American Heroes

EXCERPTS

Earl D. Plumlee

Staff Sergeant, US Army

Conflict/Era: War on Terrorism (Afghanistan)

Date of Action: August 28, 2013

Medal of Honor

I’m a Green Beret and I feel like I’m being punished.

I’ve just finished serving on an Operational 1434 as the lead of the A‑Team, the heart and soul of Special Forces. I trained and worked with local militias and the paramilitary Afghan National Police to eliminate the Taliban and create good governance to run the country.

Though we risked shoot‑outs with the Taliban daily, it didn’t take long to drive the insurgents out of town, permanently. Miri, a village in the center of Andar District, Ghazni Province, is safe, its bazaar, small hospital, and school intact. For now.

The operation ends and I’m given a choice. I can go home or I can stay in‑country and take a desk job at the company command headquarters at Forward Operating Base (FOB) Ghazni, about eighty‑five miles southwest of Kabul. The battalion of the 10th Mountain Division is here, retrograding, along with a brigade of Polish soldiers.

I accept the position, but after being a Green Beret field operator, working logistics behind a desk feels more like a penalty than a reward.

August 28, 2013, dawns clear and gorgeous. It’s close to the end of my deployment and I dress in full gear for a “change of command” photo. I also bring along my coolest weapon: a .308‑caliber SCAR MK20, a sniper support rifle (SSR) designed for both long‑range and close‑quarters combat.

Pilots get a bad rap for always making sure you know that they’re pilots, but I joke that snipers are way worse. I go all out, so that anyone who sees this picture will know they’re looking at a super cool sniper.

After the photo, I set my gear down and go grab coffee in the med shed with my medic buddy Scotty.

Suddenly, we’re rocked by an explosion. It feels like a giant grabbed the building and shook it. I’m thrown to the floor, along with all the medical equipment. The dust inside is as thick as fog.

We’ve been hit directly by artillery, I think, getting to my feet.

Scotty and his patients are fine. I’m fine. Right now, I need to see where we’ve been hit and let the base know everyone in the med shed is okay.

Outside, there’s so much dust hanging in the air, it’s nearly obscuring the blue summer sky and amping up the confusion. Everybody is thinking their building got hit by artillery, but there aren’t massive injuries, so there’s no way we all got hit.

I hear small arms fire. It isn’t ours. I’m hearing AK‑47s and Soviet‑made machine guns called PKMs and explosions from RPGs, and roughly half a mile away, near the rear of the base, I see a monstrous, fiery black mushroom cloud. The plume is massive, the biggest I’ve ever seen. Watching it, I feel small.

The explosion, I’ll learn later, is caused by a nearly five‑thousand‑pound Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device, or VBIED. Our base is under attack — but instead of coming through the main gate, the insurgents are coming through a sixty‑foot hole in the rear perimeter wall.

Clearly, the enemy has a plan of some kind.

I’ve got to get out there.

My stuff is still all laid out where I left it, ready to go. I put on my kit and helmet and forgo the heavy gun belt. I conceal my Glock 19 pistol inside the waist of my uniform pants and grab my SCAR MK20 sniper rifle.

Now I need to find a way into the fight.

I spot a soldier driving one of our Toyota Tacoma pickup trucks. It’s not a fully up‑armored vehicle. More like half — just the doors and the back of the truck, not the glass. I bolt toward it as another soldier, Sergeant First Class Nate Abkemeier, comes running up.

“Are we doing this?” he asks me. “I’m driving.”

We commandeer the truck. As we pull away, Nate almost runs over a four‑wheeler. I recognize the driver. Sergeant First Class Andrew Busic is another Green Beret buddy of mine. Drew’s about to drive into the fight, only his truck doesn’t have a stitch of armor.

“Hey, Drew,” I yell. “Get in with us. You’ll get shot up in that four‑wheeler.”

He jumps in the back of the Toyota. And I jump out.

The SF compound has its own gate. I need to protect the physical integrity of our compound, to prevent the Taliban from entering. I need to close the gate.

“Get in the truck!” Nate yells to me.

There’s a three‑story building overlooking our base. It’s located 180 degrees from the blast — and the Taliban has occu‑ pied it. They were hiding in the building, waiting for the VBIED to go off. Now they’re sprinting from cover, sixty, eighty, maybe as many as 150 guys. Some are shooting at Drew and Nate while I’m locking the gate.

“Get in the truck!”

As I make it back out through the foot gate, I hear a ton of fire coming from the breach in the perimeter wall.

I jump back in the truck, and as we drive away, another four‑wheeler drives next to us. It’s manned by Matt, a Green Beret medic, and Army Chief Warrant Officer 3 Mark Colbert. These are my guys. We’re all working at headquarters.

“You guys going in there?” Matt asks, pointing.

“Yep,” we reply. “Let’s go.”

We give each other a thumbs‑up and speed off together.

The Taliban has a huge amount of weaponry. RPGs and recoilless rifles and a mortar section.

