Richmond Family

The North African Theater Theater of Operations, United States Army, was established on 4 February 1943. Command was assumed by General (then Lieutenant General) Dwight D. Eisenhower. Shortly thereafter, on 10 February 1943, General Eisenhower requested the War Department to establish in the theater, pursuant to Article of War 50½, a branch of the Office of The Judge Advocate General and a Board of Review. On 22 February 1913, the President, in a letter to the Secretary of War, directed The Judge Advocate General to comply with General Eisenhower's request. After this short period of gestation, BOJAG was born, a Branch Office and a Board of Review being established in the North African Theater by an order of 8 March 1943.
Brigadier General (then Colonel) Adam Richmond, J.A.G.D., who was General Eisenhower's staff judge advocate, was detailed as Assistant Judge Advocate General in charge of the new Branch Office.
From its inception the new organization was a lusty infant. General Richmond and Lieutenant Colonel G. B. Chapman III were already in the Theater, but before the remainder of the officer complement and the enlisted personnel could arrive from other assignments, the press of work required the prompt, though temporary, establishment of a Board of Review, composed of officers immediately available.
By 24 April 1943 the entire commissioned complement had arrived, but the enlisted personnel, consisting of ten WAC's, were still en route. Pending their arrival reliance was had upon the Judge Advocate Section of the Theater Headquarters for clerical and stenographic services. Procurement of the supplies needed by the Branch Office presented no small problem, and necessity dictated a development of technique, not entirely unnecessary even today, which would have done credit to a front line outfit. Typewriters formed the scarcest item of indispensable supply. There did not appear to be any available, and all usual methods of procurement failed. Finally, in a subtly worded memorandum, General Richmond pointed out to the lords of supply, "It so happens that it is the mission of this office to fight the war with typewriters. Our enlisted personnel, consisting of ten WAC's, will arrive in a few days. If the requested typewriters are not furnished, the WAC's will be without arms or ammunition." Where all else had failed this appeal produced results. Their arms and ammunition were delivered the day before the WAC's arrived. The WAC's have used them well.
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In practice the Branch Office operates as an autonomous War Department unit. The Board of Review functions as prescribed by Article of War 50½, and the Military Justice Division examines general court-martial records not required to be examined by the Board of Review. The relationship between the Assistant Judge Advocate General in charge and the Branch Office on the one hand and the Commanding General of the Theater and Theater installations and units on the other is analagous to the relationship The Judge Advocate General bears to the President, the War Department and the Army in general in military justice matters.
Because of the legal relationship between the Branch Office and the Theater Commander General Richmond shortly reverted to his former assignment as General Eisenhower's staff judge advocate. On 18 July 1943 Colonel Hubert D. Hoover arrived in the theater and on 20 July assumed the duties of Assistant Judge Advocate General in charge of the Branch Office.

Brigadier General Adam Richmond was, like General Krueger, a career soldier. A native of Council Bluffs, Iowa, he received both his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Wisconsin. He entered the Army as a second lieutenant infantryman in World War I; in the interwar years he was stationed in Washington, D.C., the Panama Canal Zone, and finally, San Antonio, where he served as the Judge Advocate General of the Third Army under General Krueger. He spent World War II in North Africa and the Mediterranean before a car accident in Naples in 1945 ended his Army career. A devoted husband and father to three girls, Brigadier General Richmond moved to Bethesda, Maryland, and became very active in the community. This loyalty and civic-mindedness would serve him well when General Krueger, his former boss at Third Army, requested that he go to Japan to defend Dorothy in her murder trial. General Krueger could not go himself—Grace, his wife, was seriously ill. As Dorothy had a contingent of defense lawyers headed up by Lieutenant Colonel Levie, referred to in some reports as Chief Defense Counsel, it is likely that Richmond served in large part as General Krueger’s eyes and ears on the ground. After Dorothy’s conviction, Brigadier General Richmond vowed to take the case “all the way to the President” if necessary.

The Richmond Family

Adam Richmond

Charlotte Elizabeth Richmond

Charlotte M. Richmond

Daniel Rufus Richmond

Dorothy Washburn Richmond

Fanny Richmond

Frances (Richmond) Girton

Frances Helen (Richmond) Lambert

Francis Richmond

George H. Richmond

Ida Pearl (Richmond) Hamilton

John Francis Richmond

Mark Moore Richmond

Mary Jane (Richmond) Benston

Robert Moore Richmond

Susan Richmond

Susan Richmond

Susie Richmond

Thomas Charles Richmond

Thomas C. Richmond

William Richmond

William F. Richmond