OLD FASHIONED LOVE
Cyril and Gene: The Story of a War Hero and His Christmas Bride
story by JENNIFER BROWN-CARPENTER
It’s that time of year when Hallmark Christmas movies fill our screens, couples kiss under the mistletoe. We cuddle together to keep warm in the cold, and gifts are picked out with great care for the ones we love. From December to February, the air is filled with romance. That was just as true 75 years ago as it is today.
Gene Daughtry was living in a little town about an hour outside of Savannah, Georgia, in the summer of 1941. She was reading the Savannah Morning News one day when she came across an advertisement of sorts. Three young men in the Marine Corps, currently stationed on Midway Island, were looking for letters from home. She picked a name and sent off a letter, fulfilling her patriotic duty. Cyril Frank Hamm, (born in Nova Scotia, Canada, but then currently a resident of Medford, Massachusetts), wrote back. They exchanged information about their hometowns, their families, their hobbies, etc. Gene was one of 7 children, living on a farm, working at a five and dime store in town. Cyril was one of 3 children, very intellectual, loved motorcycles, and had joined the Marine Corps at 15.
Over the next few months, their letters were sent back and forth as quickly as they could get from one to the other, until December 7th. The date which will live in infamy. Cyril was stationed at Pearl Harbor when it was bombed. He was not injured but was radio silent to Gene until mid-January of 1942 when he wrote: “Dear Gene, Well I received your letter a few days ago, but under existing circumstances, this is the first opportunity I have had to reply.” That was the only mention he ever made in his many letters of that day perhaps because he didn’t want to relive it at the time, and perhaps, in large part, because of censoring.
Gene and Cyril exchanged photographs of themselves with each other. They kept up the long-distance correspondence for the next 2.5 years while Cyril moved from Hawaii to Midway to the Pacific Ocean and finally, in the summer of 1944, to Saipan.
In July of 1944, after three years of writing, Cyril had his mother mail Gene an engagement ring. Gene wrote Cyril to describe the ring, closing out her letter by saying: “And every day, I think of you all the time and hope that it won’t be too long until you can take a peek at the ring, and share in all my happiness.”
Five days after Gene wrote the letter, on July 25th, a hand grenade exploded in front of Cyril, and the shrapnel flew into his legs. He was moved from Saipan to New Caledonia for surgery, and from there to California for more surgeries. He spent the next several months lying in a hospital bed while his legs healed. He would walk with a limp for the rest of his life. Cyril was honorably discharged and awarded the Purple Heart.
He finally made it home, back to Medford, to Mom and Pops as he called his parents. And in November of 1944, he decided to hitchhike down to Georgia to see “Jeanie with the light brown hair.” He arrived the Monday after Thanksgiving, November 26th, and on December 2nd, six days after finally meeting in person, Cyril and Gene were married at the courthouse in Sylvania, Georgia.
Shortly after their wedding, Cyril moved Gene up to Medford to be with his parents while he went back to California for more surgeries. Over the next 40 years, they would have three children and five grandchildren together. Cyril became a Methodist minister, and they moved all over South Carolina while he preached. Swansea, Clio, Yemassee, and McBee were all towns they called “home” over the years. But eventually, they settled in Brunson and welcomed a great-grandchild in 1987.
Cyril passed away from a heart attack in 1989. Gene went on to live for 20 more years and saw all of her great-grandchildren be born. All through those years, she kept a small shoebox, full to the brim, of the letters that Cyril wrote to her from 1941 to 1944. And sitting on her bathroom counter was always a little calendar with the date permanently set on July 27th, 1989, the day Cyril had passed away.
Gene passed away in March of 2009 and is greatly missed by her family. The story of Cyril and Gene lives on in their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren. And this time of year, filled with romance and all things love, always reminds us of the Georgia girl who married the Marine 75 years ago this December. Their love story truly is better than the movies.
