To all the readers and followers of this project, I want to thank you for coming along with me and Dorance Alquist on this journey. It started back in 2017 for me and 1941 for him.
He was drafted in June of 1941, before the United States had even entered the war; one of the first of his friends to report to Fort Snelling. He was 23 when he left behind his family, his girlfriend and a job at Title Insurance Co. After mustering at Fort Snelling, Dorance was sent to basic training at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. He must have shown natural competency and leadership because they held on to him after training instead of shipping him out.
By the time his 24th birthday rolled around on February 27th, 1942 Pearl Harbor had been invaded and the U.S. had officially entered the war on two fronts. Dip seemed content to remain stationed at Fort Bragg instead of heading overseas.
March 1, 1942
Dear Mom & Dad:
What a birthday! The most exciting & eventful one I’ve ever experienced. Everything happens to me – t’was, on one hand, a very happy day, & on the other hand, a very sad one. In one short & concise sentence this is what happened. I had corporal stripes pinned on me, & I lost my gal – all on the 27th.
Yes, Dorance’s girlfriend (Marian with an “a”) dumped him on his birthday. However, he was not too shook up about it, he maybe even anticipated it with his long absence. He did however, also begin his rise in the ranks at Fort Bragg.
He spent the majority of 1942 at Fort Bragg, eventually achieving the rank of Sergeant and leading basic training himself. But by the end of that year he wanted to achieve something more and prove himself to the Army. He and a few of his friends from Bragg took entrance exams for the Officer Candidate School and were admitted to the school at Fort Sill in Oklahoma by the end of the year.
By his 25th birthday in 1943 he was knee-deep in his accelerated schooling, working to become an Officer in the United States Army.
Sat. Feb. 27, 1943
Dear Mom & Dad –
Hey – that date up there sure looks familiar – if I’m not mistaken I was born on that same day about 25 years ago – am I right? I thought so.
Now for a little surprise for you – it so happens that Dorance is spending this birthday in the hospital. Don’t be alarmed – I’m as healthy as can be now and am getting out Monday. Remember that cold I wrote you about – well I just couldn’t seem to shake it & last Tuesday it just kicked back at me & this is where I landed with fever & Bronchitis. I recovered overnight tho, so I guess all I needed was a chance to rest & let the old health catch up to me. The pace in school is terrific & I was going along from day to day trying to shake this cold – just couldn’t be done – I guess in the end the cold would have shook me. Oh well – this is a nice little vacation from the rat race.
He recovered after missing a week of school and was able to graduate from Sill as a newly minted Lieutenant on April 29 of 1943. One person that had been writing him encouraging letters during the last year was an acquaintance from Minneapolis named Marion Sneen (that’s Marion with an “o”). She recently moved to Los Angeles, California with a friend seeking more adventure and found a faithful pen pal in Dorance Alquist.
Imagine both of their surprise when Dip was sent from Oklahoma to Camp Roberts, just south of L.A.! Well, plans were made and telegrams were sent and Dorance planned a weekend leave to travel to Los Angeles and meet up with Marion unfortunately, at the last minute he was sent instead to a San Francisco Replacement Depot.
He ended up spending over three months with almost no duties but unable to leave long enough to drive to L.A. He did however, have plenty of time for day trips to San Francisco where he started dating a girl named Nancy Fenwick. Frequent double-dates with his buddy Roger Loper solidified the relationship and by the time he shipped across the Pacific in September they were writing letters regularly.
At this point in the war, the U.S. had just begun to turn the tide against the Japanese. They had been slow to catch up after Pearl Harbor but the industrial capabilities of the U.S. far out-paced those of Japan and soon the sheer number of ships and planes and people was beginning to overwhelm the Pacific. After 16 days at sea Dip landed on Guadalcanal, which had recently been overtaken by the Navy and Marines.
Dorance was attached to the 8th Field Artillery Battalion in the 25th Division of the Army under the command of Gen. MacArthur. After spending two months of rest in New Zealand with his new battalion, they reported to the island of New Caledonia. It was here that the training for jungle and island warfare began in earnest.
This is where he found himself on his 26th birthday.
March 4, 1944
S.W. Pacific
Dear Mom & Dad: -
It’s Saturday afternoon – guess if I was back there now I’d be strappin’ my skiis to the car & be takin’ off for “Moon Valley”. As it is, I’m sitting in my little tent clad in a pr. of shorts writing this letter with sweat rolling off my brow. This ol’ sun down here, especially at this time of the year is terrific…
By the way – what a birthday I had! Got soaked in a rainstorm, got that “can’t we be friends anyway” letter from Nancy, & had a headache all day. Oh yes – and lost my raincoat – everything happens to me!
