February 1944. In New Guinean jungles,

 

February 1944. In New Guinean jungles, a lone American soldier finds something strange. A little Yorkshire terrier is in an empty foxhole. Corporal Bill Wynne purchases her for two Australian pounds and calls her Smoky. She then stays with him everywhere. Two years of combat, Spam for supper, rain every day, 150 air raids, and two typhoons. Smoky never leaves his side. When bombs drop, she yips and shakes as if she senses something horrible is about to happen. She does this more than once to save Wynne.


Then there is the instant that makes her a legend. An airfield requires a telegraph wire under a runway crowded with planes and people. Digging would shut down everything for days. Wynne attaches a string to Smoky and pushes her through a seventy-foot pipe barely wide enough for her to squeeze through. She gets through fast. This saves the operation.

She is the first therapy dog to visit wounded veterans for twelve years after the war. Today, monuments and awards still keep her memory alive.


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