Tuesday, May 7, 2024
Sgt. Woodrow F. (Woody) Birckhead, U.S. Marine Corps 7th Regiment/1st Division, poses with his family and his new Quilt of Valor quilt that he received from the Granbury Quilters Guild on June 30.
Woodrow F. (Woody) Birckhead was all smiles when the Granbury Quilters Guild presented him with a Quilt of Valor on Friday, June 30.
A Quilt of Valor is a quality, handmade quilt that is machine or hand quilted. It is awarded to a service member or veteran who has been touched by war, according to qovf.org.
Sgt. Birckhead, U.S. Marine Corps 7th Regiment/1st Division, was a soldier in The Chosin Few — one of the bloodiest battles of the Korean War.
The short-lived battle took place at The Chosin Reservoir in North Korea in 1950, where Cleveland and Akron reservists fought through Chinese forces while also enduring the savage cold — plus frostbite — in one of the coldest Korean winters on record, according to cleveland.com.
“The temperatures were like 35 degrees below zero,” said Gail Olney, member of the Granbury Quilters Guild. “The food that was dropped from the airplanes froze before it hit the ground.”
Birckhead, who was 19 at the time, didn’t even finish high school or attend boot camp before he was thrust immediately into battle.
"They made him a sergeant after the fact because he survived basically,” Olney said. “He hadn't even finished high school and they made him a trainer right away.”
He was also only supposed to be in Korea for nine months — but certain events transpired that made his stay a little longer than intended.
“He actually stayed for 12 months because I think he had some kind of fight with another soldier, but once all that was resolved, he could come back to the states,” Olney said. “He came back to finish high school, which is an interesting thing.”
Olney said when the Granbury Quilters Guild came to present Birckhead with the quilt, he didn’t want to talk about himself. She described him as being a “very cool guy.”
"He was just happy that all his family was there, and kind of going with the flow,” she said.
Olney said a small group of members from the guild work together to sew the Quilts of Valor, with each quilt featuring a different design. This was the eighth quilt that was presented to a local veteran.
“We had to expand our area because we have so many quilts that are finished and we only have a few names of local people — there's like 2,000 veterans that are backlogged of people in the state, so we're going to present one in Fort Worth, one in Stephenville, and one in Alvarado.”
The Granbury Quilters Guild meets at 6 p.m. on the third Monday of the month at the United Co-Op Community Room in Granbury. Workshop days are held the third Thursday of every month from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. in the same location. Visitors are welcome.
For more information, visit the Granbury Quilters Guild Facebook page. To make a Quilts of Valor nomination, visit qovf.org/nominations-awards/.