I’m sitting in the passenger’s seat, my MK20 lying lengthwise on my lap.

“Slow down,” I tell Nate, as we pull onto the airfield. “I’m going to dismount and climb that wall and employ my sniper rifle. I can hear these guys. They’re on the airfield, about a hundred meters outside the camp.”

As Nate slows, Matt’s four‑wheeler pulls in front of us. He edges toward the opening of the airfield.

They’re immediately slammed by a monstrous amount of small arms fire. Rounds are hitting everything all around them. Both Matt and Chief Colbert get hit.

We’ve all rehearsed battle drills endlessly. We can’t see where Matt and Chief Colbert are taking fire from, but we can see where the rounds are landing. Nate pulls our truck in between them and the incoming fire to create some cover. When Nate stops, I’m going to kick my door open and provide covering fire over the hood while Drew and Nate climb out after me to drag Matt and Chief Colbert to a better position.

But as Nate starts to turn, I see about a dozen Afghan Army guys standing in a semicircle about ten to fifteen meters away. The truck stops and I kick the door open, wondering what they’re doing over here, facing the wrong way.

Then I get a closer look. These guys aren’t Afghan soldiers — they’re Taliban soldiers wearing Afghan uniforms.

They bring up their weapons and start shooting the shit out of our truck as they scramble for cover. It’s then that I realize there’s no protective armor inside the doors. The armor panels have been replaced by plywood.

My sniper rifle is a little over forty inches long. I jerk my rifle up and I spin. The motion accidentally shifts the truck into neutral. Nate doesn’t realize. He’s flooring the gas and not going anywhere.

I stick my arms out the door. As I present my rifle, the charging handle hits the doorframe.

I fire off one .308 round. It hits the dirt in front of the lead insurgent and throws rocks and gravel all over him. He ducks his head. I squeeze the trigger again.

My rifle jams.

Everything turns slo‑mo.

My rifle has never jammed before — or since — but it’s jammed now.

I see these guys staring at me. I see the muzzle blasts from their AK‑47s. I’m not going to die sitting in a truck seat. I’m going to buy Nate and Drew some time.

When your rifle goes down, your pistol comes out. My Glock is drawn before my feet hit the ground. I shut the door behind me, trying to keep any incoming enemy fire from hitting Nate.

I’m an exceptional pistol shot by any standard, but I’ve never fired one in combat. Now I’m going to engage Taliban fighters using only a Glock 19 handgun with ball ammo. I target the nearest group of fighters.

There’re three of them. I hit the lead guy in the pelvic girdle and he instantly collapses. I’d always heard stories about how a nine mil doesn’t have any knockdown power, that you need a .45 to create any effect. I thought I’d have to put fifteen rounds in him.

His fellow soldiers don’t run to help. They run away.

Clear the front site post. If you don’t, you’re not going to hit anything — and you’ll die out here.

The best cover is your own muzzle. That’s always been one of my mantras. As I squeeze off rounds and advance, Nate manages to jam the truck into reverse. He floors the gas, yanks the wheel and spins around, and ends up crashing into a wall behind me.

I keep firing, closing the distance between me and the enemy. Keep waiting for a bullet to hit me and for it to be over. I just want to make as much of an impact as I can before that moment comes.

The bullets keep missing me, but they keep hitting Nate and the Chief. I see the two of them hit the ground like sacks. Drew is trapped in the back of the seat. He’s shaking the doors, trying to get out to join me, and he’s catching hell from all the incoming fire.

I end up driving the enemy back and away from us.

My pistol is now mostly empty. My rifle is jammed. I’m alone with at least a dozen or more insurgents somewhere in front of me. The closest one is the guy I hit in the pelvic girdle. He’s not dead, but he can’t walk. He’s lying on the ground, and he’s firing his rifle. At me.

I’ve got to find cover so I can reload my weapon.

I duck behind a little water tank. Then I remember I have a hand grenade.

I can use it to create just enough time for me to fix the malfunction in my rifle.

I grab the grenade, pull the pin. I lean out and gently toss it in the direction of the insurgent I wounded.

He starts firing at me, then the tank. He doesn’t let up. Little pieces of white plastic rain down on me as I’m locking the bolt of my rifle to the rear and ripping the magazine out. I’m digging out the mess in the chamber when the grenade detonates.

In the movies, if a guy gets hit by an explosion, he gets blown straight up in the air because that’s cinematic — but in real life, usually the person just folds over. But this explosion actually does blow the insurgent straight into the air. His arms and legs are pinwheeling, his body flopping around, and I’m thinking, That’s not a thing you normally see. Nobody is ever going to believe that that happened.

I’ve got my rifle up now. I’m looking around, but I can’t find anybody. The insurgents who were here moments ago seem to have retreated.

They know something I don’t. What are they planning to — ?

Fire to my rear — the distinctive snap‑thump sound made by a rifle.

A round cracks, then hits the wall eight inches above my head. I look over and see a guy lying on the airfield, in a sling‑supported prone position at a hundred meters out. I know the exact distance because he’s lying at the edge of the area where we do our sprints.

