Easter Posey

Infobox_Person
name = Easter Posey


caption =
birth_date = birth date|1920|4|4|mf=y
birth_place = Lincoln, Tennessee, U.S.
death_date = death date and age|1942|4|21|1920|4|4|mf=y
death_place = Huntsville, Alabama, U.S.
death_cause = Accident
known_for = First American woman to die in line of duty in World War II
occupation = Chemical Warfare Service

Easter Posey (April 4, 1920 – April 21, 1942) was the first American woman killed in the line of duty during World War II. She died in an accidental explosion on an incendiary bomb manufacturing line at Huntsville Arsenal.

Background

Born in Lincoln, Tennessee (near Fayetteville), on Easter Sunday, she was named for the holiday. She was one of 18 children in the family.

Huntsville Arsenal

The United States Army's Chemical Warfare Service decided to create a chemical munitions manufacturing and storage facility in Huntsville in 1941. Prior to the inauguration of the Huntsville Arsenal, there was only one other such facility, at Edgewood Arsenal, Maryland. The Huntsville facility produced colored smoke munitions, gel-type and toxic agents such as mustard gas, phosgene, lewisite, white phosphorus, and tear gas. As male employees increasingly were lost to the draft, the arsenal decided to use women employees wherever possible. The first were hired in February 1942.

Easter Posey and her sister, Stacey, were attracted by the relatively high pay from the Army for work at the Arsenal, and started working on March 16, 1942. [cite web
title = Women at War: Interview with Ms. Stacey Posey
publisher = Redstone Arsenal
url = http://www.redstone.army.mil/history/women/posey.html
accessdate = 2006-09-04 ] Easter Posey was by then engaged to be married.

The accident

On April 21, 1942, the two sisters were assigned to a warehouse that was producing a four-pound incendiary bomb. Easter was assigned to a mixing machine at one end of the warehouse, while Stacey started work on a filling machine in the middle of the warehouse. At around noon, an explosion took place, causing a fire inside the building. Easter was the only fatality; her sister was severely injured and had to spend the rest of the year in hospital.

Due to the sensitive nature of the work at the arsenal, the accident was not publicly reported at the time.

Easter was buried in the cemetery of the Stateline Methodist Church on U.S. Highway 231, just across the border from Alabama.

Memorial

The U.S. Army Missile Command named a recreational area in the Redstone Arsenal complex after Easter Posey in May 1994. The plaque reads "Dedicated to the Women Workers of Redstone and Huntsville Arsenals Who Gave Their Lives in Service to Their Country".

References