The Early Years
(12 Jul 1921 -
28 Jan 1942)
Army Air Forces
(28 Jan 1942 -
1 Aug 1943)
Post Ploesti
(2 Aug 1943 -
Present)
Official MOH Citations:
2nd Lt. Lloyd H. Hughes
(Lloyd "Pete" Herbert Hughes, Jr. - 12 Jul 1921 - 1 Aug 1943)
Source: Personal papers. Newspaper article found pasted in a book belonging to Mary Margaret Baucom. The newspaper article is of unknown origin, but is probably from one of the Corpus Christi newspapers, although it may even have been printed in the college newspaper. It must be dated after 26 Feb 1944, when Pete was awarded the Medal of Honor.
Keeping Up With Exes
By Dorothy Thompson
Occasionally we catch ourselves wondering what has happened to some of our former friends and classmates. Some of have distinguished themselves sufficiently to merit publicity in the local paper and we get the chance to see what they are doing; other are important in their jobs and to their family, but we don’t get the opportunity to hear from them; many move away to find their place in this world; and some are lost to us forever. From conversations with friends, parent and neighbors of ex-students of Del Mar College, the tained (sic - ?).
Comparatively few ex-students may be aware that a former Del Mar student won the nation’s highest award for gallantry in wartime, the Congressional Medal of Honor. Lloyd D. (Pete) Hughes (sic - Lloyd H.), who was killed in action during the famous bombing raid over Ploesti, Romania, on August 1, 1943, received the award posthumously.
He was a student at Corpus Christi Junior College in 1940-41 and had attended high school in Refugio. He went on to Texas A&M and was later commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U. S. Army Air Corps as a pilot.
Hughes and a friend, Robert L Wright, were the last pilots to join the “Sky Scorpions,” a group in the ninth Bombing Command in North Africa, before the raid on Ploesti. This was an area tagged at the “taproots of German might, because of the great refineries that that provided fuel for Hitler’s war machines. The raid named the “Tidal Wave,” would feature bombers coming in at tree-tip level and, if successful should shorten the war by as much as six months. Hughes’ plane, though hit and leaking gasoline, delivered its load of bombs on target, but the huge bomber had become a blowtorch. Three men survived the subsequent crash, but Hughes died with seven other men (sic - see below).
The Medal of Honor was awarded to Hughes for his act in keeping his flaming plane on course to deliver its explosive load, realizing that he had but little chance to survive.
Corrections:
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His name was Lloyd "Pete" Herbert Hughes.
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Pete was in the Army Air Forces, not the U.S. Army Air Corps.
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Robert Lee Wright, Pete’s wingman and roommate, said that the 389th Bomb Group were never known as the “Sky Scorpions.” (source: Philip Wright, son of Robert Lee Wright)
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There were ten crew members: Six died in the crash, two died of their wounds within days and two survived to become prisoners of war.
Last updated: December 22, 2008
