Private Bernard Ralph Douglas was born in Pensacola on June 4, 1923, the son of Anderson M. Jr. (1894) and Clara Douglas (1899). His father had been in the transfer business for years as a driver and soon owned his own company at 403 South Baylen Street. His father also served in the Army during WWI as a musician with overseas duty from April 1918 to February 1919. He worked his way up to "band leader" just before embarking back to the states. His father had learned an appreciation for music from his own father Anderson Sr., who used to play himself for the "Wilkie Douglas Orchestra" as a band leader.
In the meantime, Bernard had left high school after two years and had gone to work for the Coca-Cola Bottling Company at 1600 North Palafox Street sometime before 1942. His mother had passed away sometime between 1930-1935 and it was now only he and his father. But as the war progressed, America called upon her citizens to answer the call to arms. In reply, Bernard enlisted in the US Army on February 10, 1943 and was sent to Camp Blanding, Florida for induction and processing. Prior to his enlistment. there were statistically very few African Americans serving in the military. And when they did serve, they were usually assigned to segregated divisions and often given combat support roles, such as cooks, quartermasters or grave-digging duty. But because of protests against the Army's racial policy, the military began to deploy minority servicemen to more traditional military roles beginning in 1943.
After his initial induction, Bernard was assigned to the newly activated (January 1943) 41st Signal Construction Battalion at Camp Forrest, TN. This camp was used as a training area for signal organizations such as the 41st. These signal construction battalions were charged with construction, installation. repairing, and maintaining communication through open wire pole lines. By November 9, 1943, the battalion was in found in and around the town of Birch in Essex County, England. Slowly, the battalion's companies spread out throughout the surrounding counties of Glouscestershire, Oxfordshire, Yorkshire, Cambridgeshire, and Buckinghamshire. After the famous landing at Normandy, signal companies shipped out of Southampton on LST's and disembarked in France. They they moved inland where they witnessed the extreme ravages of the intense fighting.
From this point on, the exact location and cause of death of Private Bernard Ralph Douglas on December 9, 1944 becomes fuzzy. Records reveal the young man died of "non-battle" causes of which there is a multitude of ways that this could have taken place. But regardless, we do know that on December 9th, his unit was somewhere in Germany just seven days prior to the famous attack on December 16th that became known as the Battle of the Bulge. Another point to consider is that he may have been returned to England for other causes by that time and may not have been with his unit in Germany. In the meantime, Bernard was buried in the Henri Chapelle Cemetery in Belgium where he rests today among the other heroes of WWII. One day, maybe further information will surface, or his family will come forth to assist.
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