Harry Swofford

Harry Swofford This morning, March 1, 2017, the rays of the Abilene sun shone through the shades in the bedroom and while listening to the Spirit of Aggieland, surrounded by his children who love him, he departed to be with his Lord. A celebration of life memorial service for Harry Swofford of Abilene will be held at 3 to 5 pm Sunday, March 5, 2017, at The Hamil Family Funeral Home, 6449 Buffalo Gap Road in Abilene, Texas. Graveside service will be 11:00 am, Monday, March 6, 2017 at the Texas State Veterans Cemetery at Abilene. Harry was born in Abilene on October 19, 1922 to Harry Swofford Sr and Zelma Mae Brazile. The family moved with the construction of the National Highway system in Texas eventually ending in El Paso, Texas, where Dad finished high school at 16 and was a Major in the ROTC program. During the years, he spent time on his Uncle Walton W. Harral's ranch at Ft Stockton and learned ranching and livestock management. Choosing to pursue a vocation in ranching, he enrolled at Texas A&M College in 1940. In August of that year, he hitchhiked to College Station from Ft Stockton. In 1943 with the US at war with the Axis powers, his junior class joined en masse to join the war effort. Harry then was sent to Camp Campbell, Kentucky and the 20th Armored Division. In February of 1945, the Division was deployed to the ETO. Promoted to the rank of First Lieutenant, he landed in LeHavre and marched across France to Aachen, and crossed the Rhine at Khoenigswintr. Co A of the 9th Tank Battalion raced across southern Germany, to Nuremburg, Liberating Dachau, then to Munich, across the Inn at Wassenburg and then into Saltzburg. His tank fired the first shots across Dachau signaling the prisoners at KZ Dachau that the US Army had arrived and their liberation was at hand. The German high command was clear that the speed of advancing US Armored forces was a major factor in the fall of the Reich. His Division was then ordered to redeploy to San Diego to support the invasion Japan when the US dropped the first nuclear bombs on mainland Japan thus ending that tragic war. Returning to College Station, he completed his education and married Henrian Engbrock of LaGrange, Texas on Christmas of 1945. Upon graduation, he went to work for Matheson Fertilizer Company and moved to McAllen, Texas where he worked in the agro business for two decades before moving to Lubbock, Texas. After leaving Occidental Chemical Company, he started a number of small companies namely Poncho Peanuts, Ag Transport, Ag West Transport and others. He retired in 1995 to his hometown Abilene, Texas. In Abilene, always a dedicated Aggie, he engaged in the Abilene, Texas A&M Club. He attended Holy Family Catholic Church. In retirement, he travelled to Europe and throughout the United States in his black Mustang…"STANG". He is dearly missed by his surviving children, Harriet and husband Gene Becker, from Victoria, Don and wife Cynnie Davis who live in Charlottesville, Virginia and Dr. Mary Beth Swofford from San Antonio.