The Pinecone
|
December 2013
• 7 •
Yes, W.T. is his full first name,
given to him by his grandmother.
He was born in 1924 to Edna Gober
Hardwick and Napoleon Hardwick.
His mother was a homemaker and
his father was a farmer and carpenter.
The family consisted of twin girls and
five boys; the girls and one son did
not survive. As was common in that
period, W.T. graduated from 8th grade
and went to work in a saw mill and
farming. He married his first wife Ethel
McCoy in 1943 and she passed away
in 2003. He had known Mary Frets for
sixty years and they married in 2003.
Hi s L i fe Turned Black
W.T. was 19 years old when, on June
18, 1943, he was drafted into the Army,
was given basic training in Alabama;
and sent to England for six-months of
additional training. On June 6, 1944 his
Unit sailed from Plymouth, England to
Normandy, France. His Unit was part
of the invasion on Utah Beach. After
four days of blistering combat W.T.
and 22 others of his Unit were captured
by the Germans; the remainder were
killed. The survivors spent their first
night crammed into a “pill box” (an
underground concrete structure). What
followed was a harrowing journey that
began from the “Pill Box” walking
to StLo and corralled in a stockade;
ironically, U.S. B25’s bombed StLo
that same day. The Prisoners of War
(POW) were marched across France to
Frankfort, Germany and jammed into a
small boxcar. With only bread andwater
for food, they spent 23 days and nights
in that small space, passing through
Berlin and moving toward the Baltic
Sea and Poland. The original POWs in
W.T.’s Unit were mingled with POWs
from other Units; he doesn’t know
the fate of others in his original Unit.
Twenty-five of the inter-mingled POWs
were
sent
to a farm
to
thresh
wheat.; but
beginning
in
mid-
J a n u a r y
1944, in
f r e e z i n g
rain, 8”
of ice and
3 feet of
snow, the
P O W ’ s
clad only in the
uniforms and shoes they wore when
captured, began a three-month trek,
walking the entire distance to Central
Germany; they arrived in mid-April.
Rescue
They heard Russian artillery firing and
a sympathetic by-stander told them that
the American Front was just ahead.
Soon a U.S. jeep appeared and they
were safe. They spent their first night
in a hotel and then were sent to Army’s
Camp Lucky Strike. The POWs went
through a very thorough de-lousing.
Stripped of their clothes and shoes,
they were rolled in several inches of
DDT dust, had their heads shaved, and
face/ears/eyes cleaned. Then, they were
issued new clothes and shoes. W.T. lost
about 70 pounds during captivity and
said his first meal when rescued was
eating 18 eggs one at a time. He couldn’t
get enough of good food. On April 14,
1945, after being MIA for five months,
the U.S. notified his mother and father
that their son was alive and would be
home soon. One of his older brothers
also had been fighting in Germany and
survived. W.T. was discharged in 1945.
Chai ned To The Pas t
W.T. drove a bus to support his
family; and, like other ex-military he
never talked about the horror of the
POW camps. His family, friends, and
employers knew nothing about former
POWs chronic anxiety to not draw the
attention of prison guards to themselves
because to do so often resulted in casual
and/or insane mistreatment.; and they
said nothing about how they competed
daily with vermin and rats for their
meager food. In 1970, 25 years after his
release from the prison camp, W.T. was
diagnosed with severe Post-Traumatic
Distress Syndrome. He had told the VA
physician about the horrors and terrors
that he still lived with; shut away in
his mind and sitting like a rock in his
heart. To tell his story to me, brought
tears to his eyes. The inhumanity that
he and others suffered scarred each of
them. A coalition of POWs tried for
years to galvanize their Federal and
State congressmen and senators to
acknowledge the life-long suffering
they’ve endured, by awarding these
service men a Purple Heart. To date,
that hasn’t happened.
Hi s Ki rby Pi nes Fami l y
W.T. and Mary are a familiar presence
at Kirby Pines. We see a devoted
couple and W.T.’s unfailing tenderness
to Mary and her health problems. We
don’t see any trace of the demons that
wrack W.T.’s heart and mind to this day.
His public face gives no indication of
his POW experience. However, with
his story now printed, we can express
our gratefulness for what he and his
comrades suffered for this Country and,
much closer to home, for each of us.
We honor W.T. Hardwick and pray that
God’s graciousness will bring peace to
his heart.
– Jacqueline Besteman, Resident
Re s i de n t Spo t l i gh t
W.T. Hardwick
