kellycol1009

The Washington Post

Brenda DeFelice

Michele Banks

handout

Squirrel photo contest 2023

Student activities at University of Maryland

University of Maryland University Archives

Garbage battle in DC

John ReVeal

NFL-Washington Redskins at Philadelphia Eagles

Local architecture 

© Dennis Brack/Black Star. National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gallery Archives

squirrel-week

Tastee Diner closing

Super Giant stores

Reprinted with permission of the DC Public Library, Star Collection © Washington Post

Author Mike Sacks

Danielle Deschenes and Daphne Sacks

Panther mural

Last Supper

Joe Graf

Jimmy Carter solar

Window art display

Follow section front redirects in Spectrum

Enable NLP source in PCS for load testing

Switch off the News Alerts Survey Widget when we have enough responses

Poll to determine if new LUF updates are available

Allows the winning A/B test variant to be turned on without Spectrum deployment

Show infinite scrolling sections in Assembler MultiView

Show option for NLP article summaries in Action Bar

A general feature flag for Recipe Features that aren't yet released

Feature flag for media team features that aren't yet released

Use new Orca video player for preroll plugin in Spectrum

Show the snow tracker (instead of the heat tracker) on Spectrum

Nationals sweep away the Marlins to get back to .500

Jayden Daniels is latest in Washington’s checkered history of first-round QBs

The Rangers swept the Capitals, and it’s time for the new core to take charge

Americans are sleeping more than ever. See how you compare.

Parenting in Gaza today is so much more than keeping your children alive

In photos: Flash floods kill over 100 people in Kenya

Trump and allies say Biden pays rent for ‘illegals’ in Michigan. Not true.

Eighty percent of Ukraine-Israel bill will be spent in U.S. or by U.S. military

Facts in the Trump courtroom v. ‘facts’ in the court of public opinion

Southwest passengers now get a $75 voucher for big flight disruptions

The Rick Steves guide to life

The sad, stale state of in-flight vegetarian meals

I learned to heal my sadness by cradling dying chickens 

Brave Little Hunter is free: Baby orca escapes lagoon for open seas

Soldiers reunite with their pets from overseas: ‘It meant everything to me’

Miss Manners: Some audience members ask rambling questions post-lecture

Carolyn Hax: Her family left all the kitchen work to her, so she went on strike

Ask Amy: Why did my friend lie about seeing my ex-girlfriend?

Apple banned this app for years. It’s now America’s No. 1 iPhone app. 

8 major newspapers join legal backlash against OpenAI, Microsoft

Fired Google workers who protested Israel deal file complaint with labor board

Attorney general moves to reclassify marijuana as lower-risk drug

Poll shows how RFK Jr.’s appeal to anti-vaccine right could hurt Trump

Views of the campus protests are too broad — and too narrow

A murder plot that cannot be ignored: India must come clean at last

How to confront antisemitism, deal with protests — and respect free speech

Is student loan debt an emergency? Take our quiz.

The FBI director’s concerns over terrorism are at ‘a whole other level’ 

U.S. campus protests spread to the Middle East and Europe  

Biden is letting Assad off the hook, with dangerous consequences

Trump Hush Money

On June 10, 1944, 2nd Lt. William H. Wallace Jr., a pilot in the U.S. Army Air Forces, ordered his crew to bail out of the B-24 Liberator he was desperately trying to keep airborne. They were over China and their mission — the 11th commanded by Bill Wallace — had taken them to the Yangtze River, where the eight-man crew had bombed Japanese shipping.

But now their plane was low on fuel, engines sputtering, with no airfield in sight. Witnesses on the ground later said they saw seven people jump from the bomber, seven parachutes open and seven airmen float to safety. The chute of the eighth man — Bill Wallace — didn’t open.

Five months later in Dallas, Bill’s widow, Ernestine, gave birth to their daughter, Judy.

“He told my mother that he had not told his crew that she was expecting,” Bill’s daughter, Judy Goodman Ikels, told me.

In a letter home, Bill had explained that he didn’t want anyone to question his authority in a crisis, to worry that the 25-year-old expectant father might be distracted by thoughts of home.

As Judy grew up, Bill was both an absence and a presence in her life.

