THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, November 9, 1995 TAG: 9511080186
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY PHYLLIS SPEIDELL, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: FRANKLIN LENGTH: Long : 164 lines
SWAPPING STORIES on the porch of their homeplace, Lucy Pope's boys are a half century and thousands of miles away from the air raids and jungle warfare of World War II.
Time and distance may soften the memories, but the Pope brothers, now in their 60s and 70s, still remember the war's impact on their until-then-peaceful lives.
Beginning in August 1943, the five oldest of Lucy and James Pope's seven children were drafted, one by one, into the military and scattered from France to Pearl Harbor. ``We did not know if anyone would return - come back in one piece, or come back in a box,'' Olie Pope said. The anxiety led to a nervous breakdown for Lucy Pope.
``Mama was always praying over us, worrying that some of us might not come back,'' Johnie Pope said.
Almost miraculously, all the Popes survived the war intact.
The Pope brothers - Raymond, Jimmie, Rufus, Olie and Johnie - along with their sister Mary and baby brother Alphonso, were raised on a farm in Newsoms, where the five oldest went to school together in a one-room schoolhouse.
``We did what brothers do,'' Johnie Pope said. ``We would run, play ball, seek and hide, and go opossum hunting.''
The family moved to Pine Street in Franklin in the early 1940s, when James Pope gave up farming. The boys went to work and helped their father pick up odd jobs until they were drafted.
The Popes served their time proudly, but their war stories have less to do with dashing heroics than with the nitty-gritty chores of keeping a military force supplied and moving. Back in the early 1940s, the military was almost wholly segregated, and a black draftee had few options.
The Navy had moved toward integration near the end of World War II, but it was not until President Harry Truman signed an executive order in July 1948, that all the armed forces were officially desegregated.
The Pope brothers, like most other black enlisted men without a good education, spent their service time behind the lines as cooks, stewards, truck drivers and switchboard operators. ``That was real life, and we accepted it,'' Olie Pope said.
He was, at age 18, the first of the brothers to be drafted, in August 1943. He opted for the Navy. ``There, you had a nice place to sleep, between clean sheets at night, instead of laying in the woods someplace,'' he said.
After basic training that included self defense but no combat drills, Olie Pope was shipped out to Southampton, England, where he was assigned as a steward in a former hotel that had been converted into an officers' quarters. ``We waited on tables, made beds and cleaned quarters,'' he said.
When air raid sirens wailed through the night, officers and stewards alike would dash to the basement shelter. ``But we had this one chaplain who was always the first one down, no matter how I tried to beat him there,'' Olie Pope said with a laugh.
Pope soon ran headlong into some British misconceptions about African Americans. ``One of my mates had gotten into a little fight and had to go to the hospital, where one of the nurses told him, `I thought you had pink blood,' '' Olie Pope remembered.
After initial misgivings about the black servicemen, the British treated Pope and his buddies cordially. Although he had a hard time with the British accents and currency, Pope developed an appreciation for fish and chips, British stout and the local pubs. One night in England, Olie Pope was surprised by a visitor - his brother Rufus, on his way to France with the Rolling 664th.
Rufus Pope had been working as a laborer in the shipyard in Portsmouth when he was drafted just a month after his brother Olie. ``I could not get into the Marines, and I could not swim, so I ended up in the Army quartermaster corps driving trucks,'' Rufus Pope said.
While his brother got the clean sheets, Rufus Pope slept wherever he could put a blanket, on the ground or in a truck.
Although he never saw actual combat duty, Rufus Pope survived the Battle of the Bulge in France. He delivered troops, supplies and ammunition to the front lines. The drivers were shelled, strafed and bombed as they dodged their trucks around mines day and night with only 72 drivers for 48 trucks.
``I never wanted to be up front with a gun,'' he said. ``Getting up there in the truck was good enough.''
On the other side of the world, Jimmie Pope, drafted into the Navy in December 1944 as a steward's mate, was stationed on the USS Saratoga in Pearl Harbor. His worst memories focus more on the angry seas than the threat of attacks.
``When the ship ran into stormy weather, it would be rockin' and water would be flying everywhere,'' Pope said. ``Everything would be tied down and everyone else would be seasick.''
In January 1945, just weeks after brother Jimmie was drafted, Johnie Pope, still a student at Hayden High School in Franklin, was drafted into the Army. He was sent to Fort Ord in California for training as a rifleman with an all-black infantry unit. ``I was trained to kill, not to cook,'' he said.
Johnie Pope remembers listening closely to war reports and trying to pinpoint where his brothers were and where the worst fighting was taking place. ``If I knew none of them was there, I just laid back and relaxed,'' he said.
By the time he had finished basic training and was shipped out to the Philippines, the war was almost over. His was a replacement unit, and Pope was sent first to Manila and then to several islands not far from Australia before landing in Okinawa, Japan, as part of the occupation forces for eight months. He spent his hitch operating a switchboard and clerking in a PX.
The oldest Pope brother, Raymond, was the last one to be drafted and went into the Army as a cook in April 1945. Raymond Pope, who was killed in an automobile accident in 1978, was also the only Pope brother to remain stateside for the duration of his service.
Meanwhile on the homefront, sister Mary was still in high school and caring for their mother while little brother Alphonso was just young enough to miss the draft. ``I had to do all the chores after they left,'' he said with a glance at his chuckling older brothers.
In 1951, Alphonso left Hayden High School, enlisting in the Air Force rather than face a draft into the Army with a probable trip to Korea. Since the 1948 desegregation order, more opportunities had opened to black servicemen and Alphonso Pope enjoyed a 20-year military career far different from what his brothers could have attained.
Trained in administrative work, Pope was never sent to Korea but became part of a Strategic Air Command group in Rapid City, N.D. ``It was prestige, all spit and polish,'' Pope said. ``But Rapid City was so boring I volunteered for Vietnam.''
In the almost 50 years since the older Pope brothers were discharged from active duty, they have married, raised children, and settled in Franklin, Portsmouth and Maryland. They found work in the shipyards, on military bases, or in construction.
The years the Popes gave to serve their country seem to have galvanized their family ties.
When the family gathers, often at the old Franklin homeplace where sister Mary Green still lives, the decades seem to drop away.
Calling each other by the family nicknames they have used since childhood, the brothers bring out the old family stories and tease each other as easily as teenagers.
``The greatest thing is that we all came home without a scratch,'' Olie Pope said. MEMO: WHERE THEY ARE NOW
Alphonso ``Bud'' Pope, 64, lives in Franklin. He is married and has
six children.
Johnie ``Doc'' Pope, 69, lives in Franklin. He is widowed and has
five children.
Olie ``Teeny Tiny'' Pope, 71, lives in Abingdon, Md. He is married
and has nine children.
Rufus ``Pug'' Pope, 73, lives in Prentis Park, Portsmouth. He is
married and has one son.
Jimmie ``Dick'' Pope, 75, lives in downtown Portsmouth. He is widowed
and has four children.
Raymond Pope, the eldest, would now be 77. He was killed in an
automobile accident in October 1978, in Franklin.
ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by MICHAEL KESTNER
Left to right, Jimmie, Alphonso, Olie, Rufus and Johnie Pope gather
around the kitchen table at their sister Mary Green's house in
Franklin, where they swap war stories.
Staff photo by MICHAEL KESTNER
Left to right, Olie, Johnie, Rufus and Jimie Pope display
photographs of themselves in uniform, taken during World War II.
Photos
In 1943, Olie Pope enlisted.
Raymond Pope, an Army cook.
Jimmie Pope was drafted into the Navy in 1944 as a steward's mate.
KEYWORDS: WORLD WAR II by CNB