My Great Uncle PFC Otis Williams "Bill" Polk served in the U.S. Army During WWII. He was drafted in March of 1941 and discharged Sept. 5, 1945. I have a picture of him at Christmas Island holding some type of Bird. I do not yet know what unit he was in. His records were destroyed in the 73 fire. Anyone else know about Christmas Island? I think he was at Guadacanal March of 1944 going by an entry in his service book by another Serviceman. Thanks LEW
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiritimati if you are not interested in the 'general' Christmas Island, and just want to know about the war that was there, scroll a little ways down Trustee note - the correct island is in the Kiribati group. Radar4077 listed another Christmas island that was not occupied by the allies untill after the war. I deleted that and inserted the wiki link for the correct island. The island your uncle was on was used as a refueling stop for aircraft going between Hawaii and Samoa. I believe some B24 missions from the 7th AF were performed from here in Oct and Nov 1943 as part of the Gilbert Islands campaign.
G'Day Lew My father was posted on Christmas Island too. It looks like they might have been there at the same time. I've been working on a web site about my father's service, made up mostly of letters he wrote home; some from Christmas Island. You can see it here: From Randalia to the Rhone At the top of the first page, you'll find "The Pacific". That will take you to the Christmas Island bit. I'd love to see your picture! All the best. Joe
Joe, I do have some information on Christmas Island in the LINE ISLANDS that my uncle passed down. I cannot open your information as it is in icloud. Anyone interested, email me at snakeriver4x4 at ymail.com I am trying to verify that the Japanese hit the island December 19th of 1941.
