WWII Women’s Army Corps Service, Hospital Work, and Public Ceremony Belonging to an Unidentified WAC Member, 1942 to 1945

WAC Women’s Army Corps Archive

Photograph

American women’s wartime service photo archive belonging to an unidentified WAC member depicting women in US military and hospital uniforms during World War II, as mobilization opened military and medical assignments previously closed to women. Congress established the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps through Public Law 77-554 on May 15, 1942; Public Law 78-110 converted it into the Women’s Army Corps with full Army status on July 1, 1943. Approximately 150,000 women served as WAACs or WACs in administrative, communications, transportation, mechanical, medical, and other assignments. Army Nurse Corps strength grew from fewer than 1,000 nurses in December 1941 to more than 59,000 by the end of the war. The personal snapshots place formal service dress beside caregiving, public ceremony, travel, and off duty friendships, recording how wartime mobilization entered women’s daily lives.

Photo archive of 18 silver gelatin photographs, ranging from 2.5 x 3 to 3 x 4 inches, New York City and other United States locations, circa 1942 to 1945. Many of the women are seen in multiple photos, with one standing out in most. The photos depict women in tailored dark uniforms wear neckties, garrison or brimmed caps, and collar devices; one woman in trousers and a service shirt stands beside an Army corporal, while another gestures amid a crowded city street in a white crowned cap. Hospital and caregiving scenes include women in aprons and pale duty dresses, three women in matching protective work garments, and two attendants posed with infants and a young Black child. Additional views record a marching formation, uniformed pairs and groups, women seated outside Gothic institutional buildings, a formal ceremony with bouquets, and the flag hung facade of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.

The archive connects the wartime service preceding the Women’s Armed Services Integration Act of June 12, 1948, with the histories of military dress, nursing, women’s labor, institutional life, and friendship outside official publicity settings. Occasional creasing, edge wear, surface scratches, fading, and curling; overall in good condition. Its movement between duty uniforms, hospital clothing, city streets, ceremonial dress, and relaxed group portraits preserves the range of public and private experience created by women’s wartime service through the lens of one member of the Woman's Army Corps.

Item #23841

Price: $1,250.00