Joseph D Thomas is a father and grandfather who lives in Clintonville. But 40 years ago Thomas was fighting in Vietnam. He was wounded there on June 10th, 1970. He came home but never received the honors he was entitled to. That changed Thursday at the Columbus office of Senator Sherrod Brown.
40 years ago, U.S. Army specialist Joseph Thomas was on a hillside somewhere in Vietnam. He cannot recall precisely where; but he does remember the firefight.
"We were attacked," Thomas says. "Company headquarters down below, we could see, was being attacked and all of a sudden there was fire coming up the mountain. Of course we returned the fire. A fellow over to the right of me who I didn't know was killed and the other fellow was actually in the bunker operating the machine gun was injured pretty badly. I was lucky; I escaped with only a minor injury."
Two months later, Thomas was back in the United States; reunited with his family. Later he'd return to school to work on a Master's Degree. He put his Vietnam experiences behind him. He says he forgot about the honors he was entitled to. "I left the country in such a hurry and I think a lot of other soldiers at the time did the same thing; didn't have time to stop and think about awards or whatever," Thomas says.
Thomas should have received the Purple Heart because he was wounded by the enemy. Now a grandfather, he sought the assistance of Sen. Sherrod Brown's office which went to work on Thomas's behalf. On Thursday Senator Brown held an informal awards ceremony where he read a list of all the military honors that, somehow, had passed Thomas by.
Brown says those awards are coming. But he had the most important, the Purple Heart, in hand and he presented it to Thomas.
Later Thomas opened the case to look at his medal that was 40 years late.
"Well it's pretty incredible. I've never been this close to a medal like this before. It's actually got my name and date on the back of it. I'm kind of proud of it," Thomas says.
His sons Joe and Luke attended the ceremony honoring their father who had never mentioned to them that he was wounded in Vietnam. Now he says it's good to be remembered.
"My sons are kind of proud. It's nice to be remembered by your country," says Thomas.