June 11, 2025 • 37 mins
As a proud member of the Cherokee Nation, Dwight Birdwell was determined to fight for the country he loved. And his actions on the first day of the Tet Offensive in Vietnam are stuff of legend. But Dwight’s story is also about survival: not just what it takes to live through a terrible battle, but how that survival changes you– forever.
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Episode bibliography:
Birdwell, Dwight W., and Keith William Nolan. A Hundred Miles of Bad Road: An Armored Cavalryman in Vietnam. Presidio Press, June 1, 1997. https://www.amazon.com/Hundred-Miles-Bad-Road-Cavalryman/dp/0891416285
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
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The link is also in our show notes below. Pushkin.
It was late on a summer night, and Dwight Birdwill
(00:49):
could sense something was wrong. He was a specialist in
the Army in command of a tank, and that tank
was parked alongside a main supply out near a little
village in South Vietnam. The year was nineteen sixty eight.
Dwight could hear a group of water buffaloes shuffling and
(01:11):
grunting in a pen nearby. He had grown up in
the Oklahoma countryside, and he knew that livestock wouldn't move
at night unless something was disturbing them. He knew in
his bones that something was wrong. He peered out of
the turret of the tank, using his starlight scope to
cut through the blackness of the night nothing, but he
(01:35):
couldn't shake the feeling. He decided to go out and look.
He woke up the driver of his tank, a gentle
guy named Bill Watts, and asked him to take his
place at the turret, and then Dwight headed out into
the night. He crossed the road, moving quietly through the brush,
(01:56):
listening intently to see if he could hear whatever it
was he felt. He crept house to house in the village,
shining his flashlight over families sleeping on bamboo platforms, finding nothing,
hearing nothing, just the slow breathing of sleeping civilians and
(02:19):
the sound of the insects in the night. So Dwight
turned to head back to the tank, and at that
very moment, three or four rocket propelled grenades flashed by him,
hissing as they went. It was a sound that Dwight
was horrifyingly familiar with. Dwight watched as they hit his
(02:40):
take the tank's cash of ammunition was set off, fueling
the explosion. The noise of the blast rocked a little village.
Then he saw something bright like a comet, fall from
the tank. It was Bill Watts. He was on fire,
and Dwight bird well started running I'm j R. Martinez
(03:11):
and this is Medal of Honor Stories of Courage. The
Medal of Honor is the highest military decoration in the
United States, awarded for gallantry and bravery and combat at
the risk of life, above and beyond the call of duty.
Each candidate must be approved all the way up the
chain of command, from the supervisory officer in the field
(03:33):
to the White House. This show is about those heroes,
what they did, what it meant, and what their stories
tell us about the nature of courage and sacrifice. That moment,
that night at the tank changed the course of Dwight
Birdwell's life. It transformed him from a tough twenty year
(03:54):
old determined to fight into someone who could not look
away from the terrible cost of war, someone who would
ask God at that moment and for many years afterwards,
why was I the one to survive? Dwight's story is
about a lot of things. It's about the prior he
(04:16):
feels in being part of the Cherokee Nation, a community
with a remarkable history of military service. It's about his
extraordinary bravery in the battlefield. An episode that feels like
it's straight out of a Rambo movie. Dwight it turns out,
is a guy who put himself in harm's way over
and over again because that's where he felt he belonged.
(04:41):
But most of all, it's the story of a man
coming to grips with the feeling of guilt that even
the highest honor in the military cannot absolve. Dwight Birdwell
(05:03):
never really knew his father. His dad was an oil
filled worker of Cherokee descent, a hard drinking man who
was in and out of jail a lot. He pretty
much disappeared from Dwight's life when he was little. When
Dwight was three, his mother met and married Ed Birdwell.
They settled in Oklahoma in a town called Bell Here's
(05:26):
Dwight remembering.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
The community was about ninety percent Cherokee, maybe more. It
was a very very rural area, an area of poverty.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
It was a hard life what people may do.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
I lived right on a creek, and every morning I
remember a Cherokee lady coming down the creek. In the evening,
she would come back and she would have a shring
of fish over her shoulder that she had caught to
feed her family.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
Dwight's stepdad was a farmer and his mother worked in
the fields picking beans and strawberries. Even though Dwight was
a talented student, he was discouraged from even thinking about
going to college. The message from his high school counselor
was essentially, you're an Indian, you won't amount to anything.
