Editor’s note: This is another column in Bill Boyd’s new series, “The Way It Was,” about growing up in Marysville. Bill continues to work with the Union County Historical Society to obtain information for his stories. With Marysville and Union County celebrating Bicentennial anniversaries in 2019 and 2020, respectively, these articles help depict what life was like in those early years.
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Hank
Every one of us has met some pretty interesting people in our lives … people who have been involved in some really special things. I’m not talking about celebrities or anything like that. I’m talking about regular, everyday folks, who have done some very interesting things. I met a few people like that, and I’d like to tell you about one of my favorites.
His name was Henry Huber, but I always called him “Hank.” We first met in 1955, when I returned from the Air Force and was back in school at OSU. Hank was also an OSU student, and we took some of the same classes. We became friends, and sometimes we studied together.
Hank was about 12 years older than I was, and he was a veteran of World War II. He had aspirations of going to work for the CIA. I remember one class in International Relations, in which I learned as much from Hank as I did from our professor.
Hank wasn’t one to talk much about his war experiences, but over time, I learned that he had been a bomber pilot in World War II. He flew B-25 bombers over Germany. He would talk about it occasionally, but mostly he just answered my questions. I think it was because of his own modesty.
Later in the war, he flew a number of missions over Yugoslavia, which was occupied by the German army. On one of those raids, his plane was shot down by antiaircraft fire. He and his crew were forced to bail out.
He expected to be taken prisoner by German soldiers, but instead he was found by guerrilla fighters. They rescued him and hid him in a barn. The next few weeks were spent with those partisans, who hid him during the day, and then traveled at night.
Eventually, they got him back to an area that was occupied by the Allied Forces. From there, it was back to England, where he resumed bombing missions.
When the war ended in 1945, Hank was unsure about his future, so he stayed in the Army Air Corps for a while. Then, in 1946, he got a new assignment. The U.S. government provided a specially equipped C-47 plane for the king of Saudi Arabia, complete with a personal pilot. And who do you think got the job as the king’s personal pilot? You guessed it … Hank Huber. He flew the king to all sorts of meetings throughout the Middle East. He also flew him on personal trips to Paris and London. In the process, he got to know the king, and the king got to know him.
When Hank left the Army Air Corps, the king presented him with a special gift. It was one of those cloth head covers that Saudi men wear. You know what I’m talking about. They sometimes look like a tablecloth, and they are held in place by a kind of heavy ring of rope.
Hank was a single guy, and when he was at OSU he lived with relatives in Westerville. We visited them one Sunday afternoon, and Hank’s sister showed us a scrapbook full of clippings about his escape from Yugoslavia.
Then she went upstairs and returned with a handsome wooden box. Hank opened the box and showed us the headgear he had received from the Saudi King. He even let me put it on and wear it.
We had lunch that day with Hank and his relatives, and before we left, I asked him what was his most memorable flying experience. He said there were actually two flights he would never forget. The first was the raid over Yugoslavia, when his plane was shot down. The other one took place in 1947. He received word that the king wanted his plane at his “summer palace” the next day, for a special, secret flight. The usual procedure was for Hank to greet the king at the door and welcome him aboard.
This flight, however, had special instructions. He was not to greet the king at the door. In fact, he was to stay in the cabin, with the door closed while the passengers boarded.
It was obvious that there was something special about this flight … perhaps a secret meeting with British Prime Minister Clément Atlee, or President Harry Truman, who was closely following developments in the Middle East prior to the creation of the nation of Israel.
Hank did exactly as ordered. He did not greet the king at the door. He stayed in the plane’s cabin, with the door closed. When the flight landed and everyone had deplaned, he restarted the engines and returned to the field where the plane was housed.
He didn’t know until the following day who had been aboard his plane. It was not Clement Atlee. Nor was it President Truman. Instead, Hank had flown the King’s harem from his summer palace to his winter palace. That may have been pretty important for the king, but it was kind of a let down for Hank.
Those wishing to contact Bill Boyd can e-mail him at bill@davidwboyd.com