Capt. Regniald B. Desiderio

Starting today, Unto the Breach will post citations of actions that earned the Medal of Honor.

Today’s featured recipient is Captain Eugene B. Desiderio, the company commander of Echo Company, 27th Infantry Regiment. 59 years ago, Capt. Desiderio and his men repelled an enemy attack by charging with rifles and grenades, despite having been wounded twice before the charge. Desiderio was mortally wounded during the attack.

His citation can be found here, and citations for other Medal of Honor recipients can be found in the “Hall of Heroes” category located on the blog sidebar.

Desiderio’s replacement was Capt. Lewis Millett, whom also earned the Medal in a bayonet charge that following February.

As an antitank gunner in Tunisia, he earned the Silver Star after he jumped into a burning ammunition-filled halftrack, drove it away from allied soldiers and leapt to safety just before the vehicle exploded. Not long after, he shot down a German Messerschmitt Me-109 fighter that was strafing Allied troops. Col. Millett, who was firing from machine guns mounted on a halftrack, hit the pilot through the windshield.

Millett fought in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam.

Reflecting on his career, Col. Millett once told an interviewer: “I believe in freedom, I believe deeply in it. I’ve fought in three wars, and volunteered for all of them, because I believed as a free man, that it was my duty to help those under the attack of tyranny. Just as simple as that.”

27th Infantry Regiment insignia "Fear No Difficulties"

Military History magazine conducted a great interview in 2002 with the late Medal of Honor recipient Col. Lewis Millett.

Among many other new things I learned about Col. Millett, I read that the commander whom Millett replaced, Capt. Reginald B. Desiderio, was also awarded the Medal of Honor (posthumously) for his actions. Only three months after Desiderio’s actions, Millett’s bayonet charge would earn him the medal as well.

Desiderio also fought in Southern France and Germany during World War II, earning a Silver Star, Purple Heart, and four Bronze Stars for courage.

Army Captain Reginald B. Desiderio, who commanded E Company, 27th Regiment of the 25th Infantry Division, was killed in battle near Ipsok, Korea, on November 27, 1950, and subsequently awarded a posthumous Medal of Honor. A forward observer with the 8th Field Artillery Battalion supporting that company, Captain Lewis L. Millett, volunteered to transfer to the infantry and take over the company. Millett earned the Medal of Honor while leading E Company a short time later.

Today a retired colonel, Millett lives in the Southern California mountain community of Idyllwild, far from Mechanic Falls, Maine, where he was born on December 15, 1920. His wife, Winona, died in 1993. Surrounded by mementos of a 35-year military career, during which he also received the Distinguished Service Cross, the Silver Star, two Legions of Merit, three Bronze Stars, four Purple Hearts, three Air Medals, the Army Commendation Medal and many foreign awards, Millett reminisced about serving in two armies in three wars in an interview for Military History.

Military History: I understand that your military career began with the Massachusetts National Guard in 1938.

Millett: Yes, I was in the National Guard for 12 years before I went into the Regular Army. When I got the Medal of Honor, I was a Guardsman on extended active duty.

MH: Then you joined the Army Air Corps. Why?

Millett: I was vice president of my high school senior class and was invited to make a speech on Memorial Day, 1940. I put on my National Guard uniform for the occasion. Adolf Hitler had overrun Europe, and I warned my classmates that we would soon be in a war. I told them that it was better to go prepared. So I joined the Army Air Corps. I was sent to Lowry Field near Denver, where I learned about machine guns.

MH: And then you deserted?

Millett: Yes. President Franklin D. Roosevelt said in a speech that we were not going to war against Hitler, so I deserted and joined the Canadian army.

MH: What did you do in Canada?

Millett: I joined the Royal Canadian Artillery Regiment. But another American and myself were sent to Ottawa for top-secret training in something called radio location; we [Americans] called it radar. I have to laugh now when I think about it. Two Americans, one a deserter from the U.S. Army and the other with a bad conduct discharge from the Marine Corps, selected for top-secret training.

