[Granville-Hough] 11 Dec 2009 - Sad Thule Christmas

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

Date: Fri, 11 Dec 2009 08:18:52 -0800
From: Granville W Hough <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Subject: SadThuleXmas - 11 Dec 2009


THULE: SAD CHRISTMAS

Those of us with SullivanÆs Hollow heritage have found ourselves in far 
corners of this earth doing the tasks set before us by our country. Even 
now, in 2007, I am sure we have relatives in Iraq, Afganistan, and on 
the high seas. Their stories will be recorded in future days. I point 
out to you the stories in Smith County Families, Volumes I and II, about 
the WW II and Vietnam services of Orson Pratt Sullivan, G.R. Sullivan, 
and Alvie G. Sullivan, and other stories about Wiley Jackson Ingram. 
There are surely many other stories not recorded.
In 1962, I was just completing my first Pentagon tour of duty in Army 
Intelligence, and I was scheduled for an overseas assignment. I had done 
well in Army Intelligence and had received the Legion of Merit for my 
insights and analyses on Soviet missile defense work. I had also become 
one of the few Army people with access to sensitive aspects of 
intelligence work, and it was considered a risk to send me to Vietnam. I 
knew too much about ongoing operations. So, it seemed prudent to send me 
to Thule, Greenland, to become Logistics Officer for the Artillery Group 
protecting the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS) radar and 
the Thule Air Base. We had batteries of Nike Hercules nuclear warheaded 
missiles. The Air Force fighters were to intercept Soviet bombers or 
fighters way out, and we would protect the huge radar and air base close in.
Now, Thule was historically the ôend of the earth,ö and the Eskimo 
village had been the base for the first operations to reach the North 
Pole. We were close to the old village, but the Danish government had 
moved the Eskimos about fifty miles away to prevent their contamination 
from disease and other activities of soldiers and airmen. We were within 
sight of the ice cap which covers all of Greenland, and we all, sooner 
or later, had experience out on the ice cap. We were so far north that 
our milepost in the middle of the air base pointed to Moscow in one 
direction, and Washington, DC, in the other. It was closer to Moscow. If 
you arrived there in the summer, the sun just went round and round, 
never setting. Then from about 1 Nov until 1 Feb, there was no sun at 
all. December was a month of total, absolute darkness, with the North 
Pole straight up, overhead.
Our barracks was insulated and heated, so we could wear normal clothes; 
and we had a recreation room with a pool table and other items. One of 
my fellow officers was an Air Force major who flew one of the fighters 
protecting the base. Each day in good weather, the pilots would do 
training flights over the area. Of course in the dark season, everything 
was by instrument once you left the lights of the base. You were also in 
radar and voice contact. You flew out to your check points, then 
returned to base. This officer was a quiet, unassuming young man who, 
like me, had never played pool in his life. We teamed up to learn how to 
play pool, and we had several interesting and humorous games together. 
Then one day in December, he went for a training flight, and in one 
sweep of the radar, he was detected on course. Suddenly on the next 
sweep, he was not there. He simply disappeared. The direction of the 
last indication showed him over the ice cap. I enclose a excerpts of a 
letter I wrote at the time on 19 Dec 1962: ôàWe have had much excitement 
since last Friday (14 Dec) when one of our pilots went down on the ice 
cap (glacier). He is still there and hundreds of people are searching 
for him. His food ran out today, if he is still alive. A helicopter 
searching for him landed to search and went into a crevasse. The crew 
got out. A C-47 searching for him crashed and two people were killed. (I 
was told that, in the darkness and disorientation after the crash, they 
simply walked into the still rotating propeller blades of the C-47). The 
remainder of the crew was found (and rescued). It is pitch black dark 
now 24 hours each day, and it is minus 40 degrees F on the ice cap. It 
was minus 18 degrees here on base today. Each time I walk out, I see the 
lights flashing out on the ice cap where the searching goes on and on 
and on. I can think of no better reminder of things to be thankful for 
than to imagine myself out on that ice cap, in the cold and darkness. I 
think the base will have a sober and somber Christmas. We all knew the 
pilot and the other people who were killed. The pilot lived down the 
hall from me.ö (PS: The Eskimos from new Thule arrived with their dog 
teams and sleds and helped bring out the bodies and other items from the 
two known crash sites. I do not believe the fighter plane was ever 
found. I never again played pool.)
Now, believe it or not, I was not the only one with Sullivan Hollow 
connections to serve at Thule that year. My first cousin, once removed, 
Lloyd Hough, born at Cohay Camp and partly reared there, was a soldier 
in one of the Nike Hercules batteries. He had moved to Texas as a 
teen-ager and I had never met him. We had several good visits and have 
kept in contact ever since. Lloyd had finished his tour when this 
December accident happened, but he did recall another incident wherein a 
B-52 pilot fell out of his plane and was never found.
-------------------------------------------------
True worship may be experienced at any time, in any place.-- alone in 
the hills or in the busy daily life -- we may find God in whom we live 
and move and have our being....(Quaker Faith and Practice 2.11)