Life History of DuWayne G. Squire - The Short Bitter-Sweet Life of Kirk

You might need to get some tissues ready for this installment of my dad's history.  It is a heart-breaking period early in their marriage.  Their faith in God is evident and helped them endure this incredibly difficult time.

Kirk DuWayne Squire
24 March 1950-14 December 1950

Our first son was born on March 24, 1950, in the Cedar City Hospital. He was about five weeks premature, but he looked so good and healthy, and the Doctor assured us that everything seemed to be just great. When Kirk was born, I ran up and down the hospital corridors yelling, “It’s a boy!” We were so happy, but Helen was in pretty bad shape as she was in labor for a couple of days before Kirk’s birth.

By the time Helen brought the baby home from the hospital, it was apparent that he had unnatural and excessive bowel movements. The doctors at Cedar City treated him until it was apparent that they could not find a proper solution to his problem. At that point, they suggested that we take him to a specialist in Salt Lake City. They recommended a Dr. Snow who grew up in Pine Valley and was now a resident doctor at the LDS Hospital specializing in pediatrics.

We went home and called Dr. Snow’s office and were able to get an appointment for Kirk. Dr. Snow examined Kirk and suggested that we admit him into the LDS Hospital, and he would treat him there. Dr. Snow tested and treated Kirk for a few weeks and was unable to find any cause or cure for Kirk’s problems, and so he suggested that we take Kirk to the Salt Lake County Hospital and have him admitted under the care of the University of Utah doctors. He said they could experiment and perhaps find a solution to Kirk’s problems. Dr. Snow stated that he had exhausted every avenue known to him for a solution, and so from now on it would have to be through experimentation if they found a cure. At this point in our conversation, I asked Dr. Snow if it would be all right for us to take Kirk to a Dr. Wilkinson who was once an M.D. in Hurricane but had since moved to Salt Lake City and ran a clinic which determined diseases through blood tests, and then he treated them with some form of electrical device. Because of his unorthodox type of treatment, the AMA had kicked Dr. Wilkinson out of their Association. When I asked Dr. Snow this question, he flew into a rage and told me that Dr. Wilkinson couldn’t do that child any more good than if he took a light bulb and switched it on and off in front of the child. He further stated in a rage that if we took the baby to Dr. Wilkinson, he would personally see that we would be unable to register our child in any hospital in the state and would see that no doctor would look at the baby ever again. At that point, he stomped out of the baby’s hospital room. The nurse that was in there changing the bedding scolded us by saying, “You shouldn’t have mentioned Dr. Wilkinson’s name in the presence of Dr. Snow.” I said, “Why not, since Dr. Snow just admitted that whatever is ailing Kirk is beyond the knowledge of the medical profession and from now on it will be strictly experimental work if a solution is found to help him.” I further stated that we were very upset because, as we saw it, Dr. Snow had just pronounced a death sentence on our son rather than let us try something not approved by the AMA.

Needless to say, we were too frightened to try Dr. Wilkinson, even though Helen’s mother had been going to him and had experienced miraculous healing. We took Kirk obediently to the Salt Lake County Hospital. Helen stayed at her Uncle Harvey Dalton’s home on Seventh East and Eighth South in Salt Lake and would go to the hospital and spend each day with Kirk. I returned to LaVerkin to my job until I was called into active duty in the 213^th F.A. Battalion on August 3, 1950. We were all loaded on the train at Cedar City and traveled to Ft. Lewis, Washington. Those were weary, lonely days without Helen, especially with the worry of our son’s illness. We had administered to Kirk and had faith that he would be healed. Even though we prayed, “Thy will be done,” the thought never entered our heads that the Lord may choose not to heal Kirk.

Since Helen couldn’t do anything for Kirk except visit him daily, I talked her into coming up to Ft. Lewis to stay with me. I had found a little cottage in the pines just off the base. Helen had our belongings loaded into our 1940 Ford pickup and her father accompanied her to Ft. Lewis. As I recall, she arrived the first part of October, 1950. I was so homesick to see Helen that I could hardly stand it. As you can imagine, we had a joyous reunion. Dad stayed overnight in our one-room cottage, and then we put him on a bus for home.

I believe that from the day Helen arrived, we had rain and fog every day. She became very homesick and worried about our little son lying in a hospital bed in Salt Lake City. The weather being so dreary and my being at the base from 5:00 a.m. to late evening every day added to Helen’s loneliness. She missed being with Kirk, and we were both so worried about him that those were sad days, even though we had each other at night.

About 30 days after Helen arrived in Ft. Lewis, we got a call from the hospital saying that we could come and pick up Kirk. We were so elated as we assumed they must have cured Kirk of his affliction. I was able to get a weekend off, and so we packed up all of our belongings from the cabin and headed for home. It was late evening when I got off work, and so it was rather late when we left Ft. Lewis. By the time we started up the Mt. Rainier or Snoqualomie Pass, it was very dark and snowing heavily.

We thought it unusual that we never came upon any other traffic, either coming or going, but I was so busy trying to keep the Ford pickup from sliding off the road or from spinning out as we were pushing snow with the bumper, that I really didn’t give it much thought. We were petrified at times because the snow was so deep and there weren’t any other tracks to follow. At times, we had to nearly stop to discern which direction the road was heading since all markers were covered by snow. We said prayers that we might be able to make it over the pass without sliding off into one of the deep chasms along the road. We knew that if we stopped completely, we would not be able to get the truck to move again since we didn’t have snow tires or chains.