MH: So you became a radar operator?

Millett: No. By the time we arrived in England, the United States was in the war and I was allowed to transfer to the U.S. Army. In August 1942, I went to Ireland and was assigned to the 27th Armored Field Artillery, 1st Armored Division.

MH: When did you see your first action?

Millett: On November 8, we invaded North Africa. We landed at a place called St. Leu, north of Oran. The outfit that was going into Oran, the 6th Armored Infantry, I believe, had a battalion aboard a destroyer that was sunk by French naval gunfire. The French fired a few rounds at us. In fact, they killed a couple of our guys. A 75mm shell hit one of our halftracks and killed two or three of our people. But otherwise we didn’t run into much. [The British cutter Hartland was crippled by the French destroyer Typhon before Typhon was hit by cruiser fire. Both ships were scuttled in Oran Harbor.]

MH: Then where did you go?

Millett: About a week later, they sent a combat command of the 1st Armored to try and take Tunis. They didn’t have enough gas and so forth to send the whole division. So we went piecemeal and we got defeated piecemeal. We made our first contact near a place called Medjez-el-Bab in Tunisia. I was an anti-tank gunner at that time, on the 37mm, which was worthless. Twenty tanks went through our position to attack the Germans. Every single one of them was left burning. They were Lees [called Grants by the British], the two-deckers, with a gun on top and another on the side. It was a good indoctrination in how good we weren’t. Our 37mm was mounted on the back of a three-quarter-ton truck, and we fired six rounds at the German tanks as they rolled through our position. The shells just bounced off and the Germans didn’t even notice them!

MH: You got a Silver Star in that action?

Millett: Yes. There was a burning halftrack loaded with ammunition right in the middle of our position. I drove the halftrack away from our troops and jumped out just before it exploded. They gave me a Silver Star for that. We lost everything there, except for one vehicle, an ammo track. The track driver, another guy and myself jumped into it. Everyone else tried driving down the road to escape, but the road was muddy and they stuck. We went over a mountain back to Medjez-el-Bab. The men walked out, but ours was the only vehicle in the battalion to make it.

MH: Where did you go after Medjez-el-Bab?

Millett: First, we went to a place to rest and get new equipment, weapons and trucks and stuff from the 2nd Armored Division. We called the place Stuka Valley because the German air force would pound us every day. But I never saw anyone killed. We were always in our foxholes, scattered all over the sides of the valley. Then, in January or February 1943 — February seems to stick in my mind — we went up to be part of the counterattack at Kasserine Pass. It was at Tebessa that my machine-gun training at Lowry Field paid off. My halftrack had twin .50-caliber machine guns mounted on it and was parked by the side of the road. During an attack I shot down a Messershmitt Me-109. It was a perfect shot. The plane was strafing down the road and I shot right through the windshield, hitting the pilot. He went straight into the ground. I was promoted to corporal for that.

MH: Eventually your past caught up with you and you were court-martialed for desertion. When did that happen?

Millett: It was in Italy and I had already been in combat for a year. We were in Naples. They had pulled us back to be reorganized from a square to a triangular division. I was walking by our pup tents when Lieutenant George Crick, the battery executive officer, told me: ‘Sergeant Millett, yesterday you were court-martialed for desertion. You were found guilty, fined $52 and sentenced to 30 days’ hard labor.’ But I was a sergeant, so I didn’t have to do the hard labor. Being court-martialed made me angry and I wrote a letter home cussing the officers up one side and down the other. Letters were censored in World War II, and the next thing I knew I was standing before the battery commander. He told me that the War Department had ordered three times that I be court-martialed. They finally did it to prevent someone from really throwing the book at me later. Then a few weeks later they made me a second lieutenant! I must be the only Regular Army colonel who has ever been court-martialed and convicted of desertion.

MH: How did you get your field commission?