He’s taking well‑aimed slow fire at me. He’s missing, but not by much. If he aims for a body shot, it’ll probably be a different story — but he’s going for a head shot.

I drop to a knee, look through my sniper scope and hold the notch where the guy’s throat and clavicle meet up.

I hold center. Pull the trigger.

He’s gone. Vaporized off the planet.

I’m startled by the tremendous thunderclap of sound that follows. I start looking around, thinking the Polish Armor has shown up with a tank, maybe hit him with a main gun.

That’s when I figure it out: The guy was wearing a suicide vest. I must have shot the vest and detonated it — which, I’m guessing, also explains what happened moments ago with the other guy, the one I saw sailing through the air like in a scene from a movie. My grenade must’ve detonated his suicide vest.

That’s why his insurgent buddies retreated. They didn’t want to get blown up. Maybe these guys have some sort of pact where they detonate their vests if they go down, and they suspected that’s what he’d do.

Which brings up a disturbing question.

How many of these fighters are wearing suicide vests?

My guys are yelling for a medic, for help, for support. They’re behind me, somewhere around the corner. I can hear them. Chief’s hit. Matt’s hit. Everybody back there’s hit. But if I run back to them, the fighters will be right on top of me. That’s not going to help my guys.

I scan the area, looking for more insurgents, wondering what their big plan is. I’m worried they’re making their way back to the camp. I’ve got to delay their movement. I decide to go close with the enemy, figuring if they’re running away from me, at least it’ll keep them off my guys. Got to buy time for my guys until support arrives.

When the insurgents scattered, I saw a few of them run down this little lane in front of me. I get about halfway down when I engage three or five fighters, but it feels like a hundred guys because all I see are muzzle flashes. They’re firing from cover, about twelve to fifteen meters away. I’m too close to use my sniper scope, but my rifle has a little .45 optic on the side that allows me to line my sights up.

I start playing Whac‑A‑Mole. I focus on one bad guy while his buddies fire at me. I move toward them, eyeing a generator panel ahead. I need to get there for cover because I’m running out of ammo.

I don’t make it.

I dump the mag. Now to reload. As I pull my muzzle up, the nearest fighter breaks from cover. He throws his rifle into his sling and screams, “Allahu Akbar!” and starts sprinting toward me.

He’s wearing a suicide vest.

I’m faster at reloading than he is at sprinting. I drop my muzzle down as I send the bolt home. I start firing and move behind the generator panel. He’s seven, maybe ten meters away when my third shot detonates his vest.

The generator panel absorbs the fragments from the explosion, but I still get rocked down to the ground. I’m not knocked unconscious, but it knocks me down, rings my bell. I’m TKO. Confused as to what’s going on and where I am.

Another fighter breaks cover. He looks over his rifle as he walks toward me, calmly cranking off round after round. He’s trying to shoot me in the face as I’m lying there, yet all his shots keep landing short. He’s making eye contact with me but missing, because he’s looking at me instead of looking down his weapon sights.

I jerk my rifle up and start hammering away at him. He collapses in a heap.

Now I’ve got to engage the other fighters to his rear.

We’re exchanging fire when a five‑hundred‑gallon tank full of aviation fuel detonates into a huge fireball. It’s intensely hot. There’s black smoke everywhere, tons of it. I use the opportunity to move around the corner and reload again.

I’m gagging on the thick, sooty smoke when Drew appears. A round hit must have hit the safety locks on the truck earlier, trapping him in the back seat. He’s covered in huge cuts from where the incoming fire hit the truck — the bullets fragmented, deforming into big, fat ninja throwing stars and bouncing around all over the place.

“I know where they’re at,” I tell him. “Let’s go get them.”

Together, we turn toward the lane. We’re doing cross cover‑ age and getting closer to where the body of the last bad guy I shot is now smoldering and smoking. Drew is about to step over him when I yell, “Stay away from the bodies. They’re all wearing suicide vests.”

Then, as if on cue, the guy’s vest goes into what we call low order. It doesn’t detonate, but it starts burning like a gigantic blow torch—an intense plume that shoots twenty or thirty feet in the air. It’s hot and nasty, and I’m so close that the heat feels like it’s cooking my skin. We duck behind another generator panel to wait it out.

Aviation fuel smolders behind us. The area is thick with smoke, and every now and then the wind stirs up and scatters the smoke just enough for us to see a bad guy or two. We engage them, only these guys are different than the others.

These fighters are carrying a tremendous amount of ammunition. They have under‑barrel launchers for their AKs, and they’re all wearing belts carrying about twenty hand grenades. One guy shoots at us while the other throws grenades as fast as he can, over and over and over again.

There’s a constant thump‑crump, thump‑crump as grenades detonate. I’m trying to line up my sights, but fragments from the explosions are blowing rocks and dirt in the air, and although the junction panel absorbs the force, the concussion is like a jab to the face every time. I feel like my bones are getting split in half.

