combat this deadly killer. The College lost a freshman, Thomas Cadwalader, to the plague; another student died at Lewis-Gale Hospital in Roanoke later that winter. 

By the spring of 1920, Morehead offered his official resignation. With enrollment struggling, endowment gone, accreditation lost, faculty leaving, the physical plant in disarray and lingering memories of war and flu, Roanoke College was on the ropes. It would have been easy to quit. But the board and Dr. Charles J. Smith, who succeeded Morehead as College president, voted to go on.

Fast-forward 20 years to December 1941. The College was as shocked as the nation as 1942 began. Dr. Smith formed the Morale Committee to keep spirits up and the College focused on the eventual comeback. Faculty volunteered to join the Roanoke-Salem Intelligence Bureau to help the community in their search for spies. Charles Brown, former dean and town mayor, formed a speakers’ bureau and defense library to help educate the public.

Meanwhile, the students formed their own paramilitary campus army. They turned the Sections into “posts” and the Commons returned to its WWI “mess hall” status. Seniors were officers and freshmen naturally became privates in the new order. Drilling and calisthenics became the detail of the day, until at least March when the “play army” seemed to have run its course and the war quickly became more serious and deadly than maintaining the campus defense. Numerous students had volunteered already to join the war effort and the draft claimed many others.

Campus life struggled to keep up; sports were allowed to continue, but with a more limited travel schedule. Social events and parties continued and the May Court offered a most patriotic salute to America. The College did scale back on its much-anticipated Centennial anniversary in June of 1942 as one remarked that “celebrating seemed unpatriotic.” Over the summer, six College faculty and staff — 20% of the College employees — joined the war effort. 

By the fall of 1942, the College benefited from an unanticipated surge in enrollment. Choosing between college and enlistment, this initial wave of Maroons felt a lot more at home in the classroom than the battlefield. The College had encouraged the interest with its “Wartime Education” program, which promised an accelerated three-year course to graduation. College enrollment ballooned to an all-time record of 370 students, including a record number of women, totaling 46. To house the crowd, the College stashed the students in the gym, the Commons, and the infirmary. Even President Smith took in four boarders at his home, “Roselawn.” 

Still, there was a military feel on campus; the College hosted 30 U.S. Army soldiers who the students nicknamed the “Green Hornets.” The College debuted its first ROTC program with 88 students enrolled. Football survived for one more season but played just four games of seven-man teams.

By the spring of 1943, U.S. war efforts had continued to mount. The draft age dropped to 18 for the first time and college deferments proved harder to come by. Numerous students were drafted during the semester and had just a few days to report. With declining numbers, the College called an end to all sports and social events. Even commencement was reduced to just one day to enable parents and family to save on time and expenses to make the trip.

But the most important news was announced in late March; the College signed a contract with the U.S. Navy to house and train a program for naval aviators. The V (Navy College Training) Program would transform the nature of the College for the next year and a half, but also guaranteed the financial survival of the school. Within weeks, the first 105 Navy flyers appeared in Salem.

The Navy had arrived just in the nick of time. Regular enrollment had plummeted to just 50 men and 115 women in the fall of 1943, over 200 below the numbers from the previous fall. The flyers were housed in the Sections, ate in the Commons, and took classes in aeronautics, navigation, and aviation science, taught by Roanoke professors. Each afternoon they were transported to Woodrum Field, an airport that served the Roanoke Valley, to practice. The cohort of 100 men spent six weeks on campus, then another detachment appeared to take their place.

With most of the boys away, the women took over leadership roles across campus. The SGA had its first female officers, and the Brackety-Ack and the yearbook had virtually all women staffs. The paper was full of war-related news and eagerly published letters from the Roanoke College boys at the front. 

By the fall of 1944, enrollment had increased slightly, 71 men and a record 146 women, but the campus seemed almost empty with the departure of the V program the previous August. Still, the students made the best of it. There was plenty to do — volunteering to pick apples, assisting the Red Cross, helping raise money, and assisting the town on numerous scrap drives for metal and newspapers.

By the spring of 1945, news of the war grew brighter and with the growing numbers of returning veterans, GI bill in hand, the campus could celebrate VE day in May with joyous relief. After VJ day in August, the campus boomed with record enrollments. The Brackety-Ack celebrated with its new column “From Khaki to Kampus.” 

And the College remembered, too. Those “War Babies” marched off to war with 36 never to return. President Smith estimated that the College had between 1,100 to 1,200 Maroons in the service between 1941 and 1945. 

To alter slightly the words of our Alma Mater, “they served Roanoke and the country well.”