Smith - Beyond glory: Medal of Honor heroes in their own words: extraordinary stories of courage from World War II to Vietnam

Copyright 2003 by Larry Smith

All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
First published as a Norton paperback 2004

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Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

Smith, Larry

Beyond glory : Medal of Honor heroes in their own words : extraordinary stories of courage from World War II to Vietnam / Larry Smith.

p. cm.

ISBN 0-393-05134-X (hardcover)

1. Medal of HonorBiography. 2. United StatesArmed ForcesBiography. 3. United StatesBiography. 4. Oral history.
I. Title.

UB433.S65 2003

355'.0092'273dc21 2003002214

ISBN 0-393-32562-8 pbk.

ISBN 978-0-393-24322-2 (e-book)

W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.
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FOR

The Blonde Bombshell, and Stacey, Jennifer, and Stephen

CHARACTER ISOLATED BY A DEED TO ENGROSS THE PRESENT AND DOMINATE MEMORY.

W. B. Yeats,
The Circus Animals Desertion

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION
General H. Norman Schwarzkopf (U.S. Army, Retired)

THE EXACT WORDS from the citation of a Medal of Honor recipient state: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity, at the risk of life above and beyond the call of duty. Those last words are particularly meaningful: above and beyond the call of duty.

Duty. Robert E. Lee used that word in explaining why he had to leave the Union Army and go into the Confederate Army. He said, Duty is the sublimest word of them all. Lee was a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, the institution I also attended. Its motto is Duty, Honor, Country.

Over the years Ive met many people who were heroes, and the interesting thing Ive found about every single one of them, bar none, was that they did not think of themselves as heroes.

They would say things like I couldnt leave my buddy out there. I couldnt do that. Or, someone would say, Those bastards were shooting at us, and I was going to shoot back before one of my men got hurt. Or, Shucks, sir, it was my duty.

They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Well, valor is also in the eye of the beholder. Not one of the people who hold the Medal of Honor said at the time he took action, Well, I think Im getting ready to carry out a heroic act. Absolutely not.

In the minds of every single one of them at that time was something like Gosh, Ive got to do it, because its my duty to my country. Not even that. Rather, Its my duty to my outfit. And not even that. Its my duty to my buddy on my right, or my buddy on my left. Thats what it was all about, as the stories in this volume will show. Thats truly what it was all about.

And somebody elsethe recipients probably dont even know to this day whosaw them do it. And said, Theres a hero. And truly the recipients of this great award, I am sure, even to this day would say, Gosh, it was just my duty. It was just my job. It was just my buddy. It was just my outfit. I had to do it. And thats what makes them heroes in my mind.

The men who tell their stories in this bookindeed, all the recipients of the Medal of Honorembody the sense of duty in its deepest form.

We thank them for doing their duty in serving their country.

THE UNITED STATES BEGAN its existence with virtually no decorations for military valor. The Founding Fathers distrusted the trappings of aristocracy and monarchy, given the kind of class system that had existed under the British. In 1792, however, George Washington created something called the Badge of Military Merit, shaped like a heart in purple cloth, but it was seldom awarded.

Indeed, it wasnt until the Civil War that Congress felt the need for additional recognition. An Iowa senator introduced a bill in December of 1861 to promote the efficiency of the navy, authorizing among other things the award of a medal of honor to soldiers and sailors who displayed gallantry in action. President Abraham Lincoln signed the measure into law on December 21, 1861.

The Navy came up with the first medal; the Army followed soon after. The original award was intended for enlisted personnel and noncoms but then was extended to include officers. The first medals were awarded to six Union soldiers who tried to hijack a Confederate locomotive in 1862. By the time the war ended, 1,520 medals had been awarded. A typical award was to a soldier who captured an enemy flag on the battlefield. Lincoln also offered the medal to all those of a Union regiment, the 27th Maine Infantry, who were willing to reenlist. Because of a clerical error, all eight hundred men in the regiment were awarded the medal. These medals came to be revoked, as were those awarded to twenty-nine officers and enlisted men who traveled with Lincolns remains to Illinois, as well as a medal that had been held by William F. Cody, also known as Buffalo Bill, an Army scout. These actions were taken in 1917 by a military commission that altogether rescinded about a thousand medals. The only woman ever to receive the medal, a Civil War doctor named Mary Walker, also saw her award revoked, although it ultimately was reinstated in a measure signed by Jimmy Carter in 1977.

Following the Civil War, 423 medals were awarded to soldiers, many of them blacks, fighting Indians on the western frontier. Up until the Spanish American War in 1898, the Navy had given 128 medals to sailors and marines, often for the rescue of someone who had fallen overboard and who was in danger of drowning. It was so freely given because it was the only medal we had.

Finally, during World War I, the Army created several new decorations to recognize varying degrees of accomplishment. Just below the Medal of Honor came the Distinguished Service Cross and then the Silver Star. In turn, the Navy created the Navy Cross and the Silver Star. In 1932, Washingtons Badge of Military Merit was revived as the Purple Heart, awarded to those wounded or killed in action.

The principal criteria for receiving the Medal of Honor have to do with displaying intrepidity at the risk of life above and beyond the call of duty in military action. The deed must be conspicuous, with incontestable proof of performance. Despite these qualifications, the Congress in the 1920s awarded Medals of Honor to the Arctic explorer Richard Byrd and the aviator Charles Lindbergh.

During and after World War I, the services awarded 123 Medals of Honor, 32 to men killed in action. The most famous recipient was Alvin York, the Tennessee Army sergeant who, unbelievably, killed 25 enemy, knocked out 35 machine-gun positions, and captured 132 prisoners in one day, October 8, 1918, just a month before Armistice Day.

It was not until World War II that the Medal achieved the stature it holds today. This was primarily because standards became more stringent, review boards more demanding. Out of 13 million men serving in the war, only 433 received the Medal, and more than half of them were killed in action. In the Korean conflict, there were only 37 survivors out of 131 Medals awarded. And in Vietnam, 188 survived out of 238.