Drew and I are constantly getting concussed, but whenever there’s a clearing and we see a guy, we take a couple of shots. I’m working my cover when something whacks the top of my plate carrier, near the base of my throat. It sounds like a loud crack.

I look down. A hand grenade is trapped between my admin pouch and the junction panel.

If I step back, the grenade will fall between my feet. I’m trying to keep it pinned against the panel so I have control of it, but I’m also trying to slap it away from me like a poisonous spider. So I start pawing at the grenade and eventually manage to rip it away from me. There’s another detonation. Drew and I get whomped again.

I’m clawing my way back up when another grenade hits the back of my knee. Drew and I kick it away furiously. The grenade explodes, blowing us down again.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Drew says. “They’re going to kill us.”

He yanks me up. We only take three or four steps before getting blown down again. We fall together to the ground in a tangled heap. This time I land on top of him. I’ve got forty pounds on Drew, and I’m crushing him. It’s all a big mess.

I’m trying to get my rifle up when I look down and see a severed forearm on my rifle. The explosion threw this severed arm so hard it damaged the butt stock of my rifle. I stagger to my feet and try to fix the butt stock. Drew drags me down an alley. We make our way back to the corner, back to where we were first ambushed.

Then I see Chief Colbert come limping up. I thought he was dead — was sure he was dead. But here he is, not only standing on his own two feet, but not even looking like he’s hurt too bad.

I want to run over and hug him, I’m so elated. He looks us over. Grins.

“What are you boys doing?”

Nobody is shooting at us, but we’re not in a safe position.

Drew says, “We know right where they’re at.”

“All right,” Chief Colbert says. “Let’s go get ’em.”

My pistol’s empty. My rifle’s empty. I start fishing around in my kit for a fresh magazine. There isn’t one. All my magazine pouches are empty.

“Chief,” I say. “I’m out of ammo. You have to take point.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The only magazine I have is the one in my rifle. I’ve got two rounds left. I can’t take point. You have to do it. But hey, don’t worry, I’ll cover you.”

He shoots me a look that says, You’re going to cover me with two bullets. Thanks, asshole.

Someone calls out behind me. I turn around and see a Polish Army lieutenant, Karol Cierpica, and Staff Sergeant Mike Ollis, a soldier from the 10th Mountain Division, sprinting toward us.

“We want to come with you,” Ollis says.

He isn’t wearing any body armor, just his combat top. He doesn’t have any gear on his rifle, just a single magazine. I’m about to say something about how he shouldn’t be over here with no gear and no ammo when I look down at my own rifle, loaded with only two shots.

“If you want to go,” I say, “let’s go.” They stack up behind us.

Another guy joins us. Lieutenant Turnipseed, a Navy SEAL. We have a good formation. I know we’re going to dominate the enemy. There’s just so much energy radiating off these guys, they’re ready to hunt. Win.

There’s no other place I’d rather be than right here. We’ve been taking it on the chin, but now we’re coming back. I let the moment sink in as we march together to the gates of hell.

But the gates of hell are quiet now. There are bodies everywhere — but not whole bodies, just pieces. Arms and legs and rib cages. Spinal cords and organ meat. Dark smears of blood and bile on concrete.

The indirect fire has slowed down because the Polish armor has moved up and filled the breach. They’ve pushed the insurgents off the camp, and now they’re hammering away at what’s left of the Taliban.

We’re standing there, watching, when we see movement from behind a nearby pile of bodies. It’s one of the fighters. He sits up and throws two hand grenades as he screams “Allahu Akbar!” and yanks on his vest, detonating it.

Everyone scrambles for cover as the grenades bounce across the ground. I’m backed by the junction panel again, wearily thinking, Oh, man, these again.

I turn my head away from the explosion as the grenades detonate. Man does it hurt. My bones feel as though they’ve been pulverized into dust. By this point, I’m thinking, I’m a pro at getting grenaded.

I hear gunfire behind me. When I turn around, I see Drew yelling something from the other side of these clear shipping containers — and I see him shooting at our rear.

A Taliban fighter is trying to attack us. Drew is trying to fight him off. Mike Ollis is also nearby. He’s rendering first aid to Polish Army lieutenant Cierpica. Mike moves himself between the attacker and Cierpica and starts firing.

I raise my rifle and fire my last two rounds.

I don’t know if I hit him, or if it was Mike or Drew or maybe all three of us, but the fighter’s vest detonates. Mike takes the brunt of the blast. It launches him backward ten feet. He hits the ground right in front of me and rolls and comes to a dead stop. He isn’t moving.

My rifle is empty. I drop it. The only weapon I have left is my knife. I take it out, thinking, I’m going to run over to the fighter and cut his throat. Then I realize that’s ridiculous since the insurgents are wearing suicide vests.

There’s an AK on the ground. I grab that instead and I run back to Mike. His eyes are open. He looks startled, but when he sees that it’s me, he relaxes a bit. His left arm is partially amputated.

