Gen. Gus Hargett
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He started out as a private in the Tennessee Army National Guard, and 47 years later he’s retiring as a two-star general.
Saturday, Dec. 5, he’ll return to Ripley and his hometown armory, which is named in his honor, to make his final weekend drill where it all began.
Maj. Gen. Gus Hargett, Tennessee’s Adjutant General, hangs up his uniform early next month after a long and distinguished military career that has taken him across the United States and around the world many times.
Hargett of Murfreesboro will be moving to Washington, D.C., where he has been selected as president of the National Guard Association of the United States, an organization that is literally the voice of the National Guard around the world.
He first raised his hand to be sworn into the Tennessee National Guard on Aug. 31, 1962, and began his career as a private in Ripley’s then A Company, 3/117th Infantry Battalion. Back then it was part of the 30th Division. He served as an enlisted infantry soldier until commissioned an infantry officer in 1966.
The tattered guidon of A Company, 3/117 still hangs framed in his office today.
Maj. Gen. Hargett acknowledges that his final weekend drill in the Ripley armory will be an emotional time for him.
“So many good things have happened to me over the years, starting right in my hometown,” Hargett said. “I’ve known so many fine Soldiers and Airmen, and their families, throughout almost five decades now, and it all comes rushing over me unexpectedly from time to time.”
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