Robert E. Hodges

Sergeant First Class Robert E. Hodges served in the US Army from May 1946 to June 1966. So, he is considered a World War II-era veteran, as part of the initial Occupation forces of Japan after the end of the Second World War.

Hodges came to be in the Army after he graduated from high school in 1946 at the age of 17 in Chicago Illinois. Upon his 18th birthday in March 1946, he received a letter notifying him of being drafted. On May 20, 1946, Hodges was to report to his induction station on Van Buren Street as a draftee. Instead, he chose to enlist for 3 years at the induction station, so that he could pick the area that he would be sent to. This would make him a regular army soldier rather than a draftee soldier.

He had a cousin in the service already who was in the Army over in Europe and attached to the Red Ball Express, a group made mostly of African American truck drivers during World War II. This is where Hodges wanted to be sent upon enlistment, but that would not be the case. When the war initially broke out, he was 12 years old and the war did affect his family’s lives some, as it did most Americans. Hodges, like most kids would watch the news at movie theatres and be brought up to speed on what was happening overseas. He was influenced, like most kids to want to fight and be like John Wayne. Hodges talked about how army life was good for him, a positive adjustment; and, it gave him stability as opposed to possibly have ended up a street kid or in a gang.

Following his enlistment, Hodges took a train to Camp Lee in Virginia, and to his first taste of segregation. He said that this experience with segregation affected him mentally, because he was red white and blue all the way through and did not care for any other colors. At Camp Lee, the soldiers training there were separated by race, between the front and back of the camp. Minus a few racial issues in Virginia, Hodges said that his time at Camp Lee was good; and, the tough and rigorous training there made him better for it.

Because Hodges enlisted after President Roosevelt’s death, he was considered to be a ‘Truman soldier’ – a black soldier after the military was desegregated by Presidential Executive Order under President Harry Truman. He was looked down upon by soldiers in the Army under President Franklin Roosevelt, due to the distance most soldiers felt toward Truman. Hodges was under the impression following completion of his basic training that he would be going to Fort Monroe to learn how to drive a truck, like his cousin in Europe, but was instead sent to the Quarter Master school at Camp Lee, where he became a cook.

Further disappointment set in when he was told he could not go to Europe, but could choose between Alaska for 18 months, or Japan as a member of the Army of Occupation for 3 years. Hodges chose to go to Japan, because Alaska was too cold in his mind. With his training as a cook, he was loaded aboard a Liberty ship to Japan which took 19 days. Hodges, still angry at being made a cook, did not cook a single meal on the trip over to Japan, because in basic training he was made an acting corporal and he had rank over most on the ship, so he got out of his cooking duties until he arrived in Japan, where he took his stripes off as to not get into trouble. 

Upon arriving in Japan, Hodges was approached by a group of non-commissioned officers who asked him if he wanted to switch careers from quartermaster to artillery; he immediately volunteered. Hodges then went to Nara Japan to join a regular army combat organization which included the 24th Infantry Regiment, and the 159th Field Artillery Battalion which he was a part of; the two units combined to make the 24th Regimental Combat Team. His specific job was to be a part of the fire direction center for his artillery unit, to direct the fire of the guns. His time in occupied Japan was spent separated from the white soldiers, with the exception of two common locations where they could mix.

Other than that, the 159th had a good relationship with the local Japanese citizens in Nara. Hodges described the Japanese occupation as smooth, unlike Germany after the war. He described the citizens as smart, and that all the US needed to do was watch over them peacefully, and they would take over and run the country with no issues. Hodges felt the Japanese knew this, which is why most caused no issues. He personally had no issue with the Japanese citizens, which would make sense since he would meet his wife who was a citizen working at the post exchange for the Army, whom he married in 1951.

Hodges lived in Japan for four years, from December 1946 to July 1950. He heard the news about the invasion of South Korea yet did not read about it because he did not read the paper at the time. Hodges and his unit were committed to Pusan South Korea in July 1950. His division was the second division to be committed to the Korean War upon its outbreak. By the afternoon, they were given their weapons and trucks and were out on a train headed into the mountains, to be committed to the fight, with no clue where they were headed.

Hodges said the weather there was as extreme as you see in the movies and TV shows that are based on the war. His first engagement with the enemy in the Korean War would be from distances where he could not see them as part of an artillery unit. In August of 1950, he would see his first enemy soldier, a wounded prisoner on a truck. Hodges was fortunate enough to never have had to fight hand-to-hand with a North Korean soldier, but he did have enemy gunfire being shot at him, in an attempt to silence his artillery guns. He said his baptism by fire was when he was working at battalion headquarters for the fire direction, where he was told to replace a field spotter in an infantry unit for the artillery in July 1950.

During the days of the Battle of the Pusan Perimeter early in the war, they rationed artillery shells because they did not have enough, but other than that the soldiers were supplied well. Hodges was wounded on the morning of September 22, 1950 by a North Korean mortar round near the Nakdong River in South Korea, and was sent back to an Osaka Japan hospital, where he would receive a Purple Heart from General Mark Clark. This was when General MacArthur pushed North Korea back to the Yalu River, and the Chinese entered the war.

Hodges was spared the historic escalation of the Korea War. Then, he was sent to Camp Zama Japan to train new soldiers on artillery, as they created a new unit from sections of previous units that had lost men. Hodges ended up back in Korea as a part of the 55th Transportation Battalion 540th Trucking Company. He could not rotate home due to not having earned enough points for rotating back to the States with his wife. So, Hodges went back in July of 1951 to earn the points he needed to be allowed to return to the US as a part of the Army. In September 1951, he was sent back to Japan, having earned the points necessary to return to the US.

Hodges returned with his wife and daughter to the States in January 1952 on a troop ship to San Francisco. From there he would be sent to Fort Sill Oklahoma. Hodges applied for a compassionate transfer, because his wife had pneumonia. He hoped he would be sent to Chicago where he was from and now lived with his wife and daughter. Instead, Hodges was sent to Fort McCoy Wisconsin for a short stint, as his whole unit was sent to Camp Carson Colorado shortly after arriving at Fort McCoy. Hodges was posted in Fort McCoy from January 1953 till May 1953, when he reenlisted and was sent to Chicago as part of the Military Police for 18 months.

Hodges was sent then to France as an MP in the town of Dreux at the Air Force base there, and then sent to Paris as an MP for 3 years. After being stationed in Europe for 4 years, he was sent to Fort Lewis Washington as a part of the 4th Infantry Division for 9 months.

Following that, Hodges would put in an application to be sent to the Signal School at Fort Monmouth New Jersey to learn combat radar system repair. After 33 weeks of training at Fort Monmouth, he would stay on as an instructor at Fort Monmouth for 6 years as an Army Instructor. Hodges would then retire from the Army at Fort Monmouth and stay 9 years working there as a civilian employee. He found his time in the service to have been very good and had no regrets, as he loved the Army. The only regret Hodges had was not pursuing the career further and becoming an officer.