Dorance spent 9 months training on that isolated island just waiting to join in on the island-hopping approach to Japan. He rekindled his correspondence with Marion Sneen during this time and performed a number of different roles in the battalion including acting as Battery Commander a few times. Eventually, his number was called and the battalion shipped out at the end of 1944 on their mission to recapture the Philippines.
News was scarce as they fought their way through the jungles of Luzon.
Philippines
March 3, 1945
Dear Mom & Dad –
Gosh – I spose you’ve worried your heads off! I see by my little book that my last letter to anyone was written to you on Feb. 11. No, I’ll take that back it was Feb. 14th and to Esther.
That was the day I was ordered “up front” with the dough-boys – I was with them until yesterday when I was relieved. Guess you’ve heard of the much talked of Forward Observer – that was me.
I could write a book right now on what happened to me and what I saw but some of it wouldn’t be good reading…
Oh yeah – I must tell you a good one that happened to me. One day last week during a quiet moment I asked one of the boys what the date was. (we never knew) He said it was the 28th, and I almost fell out of my foxhole when I realized my birthday was the day before and I hadn’t even given it a thought. Guess I’m not officially 27 then – isn’t that right?
Dip remained on active duty through the beginning of July. This included front line duty as Forward Observer and Aerial Observer and led to his position as Battery Executive where he commanded the Artillery operations of his Battery.
In July his battalion was brought back from the front lines to rest and train for the anticipated invasion of Japan. He would have landed right after the Marines had it not been for the dropping of the atomic bombs and subsequent surrender of Japan. What was to be an invasion now turned into an occupation.
Instead of dreading an attack on the homeland of the Japanese he had been fighting, Dorance now looked forward to landing in Japan as a completion of his tour around the Pacific. He had been overseas for 2 full years now and was fairly confident he would return home in one piece.
Despite hitting a typhoon in the South China Sea and then being anchored outside Japan for a month while the bay was cleared of mines, Dorance did eventually set up camp in Japan. Once there, he was put in charge of the destruction of airplanes, tanks and other military equipment. He found the place interesting enough but all he wanted to do was return home.
After seeing almost all his fellow officers be replaced, Dip finally got his sailing papers today, November 28th, 1945. He was going to make it home for Christmas after all! I can’t imagine the emotions of sending this last letter to Marion back in Minneapolis or even the emotions as she received it.
Dorance Alquist was drafted before the U.S. was at war and served the entire war until after victory had been declared. He told me many years later how important his army training in leadership skills had been to his life. He was certainly a natural communicator and had the ability to make fast friends wherever he went. He returned a changed man.
Instead of returning to his entry-level job at Title Insurance, he went to the University of Minnesota on the G.I. bill and got his degree in Mechanical Engineering. He spent most of his working life as a Project Manager for a mechanical contractor. He also stayed in the Army Reserves and did weekend training for years.
Instead of returning to his girlfriend (Marian with an “a”), he returned to his correspondence girlfriend (Marion with an “o”). They got along famously in person and eventually he married her in June 1948. Together they purchased a newly built home in Richfield, MN for $11,000. They had three daughters (Jan, Jill and Jody) and six grandchildren and lived happily in that house for the rest of their lives.
It was in the attic of that house that we found these letters and photographs after Lt. Dorance Alquist died at the age of 96. It’s been fascinating to go through the whole story and learn what it was like for him during the war. I hope you have enjoyed following along and maybe it even shed some light on the experiences of your relatives during World War II. It’s been rewarding to find some of the descendants of people mentioned in the letters and provide them with a glimpse of their parents or grandparents through someone else’s eyes.
I am working on scanning the hundreds of negatives that Dip shot during his service. There are some amazing photographs and I intend to organize them into a book in addition to some of the letters to tell a more visual story. If you are on the mailing list I will give updates periodically to let you know how this project progresses and you’ll be the first to know when it’s available.
Thank you so much for the support, both moral and financial, of this project. I hope that your reunions with your families this holiday season are as joyous as Dip’s after being overseas for over two years. I will always miss Grandpa Dip’s harmonica playing during our family gatherings but I know he’s smiling down on us as we celebrate his life.
God bless and take care of one another,
Christian Olsen
