US Army Air Corps flight jacket
Women's Red Cross uniform
Textiles from The Charleston Museum’s exhibit “We Have Just Begun to Fight!”
Left: This brown leather jacket has silk blood chits or escape flags sewn in. It was worn by Charlestonian, Jimmy Holcombe, who flew air-sea rescue missions in the China-Burma-India Theatre. The information on the flags is printed in French, Thai, Lao, Chinese, Korean, Annamese and Japanese, along with his serial number. It states that the flyer is an American whose plane has crashed, he is an enemy of the Japanese, and that the American government will compensate anyone who rescues him and returns him safely to Allied military control. These notices served as survival tools for downed U. S. flyers. (click here to learn more)
Right: This blue cotton jumper and white blouse was worn by Mary Elinor Waterhouse Hoyler (1912-1998) of Beaufort. She volunteered with the Red Cross at home while her husband, Lt. Hamilton Hoyler, USMC, served in the Pacific. He was at Pearl Harbor and she did not know his fate for six months. After the war, he returned to Beaufort and they had three children.