David McKinley Blackwell was born in Holden, Louisiana and grew up in Washington Parish. He grew up on a farm where life was hard. The Blackwell family did not have a lot when Blackwell was young. Technologies such as automobiles and tractors were out of reach for most of the poor farmers in the community. He planted corn, cotton, peanuts, and sugarcane. Cotton was the most profitable crop. The Blackwells used that money to buy school clothes and supplies for the winter. Blackwell had six sisters and five brothers. He had a younger brother join the Navy and an older brother drafted. Blackwell was inducted in New Orleans [Annotator’s Note: New Orleans, Louisiana]. Due to his draft status, employers did not want to offer him a job because he would soon be forced to leave. He learned arc welding as a trade in the meantime, thinking that he would be needed as welder in the military. He tried to enlist in multiple branches of the service before the Army accepted him.

David McKinley Blackwell entered the Army at Camp Polk [Annotator's Note: now Fort Polk in Vernon Parish, Louisiana]. From Polk, the Army sent him to Camp Barkley [Annotator's Note: near Abilene, Texas]. Blackwell arrived back in Louisiana for maneuvers, due to the similarity of environmental conditions in the Pacific. Because of things such as the heat, insects, and snakes the Army saw Louisiana as a good location for training people from other parts of the country. These exercises lasted approximately six months. After he finished maneuvers, the Army sent Blackwell back to Camp Barkley. He requested to be placed with the medics, and subsequently received medical training. His unit acquired the equivalent of 13 weeks of training in just 9 weeks. The Army assigned him to the 30th Evacuation Hospital as a cook. The nurses were sent away during battles, and they were only recalled once the hospital stopped receiving wounded. The 29th and 30th Evacuation Hospitals were shipped out together. The 29th suffered too many losses to continue during the war. Blackwell left the United States via San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California] on the USS President Johnson [Annotator's Note: President Johnson, originally named the SS Manchuria]. The President Johnson's engines gave out over the course of transport, delaying the 30th Evacuation Hospital, extending the trip to nearly a month. He arrived in Sydney, Australia in October [Annotator's Note: October 1943]. The ship departed Sydney and from there traveled to Papua New Guinea via the Coral Sea.

David McKinley Blackwell did not stay in New Guinea long. The terrain was mountainous and covered in jungle. From there he went to Leyte, Philippines and then to Finschhafen [Annotator's Note: Finschhafen, New Guinea]. Upon arriving in the Philippines, he witnessed the devastation left by the fighting [Annotator's Note: Battle of Finschhafen, 22 September 1943 to 24 October 1943]. A nearby Palmolive Soap mill and plant lay destroyed. The 30th Evacuation Hospital moved on to New Britain Island [Annotator's Note: New Britain Island, Papua New Guinea] and treated patients from nearby Wewak [Annotator's Note: Wewak, East Sepik, Papua New Guinea]. After their time on New Britain Island, the 30th Evacuation Hospital moved to Davao City, Mindanao, Philippines. Blackwell was in Davao City when the United States used the atomic bombs [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945]. The Army was already preparing units for a land invasion of Japan. Blackwell's unit moved on to Yokohama [Annotator's Note: Yokohama, Japan] and later Sapporo, Japan as part of the Allied Occupation of Japan in the time after the Japanese surrender. Blackwell's unit later returned to Yokohama to then sail home to the United States. On the return trip, Blackwell traveled through a destructive storm safely. The mobile hospitals his unit used were made of tents and cots, but also had technology such as x-ray machines and generators. They were often too close to the front to make use of the generators, as there were blackouts implemented to hide their position from the enemy. The hospitals were generally set up three to five miles from the front lines, still close enough to receive and treat the wounded. If a soldiers' wounds were too severe to recover within a few weeks, they were further evacuated away from the front. Blackwell served as a cook and did the best he could to feed the soldiers with the meager supplies given to him. He recalls the medical treatment of not only his fellow soldiers, but also that of the enemy soldiers. The 30th Evacuation Hospital treated and fed enemies in the hopes of gaining military intelligence from them, the captured enemies' most common request was generally for cigarettes. While they did the best they could for captured soldiers at times, the nature of war is brutal and unforgiving.

