The Home Journal

A SOLDIER WRITES

Very often we get letters from Virgin Islanders abroad, especially from those in the armed services relating their experience in the strange lands where they are stationed, or expressing their views on subjects that are dear to them.

A few days ago we got a letter from Austin C. Donovan, former school teacher here, who is now with Army Psychological War Detachment in the Pacific area. His letter commented on a variety of subjects. Not so long ago, he wrote to the Secretary Of the Air Force at Washington to find out why we were being discriminated against when he discovered that the new Air Force Academy was accepting cadets from all states and territories except the Virgin Islands. The explanation was that it was an oversight, etc. Recently, the Dept. of Defense prepared a bill for introduction that would permit Virgin Islanders to enter the military academies. We are sure that indignant letters from Mr. Donovan and others helped. But introduction of a bill is pretty far from passage, and we have to keep plugging.

The main subject of Mr. Donovan's letter concerned a proposal for a Virgin Islands flag. He went to the trouble to draw a flag which we think has great merit. Mr. Donovan didn't know that we would have a new Virgin Islands flag today if it were not for the policy of the administration of disapproving everything that disturbs the status quo.

In any event, Mr. Donovan's letter is so expressive of the way many of us feel we thought we should share a few paragraphs with our readers.

Mr. Donovan wrote:

"As a Virgin Islander living abroad I have always been cognizant of the fact that, once we leave the Islands, we have no common identifying symbol with our compatriots back in the Islands nor with those we might meet abroad, if you might speech and customs which, under the impact of new culture patterns, rapidly change.

As I recall, when Virgin Islanders were drafted into the Army in World War II, mention was made of a distinctive shoulder patch for us with the name Virgin Islands as a part of the design. The idea, while a good one, was not pushed and we ended up wearing a patch designed with Puerto Ricans in mind. As a result of this our identity

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THE EDITOR'S
OPINION

as soldiers from the Virgin Islands was lost completely. Aside from the esprit de corps such a patch would have accomplished, Virgin Islanders would have been spared untold embarrassments when assigned to duty on the mainland.

"To me it is of the utmost importance that we, as a people, keep our identity. At no time in the past has it been as important as now when the Islands are in the process of change. As we have changed in status from an Island possession to a territory, as we seek fuller control of our legislative processes and even aspire to local election of the chief executive, it becomes imperative that we have such a symbol.

What I have in mind is a flag, a flag so uniquely Virgin Islands in character that there can be no question about it. A flag which by its very nature tells something about the Islands and one which will have significance for all.

This is my suggestion for such a flag:
The flag should be oblong. In the quarter next the staff and to the top, the canton or union, should be the Dannebrog of Denmark. The fly or free end should be the precise blue of the Caribbean.

In the fly there should be three white five pointed stars, tip pointing upwards in relatively the same geographical position as the three main Islands of St. Thomas, St. John and St. Croix. The stars should be equal in size.

Such a flag should tell at a glance something of the colonization of the Islands by the Danes, the unity of the Islands and their natural setting as three gems in a blue sea. The red, white and blue, duplicating the colors of the United States flag would explain our present allegiance.

Now, this is not meant to be the last word on the subject. What I would like is to stimulate thinking on the idea of a flag for the Virgin Islands and to have several designs submitted from which a representative one would be chosen.

Everywhere I have gone in the states and overseas, state and territorial flags are much in evidence. Children pledge allegiance to the state flag almost as often as to the U.S. flag, especially in such states as Texas and California."