“Children don’t really understand death,” said Judy, 78, a retired State Department employee who lives in Bethesda, Md. She knew of Bill, of course. Growing up in Texas, she saw his parents — her paternal grandparents — every week.

“But they didn't talk about Bill very much,” she said. “It was a great grief for them.”

Her mother remarried, to Sandlin Goodman. He adopted Judy, who grew up an only child. Judy went to college, married Larry Ikels of the U.S. Information Agency, was posted to countries such as El Salvador, Mexico and Greece, and had two children.

Then one evening in 2015, Larry said, a curious message had come into their joint email account. Someone was looking for relatives of Ernestine Goodman, whose first husband had died in China during World War II.

Patrick Lucas

The email was from Patrick Lucas, an American living in Beijing who shared stories of veterans who fought in the China-Burma-India theater of war on his Remembering Shared Honor website, <a href="https://rshonor.net/" target=_blank>rshonor.net</a>.

“He told me, ‘I never dreamed in my wildest dreams that I would actually find Bill’s child,’” Judy said. “He was just hoping for a second cousin.”

That shot-in-the-dark email inspired Judy to learn more about her father’s life, to travel to China and visit the place of his death, and to write the new book <a href="https://deathinwartimechina.com/" target=_blank>“Death in Wartime China: A Daughter’s Discovery.”</a>

The C-B-I is often overlooked when remembering World War II. It had unique challenges, mainly getting men and materiel there in the first place.

After completing flight school, Bill had to fly a B-24 on a punishing journey that took him to Brazil, across the Atlantic Ocean to Africa, up to India and then through the Himalayas to southern China. The trip was known as both “flying the hump,” for the vertiginous mountains that had to be crossed, and “following the aluminum trail,” for the aircraft wreckage scattered along the way.

After Bill had made it to his 308th Bomb Group base near Kweilin, he wrote to Ernestine: “I think our work here is going to be much as we thought it would be. By that I mean not too dangerous and effective as the devil. I don’t really see how a man could ask for a better chance to help win a war.”

When Bill’s plane crashed, Chinese villagers hurried to the site, hoping to find him alive.

“When they found him dead, they stayed with his body until the Army could send up horses to bring him down to the base,” Judy said. In 1947, the lieutenant’s body was repatriated and interred at Arlington National Cemetery.

In 2006, nine years before he’d connected with Judy, Lucas had spearheaded the installation of a memorial on the spot where Bill Wallace’s body was found. In 2016, he took Judy and her husband to visit it. They were greeted by villagers who expressed gratitude for the sacrifice Americans such as Judy’s father made during World War II.

“I just felt in my bones I had to get there,” Judy said. “I had to stand on that spot where he was found and where someone had taken the time and trouble and money to put up a memorial. I had to thank those people.”

“Death in Wartime China” was published last year. Judy dedicated it to her husband, who died in 2018 at age 74.

Judy has explored whether her father deserves a Medal of Honor for keeping the plane aloft while his crew bailed out. That honor seems unlikely, given that there are no living witnesses to his heroism. She now thinks his actions merit a Distinguished Flying Cross and is conducting more research with that in mind.

“If we get an award for Bill Wallace, I am throwing the biggest party,” she said.

I asked Judy what went through her mind on that cold February afternoon when she arrived at the white limestone marker that honors, as its inscription reads, “A young hero who knowingly exchanged his life redeeming seven others.”

Said Judy: “I just collapsed right there. I just sat down at the base of that memorial and cried. It had been 70-some years of wondering.”

Nieman Fellow, 1998

Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism Fellow, 2007

Two-time winner, "Journopalooza" Battle of the Bands

University of Maryland, BA in English

John Kelly writes John Kelly's Washington, a daily look at Washington's less-famous side. Born in Washington, John started at The Post in 1989 as deputy editor in the Weekend section.

John Kelly

washpost

'Death in Wartime China': A hero pilot and his daughter

the-washington-post

Family photo

The District

Maryland

Virginia

Crime & Public Safety

Local Education

Obituaries

Transportation

Capital Weather Gang

D.C., Md. & Va.

Fast, informative and written just for locals. Get The 7 DMV newsletter in your inbox every weekday morning.

The Washington Post offers breaking local news, weather and traffic information for the DC, Maryland and Virginia metro areas, plus information about school districts, crime, government, religion, the lottery,restaurant reviews and obituaries.