Lt. William Beedle

Bill was not a happy soldier.

When he wanted to see his last pre-war picture, I Wanted Wings, he had to sneak out of camp. The officers were particularly harsh on the “sissies” (i.e. actors) who came through training. He went through agony in his first week, because, partly due to a natural shyness and partly on account of ambitious autograph seekers with no sense of propriety, he could not use the bathroom in the group latrines. He cried into his pillow because he missed his new wife of less than a year. He felt time pass that was lost to his career, and his finances were constantly on his mind.

William Holden (enlisted as William Beedle, which was still his legal name at the time) was one of the very first married Hollywood stars to enlist in the American military after Pearl Harbor, and he, perhaps more than most actors, suffered both financially and professionally because of his service time.

When he left for training at Tarrant Field Air Base in Texas and later Fort Monmouth in New Jersey, he was a fresh faced juvenile who may have been on the right track to stardom. When he returned, his face and body had matured to the point where he had to start all over again, because the old William Holden could no longer be pointed to for bankability.

William Holden served in the Motion Picture Unit during World War II. Although he discharged his duties well, Holden had a great sense of guilt and shame over having served out the war as a PR boy, supporting war bond rallies, hosting pageants for the “real” soldiers, and making training films. This feeling worsened when his brother Robert, a Naval pilot, was killed in the Pacific.

Just like that, just because of a little fame and looks, one brother lived and another died. It was a shame he never quite recovered from.

(Perhaps it was this feeling of helplessness that led him into, if the rumours are true, work he completed for the CIA through the Cold War.)


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