The Register-Herald, Beckley, West Virginia

Local News

November 10, 2007

War veterans sharing lives once again

By Mary Catherine Brooks

NEW RICHMOND — Shadric Whitt, 88, and Ernest “Casey” Milam, 90, are sharing their lives once again — this time as roommates at Wyoming Nursing and Rehabilitation Center.

Both grew up in the Mullens area and served in the U.S. Navy during World War II on the USS Clymer.

“He was already in the military,” Whitt explained. “I was part of the ship’s crew. I’d never been on a ship before and didn’t know what to expect. I was part of the deck force and had to do whatever labor needed to be done.

“I was standing on the deck one day and felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around and it was him,” Whitt recalled with a grin.

The two served as radio technicians, part of the ship crew that delivered Gen. George S. Patton ashore on the northwest coast of Africa and Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower to Casablanca.

“We set up their communications,” Milam said, “then went back to the states.”

The pair didn’t stay together for long, but came together for Christmas dinner in 1942 while the ship traversed the Panama Canal.

“We didn’t get to see each other often, but it made me feel better to know he’d been there ahead of me,” Whitt said. “We went through a lot of invasions.

“My oldest daughter is 64 years old now; she was 2 when we saw each other for the first time,” Whitt said — she was born while he was in the military.

He and his wife, Margaret, had eight children. Milam and his wife, Nancy, had three children.

Whitt was a vocational school teacher. He attended college on the G.I. Bill.

“They needed teachers really bad at the time,” Whitt explained. He taught school with a one-year temporary certificate while earning his college degree.

“Back then, that was good pay,” he said.

For a short time, Whitt worked for WHIS, Channel 6, in Bluefield; his dream, however, was to become a pilot.

“I always wanted to fly airplanes,” he said.

After the military, Milam returned to Wyco and went to work in the mines. He retired in 1981.

He still plays bluegrass music to entertain folks at the center and, at one time, wanted to appear on stage at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn.

For years, Milam wore an old railroad engineer’s cap which earned him the nickname Casey for Casey Jones.

“It hung with me all through the service and back to West Virginia,” Milam said.

His children showed off his numerous medals and a letter from President Harry Truman, thanking him for his service in the military.

Today, the numerous medals earned by both men, along with pictures of family, adorn the walls of their shared room.

“We make a good team,” Milam said. “He does the talking and I do the listening.”

— E-mail:

mcbrooks@register-herald.com

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