Millett: When I was in Japan, an officer I knew as a lieutenant in Italy, Bob Schoos, told me that they had saved up documentation on things I’d done and used it to justify making me an officer. I was commissioned in November 1944, but I’ve never seen the backup paperwork on it.

MH: What was your job in Italy?

Millett: I was an artillery forward observer. I fought with all the outfits over there. If you saw the film San Pietro, the WP [white phosphorus] rounds you saw hitting the olive grove were mine. I was working with the 36th Division then. I was with the 1st Special Service Force and British outfits, too, the Irish and Scots guards, the Coldstream Guards. I once had a discussion with an English captain about the officer’s role. He said it was to show the men how to die. I said I thought it was to show the men how to fight.

MH: Where did you go from Italy?

Millett: I went home. The war ended in Italy on April 29, 1945, and by June I was home. Shortly after the atomic bombs went off in Japan, I was discharged from the Army and became an officer in the Army Reserve in Maine. They weren’t doing anything so I joined the Maine National Guard — I had to take a bust to second lieutenant — and joined the same regiment my uncle had been in.

MH: How did you come to return to the Army?

Millett: I was attending Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, when the Army called for volunteers to return to active duty. I was supposed to graduate in June 1949, and I volunteered for June, but they called me back in January, so I didn’t get my degree. But later I got a degree in political science from Park College in Missouri and an honorary doctorate in humane letters from Emerson College in Massachusetts.

MH: Where did you go from there?

Millett: Osaka, Japan, where I was assigned to the 25th Infantry Division, and then to the 8th Field Artillery. I was service battery commander and I got the E Flag [for excellence] three times in a row for the best unit in all ‘divarty’ [division artillery]. And I was the only officer! One third of our unit was missing, you know. We only had two firing batteries instead of three. We were short-handed as hell.

MH: What roles did you play after the Korean War broke out on June 25, 1950?

Millett: Sometimes I was a forward observer and sometimes I was a liaison officer.

MH: You are probably best known for earning the Medal of Honor near Soam-Ni, but you also were given a bottle of Scotch by No. 2 Squadron of the South African air force. What was that about?

Millett: I was wounded in the battle in which Desiderio was killed. I couldn’t walk, so I was flying in a Stinson L-5 observation plane with Captain James Lawrence of Pittsburgh — a fearless pilot — when we saw a South African fighter plane make a crash landing on a frozen rice paddy behind enemy lines. Lawrence landed the L-5 next to the downed plane and I gave the pilot, Captain John Davis of Pretoria, my seat. I stayed behind, and Lawrence returned for me after flying Davis to safety. He got back just in time. We took off in a hail of bullets from a Chinese patrol. The South Africans gave me a bottle of whiskey for that. It is ironic, when you consider the later battles over apartheid in South Africa, that Davis, who was white, was flying in support of the 24th Regiment, which at that time was a black outfit, when he was killed a couple of months later.

MH: After you transferred to the infantry and became commander of E Company, did you make any changes?

Millett: A few. I put two BARs [Browning Automatic Rifles] in each squad. And I loaded each man with four to six hand grenades, instead of the two they had been carrying. That was not a complete success, as some of the men felt they were already carrying too much. We compromised. Those who could carry more than two hand grenades did so. Those who couldn’t didn’t have to.

MH: And you introduced bayonet training?

Millett: Yes. We had acquired some Chinese documents stating that Americans were afraid of hand-to-hand fighting and cold steel. When I read that, I thought, ‘I’ll show you, you sons of bitches!’ So I had every rifleman in the company fix his bayonet to his rifle and leave it fixed, 24 hours a day. I fixed my bayonet to my M1 and left it there. We had bayonet drill when we could. Now I had never had bayonet practice in the U.S. Army, so I had to recall my training with the Canadians to get any kind of technique at all. On the march, we’d attack bundles of straw in the fields; we’d practice thrusts into mud banks.

MH: Soon after taking command of E Company, you were awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. What were the circumstances?

