When Tawanda Scott Sambou was assigned to find a story for a CNN series commemorating the 75th anniversary of World War II, the first thing she asked herself was, “What role did Black women play in the war?”
She thought she was coming to a dead end in her search until she came across a documentary on the all-women, majority-Black 6888th Battalion. “I was so intrigued,” said Sambou, who is now a senior producer at NBC News. “I just thought, ‘Wow, people don’t know about this troop, this unit. I would really love to share their story.'”
The 6888’s story is not often told. In 1945, Army officials reported that unreliable mail delivery to U.S. soldiers was hurting morale, so the 6888th Battalion traveled to Europe to sort through a backlog of mail in the millions. Not only did they create their own system to handle the backlog, but they also did it quicker than the Army expected.
And yet, these 855 women were mostly forgotten in history.
“For the Six Triple Eight unit, there were no celebratory moments for them,” Sambou said. “It was as if they didn’t exist.”
That is, until Sambou’s CNN team ran its story on the 6888 in 2020. Four years later, Tyler Perry turned the battalion’s story into a Netflix film starring Kerry Washington. But the women’s long-overdue federal honor came 77 years later, in 2022, when the 6888th Battalion was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal for their service. The ceremony was held at the Capitol in April.
“Moments like this remind me of why journalism matters,” Sambou said. “Seeing these women get recognized finally, after all these years, you would think it shouldn’t take that long, but we finally got there.”
Sambou hopes her reporting and the national recognition the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion has received will help bring more awareness to their role in winning World War II. She sees her work as a public service.
“What I’d love for young journalists to recognize is the responsibility that we have every day when we decide what stories get to be told and who gets to tell them,” she said. “It’s a responsibility, and it’s also a privilege that we should not take for granted.”
