Serviceman's medals come home ? 68 years later

By BROOKS TAYLOR

Mt. Pleasant News

Second Lt. Jack Sroud was returned to American soil decades ago. His medals, including a Purple Heart, arrived Feb. 10, 2012, exactly 68 years to the day after he married Bev Litton.

For his former wife it provided a bit of closure, although Mt. Pleasant?s Bev Hodson quickly added that nothing really ensures closure. ?They say there is closure, but there isn?t. I still think of him every day.?

She also things of her son, Jackie, she had with Sroud.

In less than two years, Hodson suffered through two tragedies. Her husband, Jack, was killed on a bombing mission in Germany on June 21, 1944, just over four months after she married him. They had a son, Jackie, who was killed in an automobile accident in Mt. Pleasant on Jan. 21, 1945.

?He (Jackie) was one year, two months and 13 days old,? Hodson quickly says. ?People ask me how I remember the exact age (of Jackie). Well, it is easy, it never goes away.?

Hodson didn?t think about her late husband?s medals until recently. That?s because she married Jack Hodson on April 2, 1946, and has had a good life following the early double dose of tragedy.

?I have had a very good life,? she said from her SunnyBrook apartment. ?Both of my husbands were wonderful men (Jack Hodson died on Sept. 28, 1999, and the couple was married for nearly 54 years). They were kind, good men and easy to live with. I still miss them and all the little things. There are a lot of good memories.?

Hodson met Sroud while in high school at Fairfield. ?He just swept me off my feet, as did Jack Hodson.?

Sroud was the bombardier on one of 935 bombers dispatched on June 21, 1944, to bomb motor industry targets in Berlin, Germany. Nineteen bombers were lost on the mission, known as ?Frantic.? The planes were to bomb Berlin and then land at a Russian airfield.

According to a report, Sroud?s plane went over the target and dropped the bombs. As the plane was pulling away, flack hit it. Two engines were knocked out, along with all the radios and the hydraulic system. The plane was at 27,000 feet and because no fires had broken out, it was decided to fly it to the Russian airfield. Shortly later, both engines were on fire ? a fire that could not be distinguished.

Since the plane was still in the Berlin area, the pilot didn?t want to bail out the crew over hostile territory, The plane still had 900 gallons of gasoline left and descended to 20,000 feet. When the plane left the Berlin region, the pilot started ordering the crew out. But not all the crew, including Sroud had bailed, before the plane blew up. Five members of the nine-member crew died.

Hodson learned her husband was missing in action on July 6, 1944, and received word of his death on July 21, 1944. He is buried in Fairfield.

Due to her happiness and her marriage to Hodson, who was a car salesman and co-owner of the former Hodson-McKim Motors in Mt. Pleasant, she didn?t think about the possibility of Sroud?s medals until she was doing some genealogy recently.

?I never received his death certificate nor his medals,? she said. ?I contacted Rick Van Winkle (head of the Henry County Veterans Affairs Office) and he was interested and would see if he had any medals coming. Rick was such a big help on this.?

The process took about three months and earlier this month, she received the medals ? the Purple Heart, an European-African Middle Eastern Campaign medal; the World War II Victory Medal; and a Honorable Service Lapel button.

?It was very hard losing my husband and son so close together, but Jack Hodson was very patient,? she concluded. ?I think it was very nice that Jack (Sroud) was remembered through the medals.?