The “Bedford Boys”

The winds of war were upon us. President Roosevelt knew it was just a matter of time when free Europe would need our help. To begin preparing, the President federalized the Virginia National Guard into the regular U.S. Army on February 3, 1941, ten (10) months before Pearl Harbor. Called up was Company A, 1st Battalion, 116th Infantry Regiment of the famous 29th Infantry Division. After completing basic and advanced training, the company sailed out of New York harbor on September 26, 1942, on the Queen Mary, the “Gray Ghost,” to begin nineteen (19) months of grueling training for the invasion of Europe to free them of their occupation of evil tyranny. At 0636 hours on D-Day, 6 June 1944, Company A landed in the 1st assault wave on the Dog Green Sector of Omaha Beach, Normandy, France with catastrophic losses. This little town of Bedford, with a population of 3200 people, was brought to her knees in the loss of twenty (20) of her sons. Proportionally this community suffered the nation’s highest per capita loss. Those lost and their surviving buddies will forever be known as the “Bedford Boys.” The Bedford Boys Tribute Center in Bedford’s historic Green’s Drugstore was created to memorialize them for decades to come. 

Greens Drugstore

In 1942, Charlie and Ann Green became the fourth pharmacists to own the corner drugstore since it was built in 1886. Located on the Northeastern corner of E. Main and N. Bridge Streets, Green’s Drugstore was the thriving activity center of downtown Bedford, fulfilling every family’s needs and serving up the best strawberry ice cream float you could buy at the “hang out” soda fountain. Bedford High School was just up the road and the young boys of the town would either work, play, hang out or just plain be in Green’s. In a few short years many of these young boys would join the Virginia National Guard, be called up into the Regular Army, train in England for twenty months, be members of the first assault troops to land on Omaha Beach on D-Day, and be dead in nine minutes. On 6 June 1944, the Bedford Boys proved their grit.  On the dark Monday morning of July 17, 1944, the little town of Bedford fell on her knees when young twenty-one year old Western Union Operator Elizabeth Teass went into her small wooden telegraph office booth and began receiving messages stating “The Secretary of War desires me to express his deep regret ….” Nineteen Bedford sons were gone forever. Today, located in the iconic and historic Green’s Drugstore, is the Bedford Boys Tribute Center. The Tribute Center is the nation’s largest and most comprehensive museum exclusively dedicated to furthering the legacies of all 38 Bedford Boys where their footprints exists and will forever remain. Acclaimed docents provide excellent educational tours to our visitors of all ages highlighting the personal stories, artifacts, effects, and dedication of Bedford’s sons who by their supreme sacrifice taught us freedom is not free.