94-year-old veteran remembers segregation of D-Day, 75 years later

FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. (FOX 2) - A Michigan man stood on the beaches of Normandy as the allies battled to save the world. He wasn't there to fight, though, because he wasn't allowed to. He had a different purpose.

William Micou was 18 in 1942 when he joined the U.S. Army. He wanted to serve and was ready to fight for his country, but he couldn't.

"To tell you the truth, I kept telling my supervers - just let me go."

William was there, on the beaches on June 6, 1944 - but not to fight.

"During that time, the war, they was segregated."

The U.S. Army was segragated but William was still a soldier - in the Red Ball Express. He remembers what happened that day.

"They say it happen one way but, it didn't happen that way. I know because I was there," William remembers. "I was in the Red Ball express, and that was one of the problems."

William and the rest of his all-black platoon were tasked with supplying the soldiers. His daughter-in-law, Renee Micou, explains that wasn't their only job.

"The Red Ball Express - the all black unit actually came in and up to the front and brought them in supplies, they repaired their trucks and they brought out those who, actually, had been killed during the war," Renee said.

The job was important and dangerous. Today, 75 years later, William still has a military-like neatness to his room and proudly displays his awards and his handsome picture. You would think William would be proud. 

"Sometimes I'd just rather be by myself then be around people."

And trying to get the truth as to why one black soldier really felt was emotional. He told FOX 2 that, at the time, that the Army didn't want African-Americans to take white women.

Today, the 94-year-old WWII veteran describes the segregation of the U.S. Army as, simply put, bad and can only hope it's better today.