Millett: Three days before my Medal of Honor action, I led a bayonet assault against another hill. The enemy ran away before we got into their holes. We took the hill, though we had casualties. One of my lieutenants, Don Wilson — who now lives in upstate New York, I believe — was wounded in the chest. We went out under fire with a litter to evacuate him. One funny incident: A Stars and Stripes photographer with a movie camera was behind the tank where the aid station was. I asked him if he got any good pictures, but he said he had dropped his can of film and exposed it all. The guys on the tank told me he had done it deliberately so he wouldn’t have to go out. Later I heard that he was awarded a Bronze Star for helping save Wilson’s life.

MH: What happened on Hill 180 three days after that, on February 7, 1951?

Millett: E Company, numbering about 100 men supported by two tanks, was moving cautiously up the road trying to locate the enemy. G Company was supposed to be on my left flank, but they were slow. I had my 3rd Platoon in reserve — actually it was protecting my left as I did not want to be enveloped. It was the 3rd Platoon that spotted activity on Hill 180. Then all hell broke loose. First I ran to the tanks and put their .50-caliber machine guns to firing at the top of the hill. ‘Keep it there,’ I said, ‘until we are halfway up the hill.’ I ran over to the platoon on the road and told them to marry up with the left flank of the platoon in the rice paddy. Then I went in front of the platoon in the rice paddy and yelled, ‘Follow me!’ Our bayonets were already fixed and we ran across the rice paddy, which had ice on it and was slick, but nobody fell down. We ran to the foot of the hill, where there was an embankment that gave us cover. From the embankment, we ran up the hill. I was about halfway up the hill when I turned around and saw that the line was ragged.

Some had slowed down. Others had stopped to fire their weapons. That’s when I yelled, ‘C’mon you sons of bitches and fight!’ [Those words were not put in the citation.] Jim Chung, a Korean soldier in our company, was the second man behind me. He saw some Chinese off to the left and he yelled, ‘Captain, Chinese, me shoot?’ I hollered back, ‘Hell yes!’ and he shot ‘em up. I assaulted an anti-tank rifle crew. With all the shooting and yelling, I had not noticed them. But someone called out to me and I moved to take the position in the flank. It was V-shaped, with the point of the V facing me. There was a man at the point and two others, one at each end of the V. The man at the point was the gunner. I bayoneted him. I guess the other two didn’t realize I was that close. The next man reached for something, I think it was a machine pistol, but I bayoneted him — got him in the throat. At about that time the third man turned and — I was straddling a very narrow trench — he froze. He had a submachine gun but I guess the sight of me, red-faced and screaming, made him freeze. Otherwise he would have killed me. I lunged forward and the bayonet went into his forehead. What surprised me was that it went in so easy. But you know, with the adrenaline flowing you’re strong as a bull. It was like going into a watermelon. In the back of my mind I thought, ‘Gee, I thought they were harder than that.’ This proved to me that when you get fired up, you have tremendous strength. But when it’s over you are really weak. That’s why when a hill is taken the Army trains you to reorganize and have leadership up there; it’s up to the leader to make them do it. Of course it’s tough, but you have to do it.

MH: Did the adrenaline start flowing as soon as you started up the hill?

Millett: I think it did, but I was in good shape, too. Now I can barely walk up a hill. But I was never tired in combat.

MH: Army historian S.L.A. Marshall, in his account of the battle, says there were some casualties at the beginning of the charge but only four Americans were killed on the hill where the fighting was the thickest. How do you account for that?

Millett: We had cover when we reached the bottom of the hill. The Chinese started throwing hand grenades and that’s what they did throughout the battle. Their grenades were not very effective. I was wounded in the shin by fragments — it hurt like hell, being the shin, but I wasn’t seriously hurt. The men who were killed, Sergeant Robert E. Blair, Corporals Joseph E. Cyr and Marshall E. Fletcher and Pfc John W. Lescallet, were all from the 3rd Platoon, which had come up on the right. Sniper fire from another hill killed them all.