I pick up my rifle, sling it over my shoulder, and try to drag him by the shirt. It keeps stretching off him, so I grab him by the buckle of his belt and carry him back to the compound. I have no idea if it’s safe, but it’s got to be safer than where we’re at. Mike’s arm is bleeding badly. I drop the AK and put him down. I talk to him, and as I get a tourniquet on his arm, I see he’s also got a leg injury. It’s not bleeding yet, but I don’t want to take any chances. After a blast injury, when someone starts to relax a bit, things can turn bad. Fast.

He’s no longer conscious. I slap his face, urging him to stay with me, but he’s not responsive. As I throw a tourniquet on his leg, I look around for my guys. They appear to have run off. I have no idea where they went. I’m alone, and I’m worried about someone walking up behind us.

Mike is fighting to breathe. I rip up his shirt. He’s got a huge depression on his chest.

I’m at the camp. Literally. The hospital is a minute away. I know Mike’s best chance is there, not here with me trying to figure out what’s going on.

I spot a civilian with a vehicle, and load Mike up in it. As another soldier comes running over, I say, “I’ll cover you two. Get this kid to the hospital.”

Then I turn back.

I’m alone, with absolutely no ammunition, and I need a gun.

I return to the spot where I dropped the AK earlier. Something’s rattling inside. I take a closer look. The rifle has bullet holes through the bolt and operating system. Crap.

Fortunately, rifles are scattered everywhere. I pick up another AK. This one has rounds through the magazine right next to the receiver, which is now stretched apart. It doesn’t work, but it’s got a good bolt. I rip the bolt out and throw it back in the other rifle. Now I’ve got a working weapon.

I’m scurrying around, grabbing grenades for the launcher and rifle magazines off the ground when I see my new incoming commander, Major Kaster. I tell him what’s going on, and then the two of us start clearing all the buildings in the area.

People have trickled back into the compound when we return to company headquarters. Everyone looks shot to pieces. Drew sees me, wants to know how badly I’m wounded.

“I’m not hit.”

He looks at me like I’m an idiot. Every single part of me is covered in blood. I look like I’ve been dipped in it. Every time a suicide vest detonated, it threw aerosol sprays and splashes of blood.

“You’re shell‑shocked,” he says, and starts sweeping me over for wounds. The only injury I have is a piece of unfired brass from a rifle stuck in my arm. I pull it out myself and go to check on Mike. The bleeding in his leg, I’m told, is from a severed femoral artery. He’s also been shot in the stomach. When the doctors go to do chest compressions, they discover that all of his ribs are broken. The blast from the suicide vest inflicted extensive internal injuries.

He doesn’t make it. He sacrificed his life to save Polish Army lieutenant Cierpica, who lay on the gurney next to Mike the whole time. Cierpica is able to tell Mike’s grieving father that the doctors did everything they could to save his son.

Chief Colbert and Drew receive the Silver Star for their valor in battle. Nate receives a Bronze Star with V device, one level below the Silver Star. Mike is awarded the Silver Star posthumously — and becomes a hero in Poland, where he is also posthumously awarded the Army Gold Medal, the government’s top award for a foreign soldier.

Lieutenant Cierpica and his wife later name their newborn son Michael.

When I first tell my story, I underplay it a bit because it’s so over the top. So crazy.

An investigation is launched. Investigators come to the base. A rarity. Step‑by‑step, I take the investigators through the various crime scenes by retracing my footsteps. I tell them, “I was standing here when I threw my grenade.” Then as I look down at the gravel, I find my grenade pin.

“This is bonkers,” the investigators keep telling me. They find all my brass.

Since it happened on base, both witnesses and video corroborate different parts of my story. Investigators count three hundred–odd rounds in the truck and in the wall where the gunfight happened. The shots were all fired inside of twenty meters, and not once did I get hit.

Which drives Drew crazy because he was getting pummeled by rounds, shrapnel, and grenade fragments.

When I think about the attack, I always go back to that moment when we got organized and decided to engage the enemy as one. The way we assembled into a synched stack and moved aggressively, right into the chaos. To be with those guys, at that time, on that day, is probably the proudest moment of my career.

It’s the epitome of soldierly virtue on the battlefield.

•••

Hershel “Woody” Williams

Corporal, US Marine Corps Reserve

Conflict/Era: World War II

Action Date: February 23, 1945

Medal of Honor

Interview with Brent Casey, grandson

My grandfather, Hershel “Woody” Williams, was a Marine who fought in World War II. A picture of Jesus hangs on the wall of his farmhouse in Ona, West Virginia. Two vials of sand from Iwo Jima sit on a kitchen shelf near a picture of him dressed in his OD‑green Marine uniform shaking the hand of President Truman as he received the Medal of Honor.

As a kid, I don’t know the details of what my grandfather did during the war or why he was awarded the Medal of Honor. I don’t know anything about the medal or its significance, only that he doesn’t wear the medal often. Maybe to a local parade or when he and my grandmother travel to some event or gala.

