Easter Posey

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 the incendiary bomb manufacturing line at Huntsville Arsenal.

Background

Born in Lincoln County, Tennessee, on Easter Sunday, Posey was named for the holiday. She was one of 18 children in her large family.

Huntsville Arsenal

In 1941, the United States Army's Chemical Warfare Service decided to open a chemical munitions manufacturing and storage facility in Huntsville, Alabama. Prior to that, there was only the 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 military draft, the arsenal decided to use women wherever possible. The first were hired in February 1942.

Easter Posey and her sister, Stacey, were attracted by the relatively high pay for work at the Arsenal, and both began on March 16, 1942.^[1] Easter was already engaged to be married.

The accident

On April 21, 1942, the Posey sisters were assigned to a plant that produced four-pound incendiary bombs. Easter was assigned to a mixing machine, while Stacey worked on a filling machine. At about noon that day, an explosion took place, causing a fire inside the building. Easter Posey was the only fatality; her sister was severely injured and spent the rest of the year in a hospital.

Due to the nature of the work at the arsenal, the accident was not made public at the time.

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

Memorial

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

References