Their Story

William Lee Tucker was born on April 4, 1926, to Charlie and Sadie (Vaughn) Tucker in Piggott, Arkansas.[1] Tucker’s mother died when he was just four years old, so his sisters stepped in to be maternal figures for the young boy. He attended grammar school (roughly equivalent to elementary school of today) but began to spend his time helping out on the family farm once he was old enough. When he turned 18, Tucker was drafted into the United States Army. While serving as a soldier, Tucker aided his division as a military policeman in the Philippines Campaign.[2]
Tucker served the Army as a military policeman in the Pacific Theater of World War II. While the primary objectives of a campaign are accomplished by the bulk of a military division, there is a great deal of consolidation and organization that needs to be dealt with in occupied territories as the main body of the force pushes onward. Military police served this function in the Second World War, where their mission was concerned with three primary tasks: controlling traffic within occupied territory, transporting and guarding prisoners of war, and protecting supply lines. The forward movement of the Army division could not continue without military police handling these vital operations: “Military police assist the commander in increasing the tether between the forward line of troops and their base of operations… Traffic control, prisoner of war operations, and pilferage prevention were key to extending the division’s operational reach in World War II.”[3] By serving as an Army military policeman, Tucker contributed to the liberation of the Philippines from the brutality of the Japanese military.
Tucker served in the Philippines Campaign of 1944-1945, where he and the Army helped the Filipino people wrest back control of their islands from the Japanese. Ever since the U.S. surrender at Bataan in 1942, the Philippines had been subject to Japanese Imperial rule. During these long three years, the Filipino people were subjected to war crimes by the Japanese soldiers and Kempeitai military police:
Although Japan granted the Philippines its ‘independence’ in 1943 as part of its Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere program, the Filipinos suffered greatly from atrocities inflicted not only on suspected guerrillas but on many innocent civilians. Torture, rape, pillage, and massacres, sometimes of entire villages, took place all over the country.[4]
To make matters worse, when U.S. forces arrived to liberate the island, the Japanese initiated wholesale slaughters of civilians under their dominion. The U.S. military and Filipino resistance set about the brutal work of pushing the Japanese off the island in the industrial meat-grinder of urban warfare. Through great sacrifice, especially of Filipino lives, the U.S. and resistance forces managed to win the Philippines back from the Japanese in September of 1945.[5] Tucker, operating with the military police forces of the U.S. Army during this campaign, did his part to ensure the end of Japanese atrocities in the Philippines.
After the Japanese surrender and the end of World War II, Tucker returned home to Arkansas. He married Susie Viola Farris in 1949, and the couple had five daughters and two sons whom they took great pride in: “Bill never made much money in life, but he often said his kids made him a ‘rich man’.”[6] Tucker worked as a farm laborer for the remainder of his working life at numerous farms in Arkansas, Missouri, and Illinois. He enjoyed fishing, tractor pulls, county fairs, and spending time with his family. On December 29, 2005, Tucker passed away at the age of 79.[7] He leaves behind a legacy of heroism in a campaign against a cruel and brutal enemy military.


[1] “William L. Tucker,” Quad-City Times, December 31, 2005, p. 17.
[2] “William Lee Tucker,” Find a Grave, November 5, 2010; “William L Tucker in the U.S., World War II Army Enlistment Records, 1938-1946,” Ancestry, 2005.
[3] Christopher A. Evans, “Military Police Operations in World War II: Extending the Division’s Operational Reach” (School of Advanced Military Studies US Army Command and General Staff College Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, 2018), 3.
[4] Cecilia I. Gaerlan, “Liberation of the Philippines 1945,” The National WWII Museum | New Orleans (The National World War II Museum, September 1, 2020).
[5] Cecilia I. Gaerlan, “Liberation of the Philippines 1945,” The National WWII Museum | New Orleans (The National World War II Museum, September 1, 2020).
[6] “William Lee Tucker,” Find a Grave, November 5, 2010.
[7] “William Lee Tucker,” Find a Grave, November 5, 2010.
References
Bibliography
Evans, Christopher A. “Military Police Operations in World War II: Extending the Division’s Operational Reach.” School of Advanced Military Studies US Army Command and General Staff College Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, 2018.
Gaerlan, Cecilia I. “Liberation of the Philippines 1945.” The National WWII Museum | New Orleans. The National World War II Museum, September 1, 2020..
“William L Tucker in the U.S., World War II Army Enlistment Records, 1938-1946.” Ancestry, 2005.
“William L. Tucker.” Quad-City Times. December 31, 2005.
“William Lee Tucker.” Find a Grave, November 5, 2010.