U.S. Military Wives in the Philippines, from the Philippine War to World War II

This chapter examines the fundamental questions: Why were soldiers’ wives in the Philippines from the Philippine-American War to the onset of World War II? What did they do there? How did they describe military life, and people they encountered in the islands? What did they believe about their roles as military wives, and as Americans? The answers to these questions often are more implicit than explicit in the sources examined in the chapter. The chapter focuses on accounts and other sources mainly from and about U.S. Army officers' wives. Army personnel in the Philippines were more numerous than navy and marine personnel, and it appears that more army officers had their wives with them than did officers from other military branches. [Author]