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Retired Walnut Hill VFD Chief Robert Stewart Passes Away

Retired Walnut Hill Volunteer Fire Department Chief Robert Stewart passed away Sunday surrounded by loved ones at his home in Bratt after a battle with cancer. He was 62.

Stewart retired as the department’s chief in 2008 after 30 years of service as a volunteer fireman in Bratt and Walnut Hill, the last 15 of those years as chief of the Walnut Hill Volunteer Fire Department. He retired to spend more time with his grandson “Little Man” and to fight cancer. He later became active again in the department as his health permitted.

Stewart answered his first fire call in 1967 after the formation of the Bratt Volunteer Fire Department. The Walnut Hill Ruritan Club founded the Walnut Hill Volunteer Fire Department in 1964 and donated a  truck to form the Bratt department three years later.

For 10 years, he served the Bratt community as a volunteer fireman until Bratt VFD’s truck finally “wore out”. Walnut Hill and the Atmore Fire Department began answering calls in the Bratt community in 1977.

He was out of a volunteer fire department for about 10 years, until he joined the Walnut Hill VFD in 1987. For 21 straight years, he served the Walnut Hill department — the last 15 of those years as chief.

Visitation will be Tuesday, May 8 from 6-9 p.m. at at the Petty-Eastside Chapel Funeral Home. Funeral services will be held Wednesday, May 9 at 10 a.m. at at the Petty-Eastside Chapel Funeral Home. Graveside services will follow at Godwin Cemetery in Bratt.

Reprinted below are portions of an earlier story and interview with Robert Stewart after his retirement.

“1501 enroute”

March 9, 2001, was the beginning of what Stewart said was the most memorable call of his career.

The call was not far from Stewart’s house. It was a single vehicle accident, car versus a tree, on Highway 99 near Oakshade Road. When Stewart arrived, he and the other members of the WHVFD found a small sports car, literally cut in half,  two pieces of car on the side of the highway. Inside, the passenger was not seriously injured.

But the driver, a 16-year old local girl, was gravely injured. Her leg was partial severed, a major artery cut. Her situation was worse than serious. In fact, she coded at least twice before arriving at the hospital. “Coded”, as in “code blue”, as in cardiac arrest. But Stewart and the rest of the emergency workers that day worked hard to get this young lady on LifeFlight.

In the end, she lost her leg, but she survived. Today, she’s a healthy, happily married 27-year old mother.

“I’ve been to a lot of bad wrecks,” Stewart said. “Sometime, people die. It’s always a good call when you can help someone that doesn’t die.”

But two words made this wreck different than many for the chief.

“Thank you.”

From death’s door, the young girl was able to return to tell Stewart and the rest of the Walnut Hill Volunteer Fire Department “thank you”.

“Sometimes they come back to tell you ‘thank you’,” he said. “It makes you feel good, and you know your department has accomplished something, when they came back to thank you.”

There have been others to return to thank the department over the years. But Valerie Baker’s accident just sticks out in Stewart’s memory.

“The ‘thank you’ means a lot, especially when they came to the department and thank everyone,” he said. “It just means a lot.”

“Not a Hero”

Stewart said he doesn’t consider himself a hero. The Walnut Hill volunteers are team, he said, with everyone working together to help the community.

He was labeled a  hero at least once. It was another wreck, this one on State Line Road. A car was upside down in a water-filled ditch with three children inside. Stewart was the first on the scene, responding from his nearby home.

“I managed to get the door open and got the three children out of the ditch,” he said. “Their mom called me a hero. I was just doing my job.”

Cat In Tree? Been there, done that. Twice.

It’s a scene that’s usually in a children’s program…the fireman rescues the cute little kitty cat from a tree. But in real life, it’s not exactly so pretty.

One cat-in-a-tree call was on Highway 97 several years ago. 1501 and his wife, Diann Stewart (a.k.a. 1503) responded to the call.

“She ran the ladder up the tree,” he said. “I knew what I was in for. I put on a bunker coat, and gloves before going up to the cat.”

“The ole cat just froze on the tree,” Stewart said with a chuckle. “I needed both hands to peel it off the tree. It stuck like Velcro on that tree. I had to keep peeling that ole cat off the tree.”

The second time Stewart responded to a cat-in-a-tree call, he was perhaps a bit smarter. He sent his son Sam Stewart, also a volunteer fireman, up the tree. This call was at the home of a local pastor. The pastor told them to drop the cat, and drop it Sam did. The can landed on a lower limb of the tree, uninjured.

Scary Stuff

“When my youngins were in school, I did not like it when you’d get a call in the direction they were suppose to be coming from,” he said. “You were always it afraid it was going to be one of yours.”

“When you live up here, you are kin to somebody,” he said. “You always care about who it is.”

A Time To Work, A Time To Play

Stewart was quick to thank all of those that have volunteered with the Walnut Hill VFD over the years. And he expressed his thanks to the other volunteer fire departments in the area the assisted Walnut Hill, as well the county deputies, state troopers and others he worked with for years.

The biggest thanks went to those Walnut Hill Volunteer Fire Department members, a group he said he always enjoyed being around.

“I had the best bunch of firemen in the county he said, “and when they were done working and got ready to play, I had the biggest bunch of youngins in the county.”

“1501 Completed Assignment”

“It’s hard not to answer a call,” he said. The fire department pager still goes off in the Stewart home, alerting them of emergency calls. Diann remains with the Walnut Hill VFD as an EMT. “After 20 years, it’s hard not to go help someone.”

“I just always tried to help.”

Funeral arrangements for Robert Stewart are incomplete at this time.

Pictured top: Retired Walnut Hill Volunteer Fire Department Chief Robert Stewart and his grandson Drew (”Little Man”) Kennedy watch from the sidelines at an accident on Pine Barren Road. Pictured top inset: Stewart receives a large plaque with his helmet during a retirement reception. Pictured bottom inset, Stewart is honored by the Walnut Hill VFD. Pictured below: Robert Stewart teaches fire safety to students at Bratt Elementary School in October 2011. NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge.