Medal of Honor hero from Fall River figured prominently in Memorial Day weekend ceremony at Riverside Cemetery

By Mark E. Vogler

Fall River native Thomas Jerome Hudner, Jr. was a primary focus of the War stories shared at Riverside Cemetery last Saturday at the town’s annual Memorial Day weekend ceremony. It was a decade ago, Saugus Veterans Council Commander Steve Castinetti noted in his speech that the Medal of Honor recipient was the keynote speaker and addressed the crowd in front of Saugus Town Hall during that year’s Memorial Day weekend. On November 13, 2017, Captain Hudner passed away at home in Concord, Mass., at the age of 93. During the spring of the following year, he was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Castinetti then told the story of then-Lt. Hudner’s heroics on Dec. 4, 1950, when six Corsairs launched from the aircraft carrier USS Leyte and flew north to the Chosin Reservoir with LT Hudner and wingman ENS Jesse Brown, the first black naval aviator. “Chinese forces were closing in on the 1st Marine Division. During the mission, ENS Brown’s plane was shot down over the Chosin Reservoir,” Castinetti said.

Then he read from Hudner’s Medal of Honor citation: “fully aware of the extreme danger in landing on the rough mountainous terrain and the scant hope of escape or survival in subzero temperature, he put his plane down skillfully in a deliberate wheels-up landing in the presence of enemy troops. With his bare hands, he packed the fuselage with snow to keep the flames away from the pilot and struggled to pull him free.

“Unsuccessful in this, he returned to his crashed aircraft and radioed other airborne planes, requesting that a helicopter be dispatched with an ax and fire extinguisher. He then remained on the spot despite the continuing danger from enemy action and, with the assistance of the rescue pilot, renewed a desperate but unavailing battle against time, cold, and flames.”

In his address, Castinetti recalled that in the spring of 2012 “Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus bestowed a rare honor on an Andover alumnus by declaring that a naval destroyer now under construction at the Bath Iron Works in Maine would be named the USS Thomas Hudner.”

“At that time, since the 1970s, just 11 vessels have been named for individuals who were living when the naming was announced,” he said.

On Oct. 21, 2014, a book about Capt. Hudner’s actions in North Korea, “Devotion,” was published by Adam Makos. In April of 2017, the USS Thomas Hudner (DDG 116) was christened at Bath Iron Works.

Castinetti noted that on Dec. 1, 2018, “USS Thomas Hudner (DDG 116) was commissioned in Boston, Mass., on a frigid day, likely similar to the day when he crashed his plane in North Korea in an attempt to save his wingman and friend Jesse Brown.”

Then in 2022 the movie “Devotion” was released, featuring “An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice by Adam Makos, which tells of the comradeship between naval officers Jesse L. Brown and Tom Hudner.”

This year’s keynote speaker was Wakefield native Shelby M. Nikitin, the former naval commander of the guided-missile destroyer USS Thomas Hudner. “As Captain Castinetti mentioned, we stand on the shoulders of giants, like Capt. Thomas Hudner, who served with such distinction that the generations who follow are compelled to honor such an extraordinary legacy,” Commander Nikitin said.

Commander Nikitin is currently Director of Maritime Warfighting at the Surface Warfare Officer School in Newport, R.I.