MH: You never ran into final protective fires or anything like that?

Millett: That’s right. All they did was throw grenades.

MH: Marshall also wrote that it was a mixed North Korean and Chinese force on the hill. Is that correct?

Millett: I presumed they were Chinese. They wore the brown quilted uniforms that the Chinese wore. But one of the dead officers we found after the battle was wearing the uniform of a North Korean major.

MH: In Marshall’s account, there were 47 Chinese and Korean dead on Hill 180. Is that an accurate count?

Millett: I’m sure there were more. When we took the hill we reorganized quickly, using the holes that were already there. If there was a dead man in the hole, we just shoveled dirt on top of him. We were relieved by the Turks that same day, and I’m sure they did the same. Marshall showed up two days later. He only saw the dead that were still unburied.

MH: You returned to the States to receive the Medal of Honor. What did you do after that?

Millett: I was an aide-de-camp to General John R. Hodge. Then I went to Greece as an adviser to the Greek army, where I was promoted to major. Now I had never been to an Army school as an officer, so on my return from Greece I attended the Infantry Advanced Course at Fort Benning, Georgia, a school usually attended by young captains. After that, I went to Ranger school at Fort Benning. That would be in 1958. I was assigned to the 101st Airborne Division after Ranger school.

MH: What did you do there?

Millett: At first I was assigned to the 506th Battle Group as S-2 [intelligence officer]. During a maneuver I led the 506th I & R [intelligence and reconnaissance] Platoon and captured the headquarters of the 82nd Airborne Division. This impressed the 101st commander, Maj. Gen. William Westmoreland, and he asked me to set up a school for small unit leaders. I formed the Recondo school based on what I had learned in Ranger school.

MH: You first went to Vietnam in 1960. What were your duties?

Millett: I set up Ranger schools in three areas. I started the Vietnamese Rangers with Vietnamese officers who had been through the American Ranger school. You know how I got things done? When I was running the Recondo school, 20th Century Fox made a 15-minute film, Rangers in the 101st. It showed the training, the death slide, all that stuff. When we started the Rangers in Vietnam, a Special Forces team was sent to set up the course. They weren’t Ranger qualified. I was supposed to be the adviser, but they were setting up the course! They had a big reputation, but when I showed that film, they bought everything I said.

MH: You graduated from the Command and General Staff School and the Army War College. What did you do when you returned to Vietnam in 1970?

Millett: I had been in Laos in 1968 to 1970. My family was living in Bangkok, Thailand. Back in Vietnam, I was adviser to the II Corps Phoenix Program that was trying to disrupt Viet Cong infrastructure in towns and villages. You know the Phoenix Program got a lot of bad publicity about being murderers and so forth. I never saw any of that. We would get information about the comings and goings of Viet Cong leadership, and we would set up ambushes along routes to and from the villages. We were trying to capture Viet Cong leaders to find out more about them. But we did kill a lot of them when they wouldn’t surrender. Because I volunteered for two years, my family could visit. All my kids have been there. My son Lee went on patrols with me. My youngest son, John, lived with a Vietnamese family for three months. My wife was part Cherokee, and she thought there might be a Montagnard relationship with American Indians because of the designs on their cloths and other things. Well, we went visiting Montagnard villages in the mountains, sometimes at night in a vehicle with our lights on. And we never got shot at! This was 1972. We had won the war! Then we turned it over to the Vietnamese, and we came home. That’s when I got angry because we quit, and I got out of the Army.

MH: There was a period when you were held hostage by Montagnards. What was that all about?

Millett: They were 350 Montagnards who had been drafted by the Viet Cong. They wanted to quit fighting and came to negotiate with the Dalat province chief. They weren’t changing sides; they just wanted to go home. Their commander, Ha Rat Sin, feared that he would be arrested if he went to negotiate. I told him they could hold me as a hostage for his safe return. They eventually came in and I was released. I heard later that they were all executed after the North Vietnamese took over the country. One time in my life I got people to stop fighting and be free — if I’d let them keep on fighting, they’d still be alive today.