You will never know how relieved we were when we finally made it over the top of the pass and saw some lights at a café and truck stop. We pulled into the truck stop much to the surprise of everyone there. They inquired as to where we had come from, and when we told them we had just come over the Mt. Rainier or Snoqualomie Pass, they could hardly believe us because the Highway Patrol had stopped traffic due to the heavy snowfall several hours earlier. We knew that the Lord had been with us, but we never could understand how we had passed through the road block.

We arrived in Salt Lake City and went directly to the hospital and picked up our sweet little Kirk. We were very disheartened to find that he had not been cured and that the hospital was releasing him because they had done all that they could do for him.

When I got Helen and Kirk home, I had to leave immediately to catch a bus back to Ft. Lewis, Washington. I was very busy at Ft. Lewis trying to requisition all the spare parts of the OVM (equipment for our obsolete 105 MM Howitzers). I would send in a requisition for hundreds of spare parts and get three or four small parts with all of the other parts marked “out of stock.” I then had to re-requisition all of those out of stock items along with the others that I hadn’t requisitioned as yet. Each Howitzer had a book listing hundreds of spare parts required before taking the units into combat.

In December, 1950, Helen told me that Kirk was so dehydrated and thin from lack of nourishment because of his diarrhea that she had taken him back to Salt Lake. When she got to Salt Lake, she called Dr. Snow. He was very curt with her and practically hung up on her. He said there wasn’t anything he could do, and so he wouldn’t come to see Kirk or let her make an appointment to bring him into his office.

Sometime earlier, Helen had taken Kirk to Dr. Wilkinson and he treated him for a time. After one of the treatments, Kirk became constipated and Helen had to use a suppository to relieve him. At that time, he had a large solid stool—the first one since his birth—but by this time, Kirk’s little body was so emaciated and dehydrated that he just became weaker and weaker. Dr. Wilkinson said he only wished he had been able to treat him earlier as he may have been able to save him. After the rejection by Dr. Snow, Helen called and told me how weak and sick Kirk was and said he had received a priesthood blessing and was promised to live long enough to see his father again.

I went to the commanding officer and asked for time off to go home, and I explained the circumstances to him concerning Kirk’s condition. He told me that he did not have the authority to authorize me time off due to the emergency status of our unit.

I then went to the Red Cross, and they were more sympathetic to my cause and were able to get me an emergency leave. I threw some things in a bag and went over to McChord Air Force Base to see if I could get a ride to Hill Field, Utah. They didn’t have any flights scheduled for Hill Field in the next few days, but they did have a flight going to Great Falls, Montana, They suggested that I take that flight, and then I should be able to get a flight down to Hill Field from there. I took the flight in a cold C-47 sitting with my back to the side of the plane in a canvas seat. Needless to say, I was very uncomfortable and cold, but we arrived at Great Falls to find the airfield covered with snow and a cold, icy wind blowing to greet us. I was informed that there wouldn’t be any flights out until morning, and so they were kind enough to issue me a couple of army blankets and give me a bunk. It was cold in the barracks, and so I spent a very uncomfortable night. I was up at daylight and rushed over to see when I might catch a flight for Hill Field. They told me that Hill Field was completely fogged in and they had no idea when it might lift or when they may try to fly in. I waited until late afternoon, and they told me it didn’t look very promising for the next day or two. I called Helen to report where I was and what the conditions were. She said Kirk was in a terribly weakened condition, and she feared that I may not get there in time to see him alive. I called the commercial airline that served Great Falls and was told there was a flight out the next morning, but it stopped at every little town in Montana and Idaho on the way to Salt Lake. I was unable to get anything with the air force, and so I took the flight. It was very scary to me as we stopped (or landed) on several snow-packed, small runways. It was a small two-engine aircraft. I got into Salt Lake in the late afternoon, and Helen’s Uncle Harvey Dalton came out to the airport and brought me to his home.

When I arrived at the Dalton residence, Helen was there to greet me, and we had a very tearful reunion. When I saw my poor, sick, little Kirk, my heart was broken as I was not prepared to see how much suffering he had gone through to stay alive until I got there. It was almost more than I could bear to see how emaciated and dehydrated his little body was. I held him for a moment, and then Aunt Partha took him while Helen and I went to the basement bedroom where Helen was staying. We knelt down and poured our hearts out to our Father in Heaven, thanking Him for the privilege of having such a sweet little spirit born to us, thanking Him for allowing Kirk to live long enough for us to be prepared to accept the fact that it was His will that he was not to live long upon the earth, and thanking Him for preserving his life long enough for me to see him alive once more. Then we asked that He take Kirk unto Himself that he might not suffer longer. We closed our prayer, came upstairs, and Helen took Kirk from her aunt and held him close to her. Within a couple of minutes, he passed peacefully on. That was December 14, 1950.

Early the next morning, Helen dressed Kirk in his best little suit and placed him on the back seat of our car, and we drove to LaVerkin. Our hearts were heavy and our feelings close to the surface all the way home.

We bought the smallest casket we could find and held a small funeral in LaVerkin. We found that we had so many great friends, and they showered us with great love and comfort. Of course, our families were the greatest and gave us the support we needed at that time.

After the funeral, I had to catch a bus and go right back to Ft. Lewis, Washington, since our unit was preparing to ship out for Korea within the next few days. It was with heavy hearts that Helen and I parted that day.