If my grandfather wants something done, he only asks once. He works for Veterans Affairs (VA), where he’s respected and admired enormously. He also has a horse farm, where at any given time he’s raising and training from ten to fifteen horses for other people to show.

Woody isn’t opposed to using corporal punishment to get a horse — or a kid — back in line. I’m the only grandchild who hasn’t received a horse crop to my backside, but when, at sixteen, I’m having some behavioral challenges, my mom’s solution is to send me to work on my grandfather’s farm.

“He’s going to tell you how things are supposed to be and show you how things are supposed to be,” she says.

Woody teaches me a lot about selflessness and how it relates to discipline and hard work. He inspires me to serve my country. At nineteen, I join the Army. That’s where I learn about my grandfather’s actions in Iwo Jima. Why he’s a hero who played a part in protecting this great country.

Woody is seventeen years old and lives on a dairy farm in Quiet Dell, West Virginia, with his mother and eleven siblings. War is coming — one, he is sure, that will take away America’s freedoms and privileges.

On October 2, 1923, Woody was born on the farm weighing three and a half pounds. Mom lost several children to the 1918–1919 flu pandemic and was sure she was going to lose him, too. The country was in the grips of the Great Depression when Woody’s father died of a heart attack. Eleven‑year‑old Woody helped support his family, working as a taxi driver and deliver‑ ing telegrams to the families of American soldiers who were killed during the early days of World War II.

Marines wear snappy blue uniforms around town and Woody is impressed. If he’s going to war, he’s going as a Marine. At seventeen, he needs his mother’s signature to enlist.

Mom refuses to sign the papers. He turns eighteen next October. If he wants to be a Marine, he’s going to have to wait.

December 7, 1941: Japan attacks Pearl Harbor.

November 1942: Woody walks into the Marine Corps recruiting office. The recruiter doesn’t so much as glance at his papers. The man is too busy studying Woody’s stature.

“I can’t take you,” the recruiter says. “You’re too short.”

To be a Marine, Woody is told, you must be five eight or better. He’s five six.

His two brothers have been drafted by the Army. He might’ve seriously considered following in their footsteps if it weren’t for the Army’s old brown wool uniform. It’s the ugliest thing in town.

I want to be in those dress blues, he thinks.

If he can’t be a Marine, well, he’s not going. Woody returns to working on the dairy farm with Mom.

In early 1943, the recruiter shows up on his doorstep. The Marine Corps, he explains, has lowered the height requirement.

“Do you still want to go?”

“Yes,” Woody replies, and signs up.

When he thought about protecting his country, he believed it would happen here, on US soil. Instead, he’s sent eight thousand miles from home. On the boat, he looks at a map of the pork‑chop‑shaped island of Iwo Jima.

His unit is in reserve to two other Marine divisions for a campaign expected to last three to five days. There’s no intelligence, only belief in the strong chance that his unit will never leave the ship. He doesn’t know — no one does — that twenty‑two thousand Japanese have dug miles of tunnels across the island and entrenched there.

The Marines sustain catastrophic losses on the beach. Woody and his unit are parked out at sea. That night, they receive new orders to board Higgins boats to Iwo Jima.

There’s no room for them to land. All day long, they huddle down and circle, awaiting the signal. It never comes.

The next day, they head into the beach.

The ramp lowers and Woody pops his head up, catching a glimpse of chaos. The beach is strewn with bodies and limbs torn apart by bullets and explosions; blown‑up tanks and Jeeps and equipment; craters and burnt vegetation.

Exiting the ramp, Woody does a double take. Dead Marines are wrapped in rain ponchos, their bodies stacked like cordwood along the black sand beach made from volcanic ash.

Woody and the six Marines with him crawl across fine sand the texture of BBs. Dig a hole and the sand refills it. Near the first airfield, sand becomes soil where they can dig foxholes.

A flag! A flag!

The Marines start yelling and shooting their rifles into the air. Then Woody sees it — an American flag mounted on Mount Suribachi, the wind unfurling its cotton fabric appliquéd with the familiar red, white, and blue stars and stripes. He joins the celebration and fires his rifle.

The airfield is protected by a cluster of bazooka‑proof concrete pillboxes reinforced with rebar and fronted with a four‑inch‑tall aperture where the Japanese place the barrells of their Nambu machine guns and rifles to mow down US soldiers.

An all‑NCO meeting is called. Woody is a corporal, not an NCO, but Woody’s captain tells him, “I want you there.”

Sheltered inside a huge shell crater, the commanding officer explains the grim reality. The Marines are in an open area. Unless the pillboxes are taken out, there’s no way to advance against the Japanese in their protected position. They’ll have to advance on the pillboxes without any cover.

The commanding officer looks at Woody. “Do you think you can do something with the flamethrower against some of these pillboxes?”

Woody is the only flamethrower left in C Company. The other Marines who came with him, he has no idea where they are, if they’re alive or dead. He’ll never know, even decades later.

“I’ll try,” Woody says.

