6888th battalion: US looks to honor 855 Black women who solved war time mail crisis An all-black, all female battalion that served in Birmingham, England during WWII is on the last leg of a long journey to receive the Congressional Gold Medal. This battalion cleared a backlog of 1-2 years worth of mail in 3 months when the military didn’t think these women could do in in 6 months to a year. These women are credited with saving the morale of our troops during the war. Each shift handled 65K pieces of mail by working three, seven days a week for a total of 17M pieces of mail to ensure the troops stayed in contact with their family.