Russell “Bill’’ Hunt of Milford was a U.S. Army Ranger in Sicily during World War II. Hunt died at a

War hero was tall timber in Milford

Frank Juliano, Staff Writer

Published: 04:31 p.m., Thursday, December 30, 2010

http://www.ctpost.com/local/article/War-hero-was-tall-timber-in-Milford-928842.php

• Russell “Bill’’ Hunt of Milford was a U.S. Army Ranger in Sicily during World War II. Hunt died at age 92 on Sept. 27, 2010. He was a descendent of Miles Merwin, an original founder of Milford. Photo: Contributed Photo / Connecticut Post Contributed
  Russell “Bill’’ Hunt of Milford was a U.S. Army Ranger in...
• Russell “Bill’’ Hunt and his wife Justine. Hunt died at age 92 on Sept. 27, 2010. He was a descendent of Miles Merwin, an original founder of Milford.

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MILFORD -- Russell "Bill'' Hunt came home from World War II a hero, but he didn't like to talk about it. Instead, he put up a flagpole in front of the house he built for his family and flew the American flag every day until his final illness. When Hunt died at 92 on Sept. 27, his family went out into the yard and lowered the flag to half staff.
Inside his home, an official framed, yellowed citation hangs on his living room wall. Though Hunt didn't like to talk about what earned him the citation while he was a U.S. Army Ranger stationed in Sicily during World War II, the citation given to him by his commanding officer explains his bravery.
It states that Hunt's section had been separated from the rest of the company near Gela, Sicily, on July 12, 1943.
"Sergeant Hunt's men were in danger of being annihilated by heavy crossfire. He gathered his men in the safest place he could find. His courage and initiative under heavy enemy fire prevented casualties among his men," it reads.
It wasn't the only time Hunt showed bravery during the war.
Another time, the 23-year-old was seriously wounded when he was hit by shrapnel in his chest.
"They usually had to leave you on the field to die, but somebody saved his life," Justine Hunt, his wife, said. "He never knew who it was, but they gave Bill the Purple Heart."
Justine said members of his unit were surprised to see him at reunions.
"They all thought he had been killed in action," she said.
An 11th-generation descendant of Miles Merwin, one of the founders of Milford, Hunt had deep roots in the town. But he didn't mind uprooting things. During a 30-year career as a rigger he was involved in a project to relocate the famous Block Island Lighthouse.
"The beach was eroding under it and Dad helped to move it further back," said April Hunt, his daughter. His company, Milford Building Movers, also had a contract in the 1950s to relocate houses that stood in the way of Interstate 95, she said.
Tim Hunt, 55, recalled that his father would come home filthy from that job each night. "Somehow he was the one who crawled underneath the houses -- a lot of them had no basements -- and hitch them up. They'd put the house on a truck and drive it somewhere.''
Bill Hunt also left Milford on several adventures, the first when he and two friends drove across the country in 1936 with just $100 among them.
"That wasn't a successful trip because he'd gone out there because he wanted to fight wildfires in California and there wasn't any work,'' said Justine Hunt.
Earlier, he had joined the Civilian Conservation Corps, hoping that the Roosevelt-era jobs agency would send him to California.
"He ended up somewhere in northwest Connecticut," his wife said. "But at least there were trees there."
Bill Hunt loved trees and in retirement was a volunteer for Milford Trees Inc., a private group that once counted every tree on public property in Milford. "In the hurricane in 1986, we lost 36 trees out in back of our house, and he was really upset about that," April Hunt said. "But we had firewood for the whole winter."
Hunt saved several large branches from the ash trees in the yard and taught himself to weave baskets in the same way that the Paugussett Indians would have done.
"I have great respect for anyone who can make an authentic basket," said naturalist Tim Chaucer, head of Milford's Gulf Pond Museum. "I had no idea that anyone could do that until he showed me how he'd separate the wood at the rings into splints, like the Indians had done it 400 years ago."
Bill was also active in the volunteer fire department. He was a member of the Woodmont Volunteer Fire Department for many years. When the city switched to paid firefighters in the 1980s, Bill helped the volunteers by making the clam chowder the group sold at festivals.
When he wasn't tending to the trees or cooking chowder, Hunt enjoyed spending time with his athletic children, building them a basketball court with a paved playing surface in the yard of his Brewster Road home.
"We had a chart out there where we'd keep our stats: how many shots in a row we made or how many one-one-one games we won," April said.
April Hunt, 52, went on to earn the first full athletic scholarship given to a Milford woman. She played for the University of Wisconsin in the early 1970s and is in the Connecticut Women's Basketball Hall of Fame.
One of her brothers, Russell, played basketball at Furman University in South Carolina on an athletic scholarship and was invited to tryouts with the NBA Chicago Bulls.
"He decided to get married instead," April said.
Bill and Justine Hunt were married for 62 years and raised eight children together.
"He was good friends with my brother and one night right after the war he called the house looking for him," Justine recalled. "I told him that my brother wasn't home but if he was looking for someone to drink beer with, that I was old enough."






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