May Albertine Buelow was born March 21, 1916, near Mirror, Province of Alberta, Canada. She was born at home on the family farm. Her mother died in the worldwide influenza pandemic of 1918. After high school she attended the Royal Alexandra School of Nursing in Edmonton, Alberta, and graduated in 1937. In 1939 May travelled to the United States (US) to visit her grandparents in the State of Washington. She decided to stay in the US, completed exams for a State of Washington nursing license, and worked as a nurse. May was visiting an aunt in Tacoma, Washington, on Sunday, December 7, 1941, when she heard on the radio that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor, Oahu, Hawaii.
On April 10, 1942, May applied to the US Army Nurse Corps through the American Red Cross since her application for US citizenship was not yet completed. She was sworn in as a Second Lieutenant on October 30, 1942.
On February 27, 1944, First Lieutenant (1st Lt.) Buelow with the US Army 104th Evacuation Hospital sailed from New York City, New York, on the British ship Samaria and docked in Liverpool, England, on March 10, 1944.
The nurses travelled by truck from Liverpool to Southport where they were billeted in the homes of local British civilians. Military housing for the large number of Allied military personnel arriving in England was limited. Local families opened their homes to the troops.
The 104th Evacuation Hospital remained in the Southport and Churchtown area for four months.
The Allied D-Day Invasion of Normandy, France, was June 6, 1944. After the successful landing on French beaches troops and equipment began moving from England to France.
The 104th Evacuation Hospital landed on Omaha Beach in Normandy on July 12, 1944. Upon landing and moving inland they saw the debris on the beach, sunken ships, damaged buildings, destroyed vehicles, and dead bodies in varying states of decomposition.
The 104th Evacuation Hospital was attached to General George S. Patton’s Third Army.
The first evacuation hospital setup was Sainte-Mère-Église, France. 1st Lt. Buelow was assigned to Central Supply, a part of surgery, and one of her responsibilities was to insure that sterile supplies were ready for surgery and patient care.
And then the war began for the US Army 104th Evacuation Hospital.
The hospital treated military and civilian casualties both men and women. There were times casualties exceeded bed capacity. After the beds were filled litters were placed on sawhorses and on the ground after that.
A duty day often included watching for landmines in the area and the sound of German 88 mm anti-aircraft and anti-tank artillery fired nearby.
One night they were alerted of possible capture by the Germans. Unit personnel were moved by truck to a secure area until it was safe to return.
At night they often heard US reconnaissance planes overhead trying to locate German positions. They nicknamed the aircraft “Bed Check Charlie.”
There were times German prisoners of war would help in the hospital. May recalled they were generally helpful, but the German nurse prisoners of war could be uncooperative.
The average stay of military casualties was three days. They would then be moved to a medical unit further behind the front lines or flown to England.
Hospital setups could be in tents or in already existing buildings. On October 7, 1944, when the 104th moved to Nancy, France, they were in a former mental hospital. On December 16 they were told about the German breakthrough in a battle that became known as the Battle of the Bulge.
On December 24, 1944, the evacuation hospital moved from Nancy to Luxembourg. Christmas Eve for the hospital staff that year was C-rations (military packaged meals) by flashlights. The building they used at this location had been occupied by the elderly and orphans who were moved to a safe location. May said casualties “poured in” by ambulances and litters tied to jeeps on Sunday, December 25, Christmas Day.
They would be in Luxembourg for three months before moving to their next setup in Trier, Germany, on March 14, 1945. The casualties by then were fewer, and May and other unit personnel were given time for a three-day pass to Paris.
The last 104th Evacuation Hospital tent setup was April 22, 1945, in Erlangen, Germany. On May 8 the unit heard about the declaration of Victory in Europe (V-E) Day.
1st Lt. Buelow had applied for US citizenship before the war began, but the process was not completed before she left for Europe with the US Army. On May 10, two days after V-E Day, she and other non-citizen military members received an order to report to unit headquarters where they took the US Oath of Citizenship. May left the US as a Canadian, officially became a US citizen in Germany, and would return to the US as a US citizen.
