24/10/2026
Special Operations Executive (SOE):
We remember Lieutenant Colonel Ernest Hugo Meggeson Hood.
Ernest Hugo Meggeson Hood was born in 1915, Burnby, Pocklington, Yorkshire. He was the son of Ernest William Hood and Alice Annie Pottage. Ernest would become an English war hero and a first-class cricketer for Somerset. He also became a school teacher in Somerset.
He joined the Somerset Light Infantry as 2nd Lieutenant in the reservists. He then was made Captain in Gibraltar in 1942; he then transferred to the Special Operations Executive (SOE) which parachuted military behind enemy lines. He joined Operation Jedburgh and was parachuted into France near Dijon. Late in WW2 he took part in three similar missions in Burma codenamed Operations Cheetah, Zebra, and Mongoose. In first of these he led his troops through 120 miles of jungle. He was awarded the Distinguished Award of Honour and the citation stated that in Operation Cheetah he had inflicted 616 casualties on the enemy, losing only five of his own men in the process; he was also awarded the Croix de Guerre for his SOE work in France.
Ernest Hood retired from the British Army with the rank Lieutenant-Colonel. He did apply for other public service jobs, but his health was not great however, he remained in Military Reserve List till 1965. He returned to teaching French and geography at Scarborough College and also coaching hockey and cricket teams. He did play for Scarborough Cricket club.
In 1960 he married Iona M Baker, Scarborough, Yorkshire.
On 11th July 1968 he was hit by a car near the school where he taught and he died from his injuries in hospital three weeks later aged 52.
