After three weeks of captivity by Iraqi insurgents, American Thomas Hamill walked free when his guards apparently fled from an approaching U.S. Army patrol, soldiers who found him said Monday.
One of the soldiers, 2nd Lt. Joseph Merrill, said his platoon was looking for a break in an oil pipeline near Balad when Hamill approached them from a nearby farmhouse, waving his shirt and shouting that he was an American prisoner.
“He came out in the field, and he actually took his shirt off and waved his shirt in the air,” Merrill said. “As he got closer, we heard he was speaking English.”
[…]
Hamill’s cousin, Jason Higginbotham, said Hamill told him he had given his captors the slip days earlier — only to turn back when he failed to draw the attention of a passing American helicopter.“He said he escaped one time about three days earlier, and he was out in the middle of the desert,” Higginbotham said.
“A helicopter came over, and he tried to flag it down, but it evidently didn’t see him. So he decided you know — he didn’t have any food and water — and he’d more than likely die in the desert trying to make it on his own, and they were taking pretty good care of him. So he went and put himself back in captivity without them knowing.”
Anyone else smell a rat?
I’ll float this theory: The Iraqis turned Hamill loose when the Americans pulled out of Fallujah and he’s been hiding out ever since, scared witless that some mujahideen will shoot him. Oh, and those Iraqis some reports had as being captured by the brave American soldiers on the pipeline patrol?
A U.S. military spokesman says Hamill identified himself and led the soldiers to the house, where two Iraqis with an automatic weapon were arrested on Sunday.
Another version:
When Mr Hamill escorted the platoon back to the empty mud shack, soldiers found an AK-47 rifle, apparently discarded by the fleeing guard.
Troops arrested a pair of Iraqi men farming in an adjacent field, Lt Merrill said. The two Iraqis are being questioned.
The soldiers, who were assigned to Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 108th Infantry, and task organized to my brigade combat team, are from the New York National Guard. They secured Mr. Hamill, who then led them to the house where he had been held captive. The patrol conducted an immediate search of the house where Mr. Hamill was held, where they detained two males and seized one AK-47 rifle. There were no U.S. or Iraqi casualties in this operation
The wife’s version:
Kellie Hamill said her husband told her that he was locked in a building and heard the troops driving by. He “pried the door open. He said he ran half a mile down the road and caught up with the convoy.
“Isn’t that something?” she said.
Soldiers then went back to the house and arrested two Iraqis and confiscated an AK-47 rifle, the military said.
Yeah, that’s something, allright.
Some three weeks later, Hamill’s captors took him to a mud farmhouse near the town of Balad, 50 miles north of Baghdad.
The door to Hamill’s room was a piece of sheet metal propped up by a board. Hamill, of Macon, Miss., told soldiers he believed a single guard was nearby, but out of sight.
About 11:15 a.m. Sunday, soldiers from the New York National Guard’s 2nd Battalion, 108th Infantry Regiment drove their Humvees along a stretch of road next to a broken oil pipeline.
When Hamill heard the Humvees, he knocked over the sheet metal, pried open the doors of the shack and ran about 300 yards toward the convoy.
”He said he thought this was the only chance he had, so he made a run for it,” said Merrill, of Deposit, N.Y. ”He said he didn’t know if the guard was there or not.”
Four soldiers who described the escape refused to answer questions about Hamill’s time in captivity.
Merrill, who spent less than two hours with the former hostage, said Hamill was disoriented but in good health. He had just one bottle of water and didn’t know exactly where he was.
”He was obviously very glad to see us,” Merrill said.
Hamill escorted the platoon back to the shack, which was empty. Soldiers found an abandoned AK-47. A military photo taken in the shack showed his bed arranged on a couple of couch cushions on the dirt floor, with a blanket tossed over them. A bucket served as his latrine.
The Mississippi man told soldiers he’d been well treated by his captors, who gave him a rudimentary medical kit, a box of cookies and an oil lamp.
Troops arrested two Iraqis farming in a field near the shack, Merrill said.
So, take your pick. I’m sticking with my theory.
UPDATE _ From the Washington Post:
The soldiers of Charlie Company put Hamill in a Humvee, gave him water and offered him food, which he declined.
Soon afterward, they accompanied Hamill back to the shack where he had been held. They surrounded the house and found only a bed and some water and food inside.
The soldiers found an AK-47 assault rifle in a grassy area outside the shack and detained two Iraqi men walking nearby, but a military spokesman said the men may not have been involved in Hamill’s abduction. The soldiers said they believed that one of Hamill’s captors fled, leaving the weapon, after seeing that Hamill had escaped and made contact with the soldiers.
[…]
It was not clear how Hamill was taken dozens of miles from Abu Ghraib to the shack near Samarra. Before leaving for Germany, he declined requests for an interview.The soldiers did say that they asked Hamill why he had not escaped earlier.
Forbes said Hamill told them he ” ‘could have escaped a bunch of times, but where am I going to go? One bottle of water, where am I going?’ No map, nothing. He stayed there and hoped that somebody would come by. That was his plan.”