Leonard at large

Wednesday, December 17, 2003

More than a year ago, I wrote a column about the late Eddie Catron, a red-haired butcher in Harrisonville. He was a long time friend of mine and a cousin of Lyle Catron's.

Soon after it was published, I received a phone call from Linda K.(Spangler) Sewell. At the time the Sewell's were living in the Sheldon community. She had known Eddie when she was growing up in Harrisonville and had fond memories of the friendly red-haired butcher at the grocery store where they traded. Reading the column was how she learned that Eddie had left this life experience into another esperience.

During our conversation she mentioned that she had a book that consisted of newspaper clippings from the Pleasant Hill paper of military service personnel during World War II. She asked me if I would like to see it. Since I had roots in Pleasant Hill, I thought it might be of special interest. My grandpa and grandma Hawk lived in the community.

I had forgotten our conversation until a few weeks ago, while I was at the Daily Mail, they gave me a book that Linda had left there for me. It was not until a few days later when she called me that I realized why she left the book and was reminded of our phone conversation about Eddie.

The book is titled, "The Stars in the Community Flag of Pleasant Hill and Vicinity." It is an indexed scrapbook of newspaper accounts from the Pleasant Hill Times of those who served during World War II. This publication was compiled by Robert E. Kennedy in 1994 and revised in l999 for the Pleasant Hill Historical Society.

A few years ago he attended an auction in Pleasant Hill and bid on and got a box of miscellaneous items which included a shoebox of newspaper clippings. Later he found that they were concerned with those from the Pleasant Hill area that served during War World War II. Still later he and his wife moved to Pleasant Hill, and than compiled the clippings into a notebook. After joining the Pleasant Hill Historical Society, he had access to their newspaper files from which added an additional 250 pages to the volume.

The book is indexed by names. The clippings tell about individuals leaving for service, coming home for leaves, and their promotions or honors. Some were about those missing in action, being killed in action, and about their funeral services.

I went to the index to find my Uncle Carl Hawk, the youngest of 7 siblings.

There were two articles about him which I will share with you. I was a young boy at the time, but remember many of the events of the war. Justsas there are those separated from their families now, many families faced similar circumstances then. Our family was worried about Uncle Carl and it was much stress on the family. This was true for other families and many of their loved ones never came home.

One article was dated Feb. 5, 1943. "Pvt. Carl N. Hawk, former P.H.H.S.

student and a son of Mr. and Mrs. Ira Hawk of Pleasant Hill, is in training with Co. D. 12th training battalion, Camp Wheeler, Ga. Pvt. Hawk, who has been employed in an Auburn, Ind.m foundry for the last several months, was inducted from that city about Dec 1: his wife, the former Miss Betty Walker of Auburn, and their year-old son, Gilbert, are living at Butler, Mo. with the George Jennings family while Carl is in service." I remember when Uncle Carl was in Sicily and was transferred to England before going into Normandy on D Day. I had forgotten about his being friends with an English family, until I read the following article. There is a date stamped on the article, but it can not be read. This same article was found at two places in the book, titled, "Has English 'Home.'"

The article included a picture of the young Pfc.

" Pfc. Carl N. Hawk, son of Mr. and Mrs. Ira Hawk of Pleasant Hill is now in England, after having been stationed for a time in Sicily. Mrs. Hawk received the following letter concerning her son from Mrs. Charles Price, Rosemary Lane, Abbotbury, Mt. Weymouth, Dorset: : "'I take great pleasure in writing these few lines to tell you we have met your son Carl and he makes his home with us whenever he likes. He came to see me last night. He asked me to write to you, as he says it will make you happy to know he has friends over here. My son brought him to the house about the first day he was here. We had a most lovely time at Christmas. He is in the best of health.

"'I have two sons. one is in the army and I think I am about the most lucky mother in all the world as he is only 20 miles from here, so I see him often. My other son is only 16, so he is on the land. He wants to go in the navy.

"'My husband is the stationmaster, but he had to go to a bigger station until the war is over; he comes home at weekends. He is the head of the Home Guard here. I have my papers to go nursing, as I was a nurse, so I shall go to the next town about three days a week, but I do not mind as we are all helping to win the war.

"Carl has shown us all your photos; also his lovely children. I would love to see them. And he has brought me some of your candy; it was lovely. I have told Carl that if he moves from here and he would like to come and see us there will always be a home for him, for the boys are so far from their homes and they are such a nice lot of lads. We people get to know all of them that live in little villages, more than people do in the big towns.'" I remember when we visited the grandparents, grandma and the others discussing Billy Green, a close friend of Uncle Carl's.

There were articles about him, including one about his being missing in action in 1944, when he was only 18, about his being killed in action, and in 1948 a funeral was held in Pleasant Hill and he was buried there.

There are many interesting articles in the book about the stars of the community.

My uncle was one of many stars in the community. It is good that the Pleasant Hill Historical Society has such a publication.

This helps to preserve the history that helped in maintaining our freedom. A salute goes to what Tom Brokaw called, "The greatest generation that the world has seen."