Published May 5, 2007 as part of a HonorAir article
Hendersonville Times-News

http://www.blueridgenow.com/article/20070505/NEWS/705050331/0/search

By John Harbin
Henderson County native Debois Edmundson hadn’t finished high school when he was drafted into the Army in 1942 and sent to Spartanburg, S.C., for basic training.
Edmundson is among 101 World War II veterans being flown to Washington, D.C., today to visit the National World War II Memorial on the fourth flight of HonorAir.
Program originator Earl Morse of Ohio first talked to Jeff Miller in 2005 after Miller contacted him with his interest in starting HonorAir.
In 2004, Morse raised money to take veterans on discount commercial flights, called Honor Flights. When Miller read an article about Morse, he called him with his idea for HonorAir.
Since then, residents of Henderson County have raised more than $165,000 to send 309 World War II veterans on three chartered jets Sept. 23-24 and Nov. 4 to see the memorial.

Small-town boy goes to Europe

Edmundson said his time in Spartanburg was spent getting indoctrinated into the Army.
“After basic training, we went to Myrtle Beach, S.C., and worked as MPs for a year,” Edmundson said.
The small-town boy was soon in for the biggest trip of his life. After spending a year in Myrtle Beach, he was shipped overseas to Thorpe, England in 1944.
Before he was drafted into the Army, Edmundson met Evelyn McConnell, who he would later marry.
“Back then, all we had to do in Henderson County was bowling or going to the movie theater,” Edmundson recalls about his early dates with his future wife.
After he was discharged from the Army in 1945, Edmundson married McConnell. The couple was married for 59 years before Evelyn died in 2005. They had one daughter, Sharon Packer.
“When I arrived in England, I worked again as an MP on gate detail, mostly,” he said.
The 85-year-old said his gate duty consisted of checking everyone in and out of the military base and, “keeping the peace.”
While he was in England, Edmundson had an unexpected run in with someone from his hometown.
“While I was on a weekend pass I decided to take a train into London,” he said. “As I was getting ready to step onto the train, my youngest brother was stepping off the same train.”
“While we were in England we had combat training and then we were sent over to France and later to Germany,” Edmundson said.
Edmundson did not talk much of the combat he was in, other than when he was sent in during the Battle of the Bulge.
The Battle of the Bulge (also known as the Ardennes Offensive) began on Dec. 16, 1944. In its entirety, the Battle of the Bulge was the bloodest of the battles that American forces experienced in World War II. The 19,000 Americans left dead was unsurpassed by any other engagement. For the Army, the Battle of the Bulge incorporated more American troops and engaged more enemy troops than any American conflict before Word War II.
On Jan. 7 1945, Adolf Hitler agreed to withdraw forces from the Ardennes, including the SS Panzer Divisions, thus ending all offensive operations.
“I remember during that combat we were sent in,” he said. “We rode around on the back of tanks and saw some combat.”
While Edmundson may not have seen much combat, he did witness the devastation in the concentration camps.
“We went into the Buchenwald concentration camp while the prisoners were still there,” he said. “We saw the cremation buildings and I saw stacks of bodies that the Germans were unable to burn before the camp was liberated. The ones who were still alive were walking skeletons.”
Edmundson said he stayed in Germany near the concentration camp for a short time in a small village below the camp.
“It was well overwith by the time we were there,” he said. “The Germans were civil to us. While I was there, we read reports in the Stars and Stripes military newspaper that there were lamp shades found in some of the German women’s homes made of human skin.”
Soon after his time in Germany, Edmundson was transferred back to the United States.
“While we were in the middle of the ocean coming home, we got the news that the Japanese had surrendered,” he said. “We landed in New Jersey and I went to Camp Shelby in Mississippi where I was discharged in 1945.”
After he was discharged, Edmundson moved back to Henderson County and began working at Ecusta Paper plant in Transylvania County. While he was working at the paper plant, he remembered a job offer that he received before he was drafted into the Army.
“While I was in Myrtle Beach the chief of police told me to call him if I ever needed a job,” he said. “I decided to take him up on his offer and moved to South Carolina for about a year and a half.”
This first law enforcement job would begin a 38-year career for Edmundson.
In late 1947, he moved back to Henderson County and began working at the Hendersonville Police Department as a patrolman.
“I was a patrolman for about four or five years before I was promoted to captain,” he said.
During his time at the Police Department, Edmundson would witness one of the most horrific crime scenes in the county’s history.
In July of 1966, three decomposing bodies were found in a grassy area near U.S. 176 in Henderson County.
The bodies were those of Vernon Shipman, Charles Glass and Louis Shumate.
“That murder was an unusual thing to happen at that time,” Edmundson said. “There had been nothing like that before.”
After working as captain and acting chief for the department Edmundson retired in 1985.
In 1991, he moved from Henderson County to Inman, S.C.
“My daughter had some horses and we found this old farmhouse,” he said. “We bought the house together and I have lived here ever since.”
After retiring, Edmundson spent his free time hunting, fishing and gardening.
Now he is excited about embarking on his trip to Washington.
“My sister-in-law, Elizabeth, told me about HonorAir,” he said.
His daughter was the one who submitted his name to the HonorAir committee.
“I am looking forward to seeing the memorial,” he said. “I was surprised by how many veterans are going.”