David McKinley Blackwell never saw combat during his deployment. His unit [Annotator's Note: 30th Evacuation Hospital] was often close to the fighting but was mainly fortunate enough to avoid enemy fire. One instance of the 30th Evacuation Hospital being fired upon was a Japanese Zero [Annotator's Note: Japanese Mitsubishi A6M fighter aircraft, referred to as the Zeke or Zero] attacking an LST [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank], but missing and instead hitting an LCM [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft, Mechanized. A landing craft built to carry vehicles to shore]. Blackwell's unit used the LCMs to haul garbage out and dump it at sea. On a day that was not his turn to dispose of the garbage, a Jap [Annotator's Note: a period derogatory term for Japanese] Zero killed several men on the LCM. After the war, he struggled to find a job as many of the factories created to fuel the war effort were closed due to the war's end. When he returned home, Blackwell used the money he saved to buy a house and ten acres of land for himself. He was married in December 1946. Blackwell did what he could to earn money and farm crops before finding a steady job. He found work with Delta Tank Manufacturing Company in Baton Rouge [Annotator's Note: Baton Rouge, Louisiana] and later in the construction industry. Blackwell did not see great success upon returning home from the war but considered his fight for freedom to be of the utmost importance.

David McKinley Blackwell served as a cook with the 30th Evacuation Hospital in the Pacific Theater. Not only did he prepare food for everyone in the unit, he also specially prepared food for injured soldiers, such as those who could not eat solid foods. The cooks only received meager supplies like corn beef hash, canned pork and gravy, canned peaches, and green peas. He had to cook for 36 officers, over 200 more soldiers, and also for the patients. The soldiers mixed iodine into their water supply and also had to take Atabrine [Annotator's Note: trade name for mepacrine, or quinacrine; an anti-malarial medication] tablets to combat malaria [Annotator's Note: mosquito-borne disease caused by a parasite]. Because they took Atabrine regularly, their skin began to turn yellow, a common but not dangerous side-effect of the medicine. Blackwell received three Bronze Stars [Annotator's Note: a device worn on a campaign ribbon to indicate the number of campaigns a ship or individual took part in] for recognition of the three campaigns his unit participated in. He also received the Asiatic-Pacific Theater Ribbon [Annotator's Note: the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Ribbon or Medal was awarded to those who took part in the Asiatic-Pacific Theater from 1941 to 1945] and the Good Conduct Medal [Annotator's Note: Good Conduct Medal is given to enlisted military personnel for exemplary behavior, efficiency, and fidelity in active Federal Military service]. Blackwell also earned the Meritorious Unit Citation Award [Annotator's Note: Army unit award for outstanding achievement or service in combat or non-combat]. Blackwell's unit set up camp near mountains that many Jap [Annotator's Note: a period derogatory term for Japanese] troops were hiding in. His commanding officer, Colonel Erkenbeck [Annotator's Note: US Army Colonel Vernon Erkenbeck], asked Blackwell if he could manage to feed all the troops before sundown, as a blackout restricted their use of lights at night due to the proximity of the enemy. Even though the entire unit had been eating the same food for months, Blackwell prepared the food so well that his command officer commended him on a job well done beyond expectations. From there he went on to become a part of the occupational force in Japan after the use of the atomic bomb [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945]. On the trips from and to the United States, food on the ship was sparse. Blackwell did not have to help cook the food on the voyage but remembers the African-American cooks preparing food as best they could while crossing the Pacific Ocean. Blackwell also earned the Philippine Liberation Medal [Annotator's Note: decoration from the Republic of the Philippines awarded to any Allied service member who participated in the liberation of the Philippine Islands]. The Republic of the Philippines erected a statue of General MacArthur [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area], and built a memorial on Leyte [Annotator's Note: MacArthur Landing Memorial National Park in Palo, Philippines] honoring those who liberated the Philippines.