He trained as a demolition man stateside, knows how to use the M2 flamethrower. Its two fuel canisters filled with compressed gas and liquid diesel fuel and high‑octane gasoline are mounted on a steel rack fitted as a backpack and altogether weighing close to seventy‑five pounds. A full blast lasts about seventy‑two seconds. The weapon’s average lifespan: four minutes.

The key is to pull the trigger in bursts. Once the canisters run dry, the operator has to roll out of the backpack and put on a new one.

He’ll be moving slowly behind a bright orange flame that will draw the attention of enemy snipers.

He’s scared to death, but reminds himself, Everyone has some instinct of bravery. As long as you can control the fear, you can be brave. He thinks of Ruby, the girl waiting for him back home.

When the war is over, he’s going to marry her.

Four Marines are assigned to cover Woody. He selects another Marine to be his “pole charge man.” After Woody sprays liquid fire through the aperture, the pole charge man probes the pillbox with a long piece of wood capped with an explosive fatal to any enemy who’s survived the flamethrower attack.

It’s time to get to work.

The combat is fierce, so intense as to blur his actions over the next four hours. Some events and moments he’ll never recall. Others will live vividly within him forever.

He remembers crawling on his stomach to reach the top of one pillbox. There, he sticks the flamethrower’s nozzle down a vent pipe and squeezes the dual trigger. He remembers his pole charge man taking a round to the head. The man’s helmet saves his life, but he’s taken out of commission. Woody takes over the man’s duties preparing the explosives.

He has no idea how he repeatedly gets his hands on fresh fuel canisters — people say he ran back to the lines; others say Marines delivered canisters to him. Two of the four Marines assigned to cover him are killed. He remembers how each man died and he remembers being on his own, bullets pinging off the tanks strapped across his back and, near the end, Japanese soldiers bursting out of the pillbox with bayonets fixed to the rifles, determined to take down the small American Marine who has killed so many of their own. Woody remembers, will always remember, pulling the trigger and watching the Japanese soldiers catch on fire before falling to the ground.

He feels no remorse. The Japanese have killed many Marines — including his best friend, Vernon Waters. The battle — the war — needs to be won. He keeps fighting, a one‑man killing machine, and by the time he’s done, he has managed to wipe out seven pillboxes.

Woody doesn’t think he’s done anything special. He was just doing his job.

In the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, I serve as a combat medic deployed to Saudi Arabia to support Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. Day after day, I try to do my job while another part of me is full of fear — fear of the unknown.

In 1991, I return home. That’s not true. Only my body returns. My brain . . . is still somewhere overseas.

I get divorced and hit the bottle. I self‑medicate for fifteen years. I end up homeless, jobless, and carless. I have absolutely nothing left except for addiction and alcoholism.

In 2005, my mother, brother, and Woody come collect me. I’m taken to the VA hospital in Huntington. I’ve never been to the VA. The doctor tells me that I’ve flagged 19 out of 19 on my PTSD questionnaire.

“What the hell is PTSD?” I ask.

“Don’t worry about that,” the doctor replies. “You’re in the right place. We’ve got all the tools and resources you need to get back on track.”

I get involved in the VA’s rehab and PTSD residential rehabilitation program. I learn healthy coping skills. Woody helps me the entire time. He, too, was diagnosed with PTSD. He’s all too familiar with my struggles.

My grandfather shares the nightmares he had after the war — fighting fires instead of shooting fire. One time he jumped out of bed and pounded the wall because he believed it was on fire. Attending the Pea Ridge Methodist Church changed his life.

The nightmares stopped, but the regrets he had over killing people remained.

The VA completely changes my life. I go back to school, get a bachelor’s degree in business administration and management, then work full‑time on my MBA with the goal of becoming a teacher.

My grandfather retires — from the VA and from horse farming. When Woody turns eighty, my grandmother says, “It’s time to hand up the horse reins.” He does, moving about a thousand yards down to the bottom of the hill, where he can still see the farm and, whenever he wants, walk back up and take a look at the horses.

Woody continues his speaking engagements and I often accompany him. My grandfather doesn’t need the money he earns, so I say, “Papa, why don’t we do something with the honorariums and create a nonprofit?”

Woody loves the idea.

I get together with my brother Bryan, who has a law degree. He works on the 501(c)(3) form while I go about assembling a board of directors for the foundation we create together. I’m building out the website when I receive a call from my grandfather.

“I was at Donel C. Kinnard Memorial State Veterans Cemetery and came up with an idea,” he says. “I’ve been working with an architect. I’m going to snail mail you some copies of this monument I have in mind.”

“This monument, what is it?”

“It’s going to honor Gold Star Families.”

That’s what the military calls immediate family members of a soldier who died in the line of duty. I do a Google search for “Gold Star Families Memorial Monument.” None exists.

“You’re not going to believe this,” I tell my grandfather. “Your idea for ‘Gold Star Families Memorial Monument.’ It’s original.” Some might say — correctly — that the idea fell into our laps. But in our minds, it’s a God thing, no question. It’s the way

Woody and my parents raised us.

