Army Security Agency Facility Vint Hill Farms Station Near Warrenton, Fauquier County, Virginia 1940 13 July 1943
As the black 1942 Buick Roadmaster approached the small frame guard shack, floodlights came on and a large military policeman—one of three on duty— came out of the shack. He held up his right hand in an unmistakable Stop right there! gesture.
When the car had stopped, he walked to the driver’s window.
“You didn’t see the sign, ‘Do Not Pass—Restricted Military Area’?”
“We’re expected, Sergeant,” Colonel A. J. Graham said from the backseat of the Buick.
The MP sergeant shined his flashlight in the backseat and saw a well-dressed civilian.
“My name is Graham, Sergeant.”
“Colonel Graham?” the MP asked dubiously.
“That’s right.”
The flashlight went off.
“Lieutenant!” the MP sergeant called.
Graham saw a barrel-chested young Signal Corps officer push himself off the hood of a jeep where he had been sitting. He marched purposefully toward the Buick.
“Is there a problem?” the lieutenant asked in a booming voice.
“Sir, there’s a civilian in the backseat of the Buick, says he’s Colonel Graham.”
“ ‘Civilian’?” the lieutenant parroted, making it clear he thought that what he had been told was highly unlikely.
He marched to the Buick and boomed, “Colonel Graham?”
“That’s right.”
“We expected a Marine colonel,” the lieutenant boomed.
“And that’s what you got,” Graham said, and held out his identity card.
The lieutenant examined the card, and then Graham, very carefully.
Then he handed the card back, came to attention, sal
uted, and boomed, “Good evening, sir. Sir, I am Lieutenant McClung, the officer of the day. If the colonel will have his driver follow me, I will take you to the colonel, who is waiting for you, sir.”
“Thank you,” Graham said.
“The colonel will understand that when I said we expected a Marine colonel, we expected one in uniform, sir.”
“That was reasonable,” Graham said. “Thank you, Lieutenant.”
“To what do I owe this unexpected pleasure, Colonel?” Colonel Raymond J. Scott, Signal Corps, commanding Vint Hill Farms Station, asked as he shook Graham’s hand.
“I didn’t mean to make waves, Colonel,” Graham said. “But I had to come out here as soon as I could, and I’d never been here before, so I asked our commo officer, Colonel Lemes, to set it up.”
“Well, what he did was call the Office of the Chief Signal Officer, and his deputy called here and said you—Colonel Graham of the Marines and the OSS—was on his way out here and to give him—you—whatever you wanted. So I sent Iron Lung to the gate—”
“ ‘Iron Lung’?” Graham chuckled. “I can’t imagine why you call him that.”
“He does give new meaning to the phrase ‘voice of command,’ doesn’t he? Actually, he’s a fine young officer.”