Staff-Sergeant Albert Edward Hodgson
Unit : 225th Parachute Field Ambulance, RAMC
Army No. : 7345316
Awards : Military Medal
Corporal Hodgson was on parachute course 37 at R.A.F. Ringway, October - November 1942. Promoted to Staff-Sergeant, he participated in the Rhine Crossing on the 24th March 1945, and, for his actions, was recommended for the Military Medal by his commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Hewlings. The award was listed in the London Gazette on the 21st June 1945, and Hodgson received the medal from the King at an investiture at Buckingham Palace on the 28th June. His citation reads:
During the Allied Airborne landings on the East of the Rhine on 24th March 1945, Staff-Sergeant Hodgson was the N.C.O. in charge of an R.A.M.C. Section, whose task it was to clear the casualties from the landing zone near Hamminkeln after the parachute landing by 5th Parachute Brigade.
Immediately after the landings the area was being most heavily shelled and mortared and swept with machine gun fire, in a desperate attempt by the enemy to destroy the airborne troops before they were completely organised. It was at this time that Staff-Sergeant Hodgson was collecting his men, organising them into bearer parties and directing the collection of casualties to a Casualty Collection Point. He was repeatedly going out on to the open dropping zone himself in charge of a party of stretcher bearers. At one time a glider which had just landed became the target of enemy mortar fire. One man who escaped from the glider and ran to the Casualty Collection Point, reported two killed and three wounded still in the glider. Staff-Sergeant Hodgson at once collected a party and led them to the glider. Three times he led his party running out to the glider in spite of the heavy and accurate mortar fire directed upon it, and he succeeded in bringing all the wounded men to the Casualty Collection Point alive. This N.C.O's coolness and devotion to duty, always totally regardless of his own safety, not only contributed very largely to saving the lives of many wounded men, but also a fine example and inspiration to the men under his command.
My thanks to Bob Hilton for this account.