The first monument is unveiled at Donel C. Kinnard Memorial State Veterans Cemetery on Woody’s ninetieth birthday. The foundation starts to take off and I’m forced to make a decision. Do I want to write my PhD dissertation or run the nonprofit? I can only do one.

I decide to help my grandfather, pay him back for everything he’s done for me. He’s the reason I’m still alive.

The foundation dedicates twenty‑five Gold Star Families Memorial Monuments across the country. Then we start working on establishing a memorial in each state. When we reach that goal, we expand into other countries.

My grandfather insists on attending each dedication. Even at age ninety‑eight and dealing with a leaky heart valve, he still moves at a hundred miles an hour. On the road together 230 days a year, we share airplane flights, hotel rooms, and meals.

One day at home, Woody makes a misstep. Instead of the bathroom, he steps into the stairwell. He tumbles down all eighteen steps and is knocked out. He breaks five ribs and his pelvis in three places.

He spends a month in the hospital, then two months inside a physical rehabilitation center. Tell my grandfather to do twenty‑five push‑ups and he does fifty. He’s released in time for Christmas. By January, he’s completely recovered.

We’re in Dallas, Texas, for the groundbreaking of the National Medal of Honor Museum when we receive a call from the World War II Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana. They want to create a 4D hologram of Woody so that museum visitors from all over the world will be able to sit down and have a simulated conversation with him.

My grandfather can’t wrap his head around the concept. And he isn’t excited about going to California where, over several days, he’ll be filmed using sophisticated technology. The week before we’re scheduled to leave, he calls me to cancel.

“Papa, you don’t understand,” I say. “The museum has already paid for our expenses, has everything in place to film.”

He doesn’t want to go.

I text the other four grandsons. We all get on the phone with him, talk him through how this is a unique opportunity.

“Papa,” I say to him, “my kids’ grandkids will be able to go to the World War II Museum forty, fifty years from now. What better way to leave your legacy and your story behind?”

It takes some effort, but we manage to convince him. A friend offers the use of his private jet and Woody flies to Hollywood and films for four straight days.

The technology is incredible. Museum visitors will see a projection of Woody sitting in a chair. When they ask him questions about his life, what it was like growing up in West Virginia and serving overseas, Woody will answer right back.

Around March, he develops vertigo. He gets fluid in his legs. Woody ignores it, and the fluid builds until it gets inside his lungs. We take him to Huntington, West Virginia, and the same VA hospital where I was treated, now renamed the Hershel “Woody” Williams VA Medical Center.

The VA medical staff recommend further evaluation at the Cleveland Clinic. Doctors there believe Woody’s heart has a second leaky valve. They can’t push the fluid out, so they put him on Lasix, a strong diuretic used to treat excessive swelling. His kidneys can’t handle the medication.

The doctors suggest dialysis.

“Nope,” Woody says. “Nope, nope, nope. We’re not doing any of that. I want to go home.”

“What do you mean when you say home?” the doctor asks. “Do you want to go to a rehab center, or do you want to go to your house?”

“I want to go to the Woody Williams VA Medical Center.”

I need to get him home right now. It takes a lot of phone calls well into the early morning hours, but I finally arrange a StatFlight, and the company generously donates their services free of charge. I manage to get Woody on the helicopter flight home the following morning, Saturday.

By Sunday, Woody’s feeling pretty good. He wants to see my mom — it’s her birthday — and my youngest brother, who he hasn’t seen in a while. My grandfather is in good spirits, sitting up in a hospital chair, but we all know he’s sick.

Senator Joe Manchin stops by Woody’s room. Woody wants the senator’s help. For some time, it’s been on my grandfather’s mind to build a protective shelter for families at the Donel C. Kinnard Memorial State Veterans Cemetery.

“I’m going to make that happen,” the senator says.

My wife, Mary, and I are with Woody in the early morning hours of June 29, 2022. I’m playing him church hymns on my iPhone. “In the Garden,” Woody’s favorite song, comes on, and that’s when my grandfather, the last living Medal of Honor recipient who served in World War II, takes his final breath, at the VA hospital named after him.

It’s another God thing.

For two days, Woody, wearing his dress blues, lies in state in the state capitol building in Charleston, West Virginia. A Gold Star Families Memorial Monument sits on the capitol lawn. Woody’s final tour continues. His casket is loaded onto a C‑130 for transport to Washington, DC, to lie in honor at United States Capitol Building — the thirty‑eighth American to do so.

My nephew, who two years ago joined the Marine Corps because of Woody, accompanies him.

A ceremony is held in the rotunda. It’s a beautiful day. Just God‑given. And special. Later, Woody will be moved to the World War II Memorial on the National Mall.

My grandfather knew of these plans before his death, and only agreed once he was satisfied that the day would honor not only him but all World War II veterans. To his very last breath, my grandfather believed he was the caretaker of the Medal of Honor.

“I didn’t earn it,” he often said. “I wear it for those Marines who lost their lives protecting mine.”