MH: Did you receive any awards in Vietnam?

Millett: I wouldn’t accept any American decorations. I wasn’t there for recognition for myself but to help win freedom for a people. I’m sorry it didn’t work out.

MH: Are you still involved with the Army?

Millett: I have been the Honorary Colonel of the 27th Regiment since 1985, and I travel to Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, at least once a year in that capacity. [Retired Lt. Gen. John Foley became the Honorary Colonel in January 2001, the 100th anniversary of the regiment.] Also, at the request of the Army chief of staff, I went to Germany to welcome Oregon National Guardsmen back from duty in Bosnia. And I’ve been to Korea many times. I’m on the Riverside County Veterans Affairs Committee that makes recommendations to the board of supervisors on actions that affect veterans. I’m a past national commander of the Legion of Valor, and a former district director of the Medal of Honor Society. And I belong to many veterans’ organizations. I manage to keep busy.

In 1940, Lewis L. “Red” Millett, a 17 year old native of Mechanic Falls, Maine, dropped out of high school and joined the Army Air Corps in order to fight the increasing fascist threat in Europe. But when President Roosevelt stated that the U.S. would not be entering the war, Millett decided to pack his bags and head to Canada – not to avoid combat, but to seek it out as part of the Canadian army. He was sent to London where he served as an anti-aircraft gunner during the Nazi’s “Blitz” bombing campaign.

“I deeply believe that if you’re a free man, then you should stand up and support freedom wherever it is,” Millett said during an interview on the 2003 PBS documentary American Valor.

When the U.S. joined the war in 1942, Millet was able to transfer back to the American Army. Joining the 1st Armored Division, Millett earned the Silver Star – the nation’s third-highest award for valor – for his actions in North Africa. He also fought at Salerno and Anzio, but paperwork suggesting he had “deserted” in 1940 (by going to Canada) caught up to Millett. He was court-martialed, demoted to private, and fined $52.

However following his punishment, Millett received a battlefield promotion to second lieutenant and a Bronze Star.

Then on Feb. 7, 1951 during the Korean War, Millett – who had been promoted to Captain – was leading an under-strength company of 27th Infantry Regiment “Wolfhounds” against a strongly held enemy position on Hill 180, which is now part of Osan Air Base in South Korea.

“The Chinese had put out the word that we were afraid of bayonets,” Millett told Stars and Stripes in a 1975 interview. “‘Americans afraid of bayonets’ is just ridiculous, I thought, so I intended to prove a point.”

During the attack, one of Millett’s platoons became pinned down by small-arms, automatic, and “buffalo gun” anti-tank fire. Millett ordered another platoon forward, telling his men to “Fix bayonets and follow me!”

Despite being wounded by a grenade blast, Millett charged forward – firing his rifle, throwing grenades, and striking enemies with his rifle and bayonet. When Millett reached a three-man buffalo gun emplacement, he killed all three with his bayonet. Once at the top of the hill, Millett waved his rifle over his head, encouraging his men by shouting “Grenades and cold steel!” – while still fighting the enemy.

Col. Lewis L. Millett in a 2003 Veteran's Day parade in Palm Springs, Calif. (The Press-Enterprise/Terry Pierson)

Millett’s charge was so effective that the remaining Communist forces fled, but not before 47 North Korean and Chinese soldiers lay dead, 18 of which had been killed by bayonets.

Capt. Millett was awarded the Medal of Honor – the nation’s highest decoration for valor – for his actions on Hill 180, which came to be known as the Battle of Bayonet Hill.

“I was surprised, I never expected it,” Millett told Stars and Stripes. “Of course, a lot of real fine people had to die so that a few might get decorated. There’s an awful lot of men who lie buried over here, and the only recognition they received was the purple heart.”

Lewis L. Millett, 88, passed away Saturday morning in Loma Linda, Calif. His passing means that only 93 living recipients of America’s Medal of Honor remain.