The last 104th Evacuation Hospital setup was in Bad Wiesse, Germany, on May 22, 1945.
The 104th began the journey back to the US on September 8. After stops along the way and periods of waiting for further orders the unit reached Marseille, France. On October 27, 1945, they boarded the Liberty ship USS Hermitage* at Marseille and would arrive at Pier 88 in New York City, New York, on November 6.
May travelled from New York City to her grandparents home in Addy, Washington. She was home in time for Thanksgiving.
May Buelow was officially discharged from the US Army on January 26, 1946. She was awarded the American Defense Service Medal and the European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with five Bronze Service Stars for the Normandy, Northern France, Ardennes, Central Europe, and Rhineland Campaigns. She was also awarded the World War II Victory Medal, and the US Army 104th Evacuation Hospital received a Presidential Unit Citation Award.
When May left for duty in WWII she, like her friends, would communicate through letter writing. One of the people she wrote to was a friend from Washington named Maurice Alm, also known as “Swede” to his friends. They had dated before the war began.
Bernhardt Maurice Alm was born December 1, 1916, in Chewelah, Washington. He enlisted in the US Army Air Force in 1942. He trained as a Flying Fortress B-17 armorer. [An armorer was responsible for airplane maintenance and loading bombs.]
Sergeant Alm was assigned to the 307th Bombardment Group (BG) in the Pacific Theater. The BG flew multiple long distance missions, hence the nickname “The Long Rangers.” One bombing mission on October 3, 1944, to Baltkapapan, Borneo, oil refineries** was 17 1/2 hours long; the mission was a round trip of 2,610 miles, and the bombing raid caused extensive damage to an important Japanese fuel source in the South Pacific.
While in New Guinea (an island north of Australia) Maurice developed rheumatic fever that damaged his heart.
After WWII Maurice returned to his hometown. He and May were married on June 2, 1946, in Chewelah, Washington.
They had three children and were married for 10 years before his heart condition would take his life on May 27, 1956.
May returned to her nursing career to support herself and their children. She retired in 1981.
May never married again. She led an active life in retirement and would return to Normandy for the 40th, 50th, 60th, and 70th D-Day Anniversaries. In 2004 she met the actor from the film Saving Private Ryan, Tom Hanks, who attended the ceremony.
May passed away on September 30, 2019, at the age of 103. She was buried with full military honors next to her husband, Maurice, at the Chewelah Memorial Park Cemetery in Chewelah, Washington.
*The USS Hermitage (AP-54) was a US Navy troop transport ship in WWII. But before Italy declared war on Britain and France on June 10, 1941, the ship had sailed as the SS Conte Biancamano, an Italian luxury liner. When Italy declared war, the ship was moored at the Panamanian port of Cristóbal, and it was interned there. When the US entered the war in December 1941 the ship was seized by the US and converted to a troop ship by Cramp Shipbuilding of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and commissioned the USS Hermitage on August 14, 1942. The ship would sail in both the European and Pacific Theaters of Operation and was returned to Italy after WWII in 1947. It was refitted, renamed the SS Conte Biancamano, and again sailed as a luxury liner until 1960.
**Borneo is a large island in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Before WWII it was divided into Dutch Borneo and British Borneo. The island was quickly captured by the Japanese in the opening weeks of war in the Pacific. The Baltkapanan oil refineries on Borneo were of significant value to the Japanese for wartime fuel supplies. The oil refineries were of important strategic value to Japan just as the Ploesti (now spelled Ploiești), Romania, oil fields were to Germany.
Thank you to Maurice and May’s daughter, Marie, for her help in the research for this story and for permission to use family photographs. For further information on the WWII experiences of Maurice Alm and May Buelow Alm email wwii@crytalsw.com.
Thank you to historian Dr. Vernon L. Williams, Director of the East Anglia Air War Project, for his research assistance.
The book Voices of WWII Veterans: A Kaleidoscope of Memories edited by Rae Dalton Hight tells of May Buelow Alm’s life and WWII experiences as well as the lives and experiences of other WWII veterans.
I met May in 2004 at the 60th Anniversary of D-Day. We kept in touch over the years. It was an honor to know her.
