In December 1942, a year after the U.S. had joined World War II, Millie Dunn Veasey saw posters urging women to join the U.S. Army, but they all featured white women in uniform.
“I thought to myself that if those white women can do it, so can I,” Veasey told the Army News Service in an interview. “And besides that, my country needs me.”
So that year, after graduating from high school, Veasey enlisted in the Army. She went on to serve overseas in the only all-female and all-Black battalion during World War II. Veasey, who was believed to be one of the last living members of the battalion, died on March 9, 2018, after just turning 100 on Jan. 31.
Her niece, Elsie Thompson, told WUNC that her aunt’s “heart was tired.” Haywood Funeral Home in Raleigh said on its website that Veasey will be buried Monday at Raleigh National Cemetery.