In Sept. 2010, the Medal of Honor Society will hold its national convention in Charleston, S.C., giving Americans the opportunity to honor those like Lewis Millett who have given so much for this country.

Col. Lewis L. Millett (Photo by Nick Del Calzo)

Col. Lewis Millett’s speech on Hill 180 Remembrance Day
Feb. 6, 1998

AMERICA, THE LAST FREE SOCIETY FOUNDED IN LIBERTY UNDER GOD, STILL EXISTS A THREAD OF HOPE IN THE FABRIC OF A WORLD REPLETE WITH TYRANNY TOWARDS MAN AND TREASON TOWARDS GOD. WE ARE STILL FREE BECAUSE MEN OF HONOR AND COURAGE DEEPLY BELIEVED THAT THE DEFENSE OF LIBERTY IS A NOBLE CAUSE.

Shortly after the liberation of Rome in 1944, I had the opportunity to visit the Sistine Chapel and observe Michelangelo’s portrayal of our Creator reaching out to touch the fashioned clay that would be mankind. When our Creator breathed the fire of life into the dust that was to be man, He imbued in man’s soul a spark of Freedom. Tyrants, since the dawn of creation have attempted to destroy man’s desire to worship his Creator and to stifle and smother that spark of Freedom.

In the coliseum of Rome, on the steppes of Russia, in the concentration camps of Europe, in the rice paddies of China, on the jungle floor of Vietnam and Cambodia, in the mountains of Laos and Afghanistan, on the desert of Arabia, in the land once called Yugoslavia lie the bodies and bones, the dust of countless millions who are martyrs to the cause of Freedom.

In 1856 a poet stood in a square in Budapest, Hungary, and shouted to a multitude fighting against the tyranny of Russia, “Shall we free men be, or slave? Choose the lot your spirit craves!” Thousands of young Americans who never heard these words have volunteered to fight against the cause of tyranny because they believed in Freedom.

It has been my privilege to fight in Africa, Europe and Asia, to serve in many foreign lands and to meet the people, Kings and Commoner, Presidents and peasants of those countries. I have helped to temper the iron of a blacksmith in Greece, to teach the children in Japan, to pull the nets of the fisherman from out the China Sea. I have dug the grub-hoe into the side of a hill in Vietnam and helped the mountain people plant their highland rice, I have delivered sustenance and toys to orphanages in the War zone and watched the children’s’ smiles illuminate the day.

Among all the ideas and customs, the hopes and desires of people whom I encountered, whether they be soldier or strangers, king or peasant, rich or poor, they all had but one desire –to be left alone in peace, to be free. But the price of Freedom comes high. The sacrifices that purchased our liberty cannot be commemorated with a few words, or even one book, or with a one day observance, or a brief speech.

Today many make heroes of those who achieve fame and fortune as troubadours of song or who portray, as actors on stage and screen, the hero we would want to be. The real heroes remain unsung, lost and buried, some in foreign lands. They achieved in their young lives far more than the tinsel fame of the movie hero and never received the screaming adulation from the immature who worship at the shrine of the Jungle rock and roll. They did not receive the roaring acclamation of the masses in our sports coliseums. They lived, often in misery, in stupefying heat, in bone-freezing cold. They died tough. Some died with sweat, some with blood, some with tears in their eyes. They sacrificed themselves for our freedom in strange places called Kasserine, Sbeitla, Gafsa, Salerno, Anzio, Cassino, Rotundo, Mount Lungo, Guadacanal, Luzon, Okinawa, Masan, Taegu, Sinanju, Chosin, Khe San, Dat To, Khontum, Pleiku–battles that bring to mind Valley Forge, Gettysburg, Chateau Thierry, the Argonne, places where my forefathers, your antecedents fought and bled.

