67 years after it was earned, a soldier gets his Bronze Star

Longtime Honolulu attorney Arthur Ross never talked much about his military service in World War II, including fighting in the Battle of the Bulge, a German offensive in which 19,000 Americans were killed, 47,500 were wounded, and 23,000 were declared missing.

He is known more as a defense attorney, and at the age of 87, as a one-time mentor to other lawyers, including Mayor Peter Carlisle, who met Ross when Carlisle was an intern in the city prosecutor’s office, where Ross then worked.

A wartime contribution that was overlooked for 67 years was corrected Wednesday, with Ross receiving a Bronze Star for "exceptionally meritorious service" for his actions in the Ardennes, Central Europe and Rhineland campaigns of World War II.

Maj. Gen. Stephen Tom, the commander of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command and another attorney who leaned on Ross for advice years ago, pinned the red-ribboned Bronze Star onto Ross’ blazer in a ceremony outside JPAC’s headquarters at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam.

Ross, who has battled cancer that forced his retirement from law in 2008, told about 175 people present, including Carlisle, that "this award and ceremony is truly a proud and meaningful moment in my life — and an unexpected one at that."

Ross was awarded the Combat Infantryman Badge and Purple Heart for injuries suffered in the Battle of the Bulge. He was discharged from the Army on Jan. 3, 1946, but didn’t know that soldiers awarded the combat badge also were eligible for the Bronze Star.

Tom Farrell, a fellow attorney and retired Army Reserve colonel, put in paperwork for the Bronze Star without Ross’ knowledge.

"He wondered why I asked him for his discharge papers," Farrell said.

Farrell said Ross, who was wounded in the hand, also suffered frostbite and pneumonia. He was evacuated to a hospital for five weeks, and then returned to the front lines.

Ross, who was with the 26th Infantry Division, described the winter fighting as "terrible," adding, "It was absolutely freezing and you didn’t know what was going to happen. They (the Germans) were entrenched in the city and we were told to dislodge them."

Carlisle said he has known Ross since 1976 when Carlisle was a law student intern in the city prosecutor’s office. Ross ended up being supervisor of the office’s appellate division.

"Art was a very energetic, entertaining guy who felt strongly about the work that he was doing," Carlisle said of those days. "And once he felt strongly about something, he put his whole heart into it."