Edward L. Thompson Amateur Radio Operator W3CQS

Edward L. Thompson who had lived in Delmar and then moved his restaurant to Salisbury was an avid Amateur Radio Operator.  He was President of the Delmarva Amateur Radio Club and also an Ensign in a Naval Reserve Unit.  He was part of a rescue mission to Tangier Island in 1936.

In 1936 a hard winter set in and most of the Chesapeake Bay froze over.  Tangier Island and Smith Island were cut off from the world.  A stranded group of about 150 Tangier and Smith Islanders in Crisfield convinced the Maryland State Police that the people on the islands were out of food and in desperate shape.  An ill fated party of 16 set off across the ice dragging two sleds with a ton of food.  They had intended to drag the sleds from Crisfield across five miles of ice to the Coast guard cutter Travis that could take them across open water to the ice shelf formed around Tangier then drag the sleds to the island.   Included in the group was Edward Thompson, who had intended to set up an amateur radio site on the island for communication purposes.  

The group attempted to do this in a blinding snow storm. The ice was so thin in spots the men had to crawl on their stomachs through two and three foot drifts in order not to break though the ice.   The men became so tire that two men were sent ahead to the cutter for help, One, was Edward Thompson and the other was Commander Ernest R Tillet of the Coast Guard.  Both fell through the ice and spent a while in the water trying to get out. Actually Tillet had to rescue Thompson.  After they got back on the ice they returned to the sleds and told the other men all of them would have to return to land.  Eight, including Thompson who was in a bad condition returned to Crisfield.  A number of them dropped from exhaustion and had to be rescued themselves. Maryland State police SGT Wilbert V. Hunter died in this effort.

a better story of this event can be found at;

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/01/04/with-a-blizzard-raging-these-rescuers-set-out-on-a-doomed-mission-for-an-ice-bound-island/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.8233691155d3