When our Creator reached out and gave mankind life, he also provided our soul with a spark of freedom which is the pathway to the liberties we enjoy. Our comrades-in-arms, who served so nobly and sacrificed so dearly were the shield and armor for all of us who enjoy the privilege, the liberty, the bounties of this nation. They accepted a challenge, we must accept a similar demand. They had a duty, a responsibility, a cause to serve embodied in the Declaration of Independence, in the Constitution of the United States and in the free society in which we live. They served these Institutions and the United States of America, and you and I with courage, devotion, duty, loyalty, sacrifice and honor. We who received the benefits of that sacrifice, that duty, that loyalty also have a responsibility and duty to serve that spark of freedom given to us by God. It is the essence of the Judaeo-Christian faith that mankind received liberty from his Creator, that man is free to choose, that man has a God-given right to liberty. We live in a country that at its birth was created with this premise, “All men are created equal, all men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these rights are life, and liberty.”

To our comrades who died in service to their country a fitting memorial to them would be these words carved in gold:
“TELL THE NATION THAT WE LIE HERE OBEDIENT TO THEIR LAWS AID THE NOBLE CAUSE OF LIBERTY.” MAY GOD GIVE US THE WISDOM, THE INTEGRITY, THE COURAGE TO SERVE THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM. FOR WE UNDERSTAND THAT HE WHO FAILS TO FIGHT FOR FREEDOM, OR SERVE THE CAUSE OF LIBERTY WILL DIE A COWARD OR LIVE AS A SLAVE. MAY OUR CREATOR FOREVER KEEP THIS THE LAND OF LIBERTY.”

Col. Lewis Millett in South Korea, 1975. (Tae Won Chung / Stars and Stripes)

Medal of Honor recipient Col. Lewis Millett – who passed away this Saturday – wrote this poem in memory of soldiers who have made the ultimate sacrifice, especially his youngest son who was one of 248 soldiers killed while returning from a peacekeeping mission in Sinai, Egypt in 1985.

A SOLDIER’S PRAYER – by Col. Lewis L. Millett

I’ve fought when others feared to serve.
I’ve gone where many failed to go.
I’ve lost friends in war and strife, who valued duty over the love of life.
I’ve shared the comradeship of pain
I’ve searched these lands for men that we’ve lost.
I’ve sons who’ve served our land of liberty who’d fight to see that other lands are free.
I’ve seen the weak forsake humanity.
I’ve heard fakers praise our enemy.
I’ve seen challenged men stand ever bolder.
I’ve seen the duty, the honor, the sacrifice of the soldier.
Now, I understand the meaning of all lives,
The lives of comrades of not so long ago.
So to you who answered duties siren call, may
God bless you my son, may God bless you all.

CAPTAIN
LEWIS LEE “RED” MILLETT
ARMY

for service as set forth in the following

CITATION:

For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty while serving with Company E, 2d Battalion, 27th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division, in action against enemy aggressor forces at Hill 180, Soam-Ni, Korea, on 7 February 1951. While personally leading his company in an attack against a strongly held position Captain Millett noted that the 1st Platoon was pinned down by small-arms, automatic, and antitank fire. Captain Millett ordered the 3d Platoon forward, placed himself at the head of the two platoons, and, with fixed bayonet, led the assault up the fire-swept hill. In the fierce charge Captain Millett bayoneted two enemy soldiers and boldly continued on, throwing grenades, clubbing and bayoneting the enemy, while urging his men forward by shouting encouragement. Despite vicious opposing fire, the whirlwind hand-to-hand assault carried to the crest of the hill. His dauntless leadership and personal courage so inspired his men that they stormed into the hostile position and used their bayonets with such lethal effect that the enemy fled in wild disorder. During this fierce onslaught Captain Millett was wounded by grenade fragments but refused evacuation until the objective was taken and firmly secured. The superb leadership, conspicuous courage, and consummate devotion to duty demonstrated by Captain Millett were directly responsible for the successful accomplishment of a hazardous mission and reflect the highest credit on himself and the heroic traditions of the military service.