Coronado, CA. - Fleet Aviation Specialized Operational Training Group, Pacific, presented a photo collage honoring the late Vice Adm. James B. Stockdale to his wife, Sybil, at the Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape (SERE) School aboard Naval Base Coronado March 24.

Photographer’s Mate 2nd Class Kristina D. Harrelson designed the collage to honor Stockdale’s perseverance in the face of extreme and prolonged adversity.

“I admire him for the fortitude he showed during his imprisonment during the Vietnam War,” said Harrelson. “His extraordinary courage was the inspiration behind the collage.”

Shot down over North Vietnam in 1965, Stockdale endured seven years of captivity as a prisoner of war, one of the longest ordeals in American history. Tortured 15 times, he was forced to wear vice-like heavy leg irons for two years and spent four of the seven years of captivity in the total darkness of solitary confinement.

In the summer of 1968, Sybil Stockdale, along with other members of a San Diego POW/MIA Support Group, formed the National League of Families of American Prisoners Missing in Southeast Asia. As the first national coordinator of the league, Sybil helped end a "keep-quiet" policy, resulting in allegations of torture of U.S. prisoners becoming fully public.

“Having Mrs. Stockdale here was truly an honor,” said Capt. Jim Gillcrist, SERE school’s commanding officer. “Her steadfast commitment to her husband and her display of the Navy’s core values got them through a difficult time. They were an incredible team, and she is a hero equal to her husband.”

During the presentation of the collage, Barbara J. Woodbury, a close friend of the Stockdale family and president of the Navy and Marine Association, stood by Sybil’s side and was with her when she returned to the Stockdale home on Coronado Island.

“We had not been in her home for more than three minutes before she was hanging [Petty Officer] Harrelson’s beautiful photo collage tribute to the admiral,” said Woodbury. “It now hangs in her living room where they have lived for all the years since the admiral returned from Vietnam.”

The mission of SERE is to ensure American service members are armed with the confidence, knowledge, and skills required to survive the challenges of isolation in hostile environments.

Training is based on and reinforces the values expressed within the six Articles of the Armed Forces Code of Conduct. The academic and field training instills the needed motivation and dedication to survive hostile isolation and return with honor.