Remembering World War II heroes: Robert Weighill and Albert Williams of Barre

BARRE – When he was a youngster growing up in Barre, Bill O’Donnell came to the realization that his oldest sister Rachel had a different last name – Williams, than his eight other siblings who all had his surname, O’Donnell.

“I think I might have been about six years old when I found out that my mother was married before,” he said. “My mom never hid it from anyone that her first husband, Albert, was killed in World War II.”

O’Donnell’s mother, Phyllis Grace (Shepardson) Williams, was widowed after only two years of marriage, while another Barre soldier died before he and his wife celebrated their first wedding anniversary.

This is the continuation of the series Remembering Local World War 2 Heroes.

Pfc. Robert J. Weighill (1918-1945)

Robert J. Weighill was born on April 4, 1918 in Barre, the son of Walter and Mabel (Garland) Weighill of Wauwinet Road and grew up there on a farm owned by his father. When he was 11 years old, his 10-year-old sister, Helen, died following a brief illness at their Barre home.

An elected official of the town, young Robert was a member of the Barre Board of Health, elected to a three-year term shortly before he entered the Army. Prior to his military commitment, he lived at the Hotel Barre and was employed locally by Ralph Keep.

He was inducted into the Army in February 1942 and was assigned to the Signal Corps branch of the military service. He trained at chauffeurs’ school at Fort Monmouth, in Red Bank, New Jersey. At the conclusion of his training, he was transferred to the Gardiner General Hospital in Chicago where he was stationed for two years.

Being stationed at the hospital became a benefit to Private Weighill, who had his share of medical issues over the years.

In January of 1944, he was admitted to the hospital for acute tonsillitis. Then, nine months later in October, he was hospitalized for phlebitis.

Apparently, he had regained his health enough to be married on Christmas Day 1944 to Ruth E. Schwand of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, at the Emmanuel Evangelical Church in Milwaukee.

However, his medical issues continued and on Oct. 27, 1945, the 26-year-old Weighill died in Gardiner General Hospital in Chicago after an undisclosed illness of about a month and a half.

Aside from his wife and parents, Weighill was survived by two brothers, Walter of Barre and Sgt. George who was in the Army, and three sisters, Mrs. Doris Klimavich of North Brookfield, Miss Florence Weighill of Worcester and Mrs. Dorothy Puliafico of Barre.

He was buried in Glen Valley Cemetery in Barre.

Pfc. Albert C. Williams (1925-1945)

Albert Cleveland Williams was born April 24, 1925 in Leverett, the son of Albert G. and Leona E. (Prentiss) Williams. In his large family he had six sisters, Barbara, Violet, Marion, Jeanette, Norma and Thelma, and four brothers, Harold, Leslie, Douglas and Lewis Williams.

Albert was a resident of Barre and registered for the draft in Athol on April 24, 1943 while he was employed in the lumber yard of Albert Reginus of Mechanic Street in Barre. He enlisted on Sept. 2, 1943 at Fort Devens and trained at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

Prior to being sent overseas in February of 1943, he married the former Phyllis Grace Shepardson, whose father owned a farm where the family lived on Hardwick Road.

Upon his arrival overseas, Albert would go on to take part in the New Guinea and Leyte campaigns. In November of 1944, he sent his wife some souvenirs including a Japanese flag and money, which likely indicated that he visited Japan on one of his tours.

According to a telegram received by his wife, Pfc. Albert C. Williams was killed on the Philippines islands of Luzon, March 20, 1945 while serving with 127th Infantry, one month shy of his 20th birthday. Phyllis would later give birth to a daughter Rachael Amelia, who would never see her father.

Pfc. Williams was buried in Greenmount Cemetery in Whitehall, New York, and his wife Phyllis was presented his Purple Heart posthumously.

A few years after her first husband’s death, Phyllis remarried, to Charles Walter O’Donnell of Barre, and in addition to Rachael they would go on to have nine more children, Charles Jr., James, Debbie, twins Philip and Phyllis, Kenneth, Bill, Veronica and Paul.

Rachael would later marry Alfred Alsten in 1968 and they settled in Barre where they had six children.

Charles O’Donnell died in April of 2001 and his wife, Phyllis, died five months later. Rachael’s husband, Alfred, passed away in 1997 and she died in 2018.

As a side note, 1981 Quabbin Regional High graduate Bill O’Donnell, one of the sons of Phyllis and Charles, entered the Navy after college in 1985 as a commissioned officer and spent nine years in the service.

He would go on to work in the Secretary of the Navy’s office as part of a Pentagon renovation program. In 2001, when one of the hijacked planes hit the building on Sept. 11, 2001, he was part of the recovery efforts there.

Then in 2019, he was asked to go to Capitol Hill in his current role as the chief administrative officer for the architect of the Capitol. He was working from home during the Jan. 6 insurrection and has since had to coordinate a lot of the repairs to the building after the uprising that occurred that day.

Comments and suggestions for Remembering Local World War 2 Heroes can be sent to Mike Richard at mikerichard0725@gmail.com or in writing Mike Richard, 92 Boardley Rd. Sandwich, MA 02563. 

This article originally appeared on Gardner News: World War II heroes Robert Weighill, Albert Williams from Barre MA