(06:15):
But Dwight was determined. He decided to find his own
way out by joining the military. He knew the GI
bill would send him to school, and he liked the
idea of service.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
A lot of the Cherokee man in the community and
area had served in World War Two and served in Korea,
and they emphasized that it was a Cherokee tradition to serve.
So I did it out of a sense of duty
to the country and out of a sense of obligation
(06:48):
to Cherokee ancestors.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Dwight was eighteen, with deep set eyes and a crooked smile,
and dark hair parted on the side. He was already
fit for the army, but not because he played football
or basketball or wrestled. Get this, because he worked chasing
chickens six nights a week.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
We left home about five retractions in the evening and
went to northwest Arkansas and caught chickens all night until daybreak.
You go in and catch the chickens, and then you
would run outside and you would climb up onto a
flatbed truck and load the chickens, run back down and
go get another bat. Shopping all night long.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
That's a random detail, but I love it. I'm just
not sure I've ever heard of a night time chicken
catcher before. What even is that? Anyways, back to Dwight
in the Army. When he enlisted, he asked to be
sent straight to Vietnam. This was spring of nineteen sixty
six and the war was just warming up. Even though
(07:57):
Dwight tested so well that he could have gone to
office a tree and at West Point, he chose combat instead.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
I felt like that was my duty, my mission, to
go where I was most neated, and I felt like
I was most neated in Vietnam. Of course, I didn't
necessarily want to die, but if that was my destiny,
that would be my destiny.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
In September of nineteen sixty seven, Dwight landed at Tunsut
Airport outside of Saigon. He remembers marveling and how beautiful
and green the countryside looked from the plane, and he
remembers seeing a line of body bags on the side
of the runway and thinking this is it. I'm here.
(08:45):
Dwight was assigned to Troop C, third Squadron, fourth Cavalry,
twenty fifth Infantry Division, which we're going to refer to
the way that he did as the three quarter calf.
It was task was securing Highway One, the main supply
route running north from Saigon to the Cambodian border. Dwight
was well liked and for once his intelligence was recognized,
(09:08):
he was given a spot doing radio repair, but he
didn't like the relative safety of the rare echelon. He
wanted to fight, and before long he joined a tank
crew as a gunner. He knew exactly how dangerous it
would be.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
If you're going to tank you've got an iron coffin.
It's just a matter of time.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
Dwight was convinced that the US was right to be
in Vietnam. He saw the bodies of town officials assassinated
by the National Liberation Front. He knew how brave they
must have been to stand up for their values. But
he saw dead via Con guerrillas too. They were young,
about his age, and Dwight looked at them and thought
(09:50):
they aren't evil. They're just as idealistic as I am.
But as nineteen sixty seven turned to nineteen sixty eight,
Dwight and his this platoon began to stumble across well
hidden bunkers, caches of weapons, signs of movement of change,
And then the early morning of January thirty first, it
(10:12):
happened a coordinated attack throughout South Vietnam. It would be
known as the Tet Offensive. Here's a news report describing
the situation in nineteen sixty eight.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
It all amounts to the most ambitious series of communist
attacks yet mounted, spreading violence into at least ten provincial capitals,
plus American air bases and civilian installations, stretching the entire
length of the country.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
The order came down to Dwight and the three quarter
Calf to get to Tan Sanute Airport. It was the
most active air base in the country.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
They said, there is a squad of VC breaking into
the wire at Tan Shanut with preeport. Cab was so
confident that we sent two turns down. There were only
about sixty off. It went down and overtook ptains.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
They thought they would only be fighting a ragged handful
of viacom. They'd outpowered and outgunned. That kind of enemy
forced before. So the men got into their tanks and
went But what awaited was in a skirmish. It was
an ambush. The tanks of the three quarter calf barreled
(11:33):
down Highway one toward the Tansanute airfield. The second platoon
was at the lead, third platoon Twipe's platoon followed behind.
Third tracks kicked up dust as they rumbled forward. Through
their early morning hours, the sky grew lighter and overcast gray.
The trip down was abnormally quiet. The convoy passed no
(11:55):
civilian traffic on the road, and the nearby houses seemed
to be deserted. It was almost peaceful. Then the lead
tank reached the airport and a wall of fire erupted
from a hamlet along the side of the road.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Chaos. They let us go right into the middle and
then cut loose, and within a very short period of
time a couple of minutes to laid patone was pretty
much wiped out.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
It wasn't a scrappy group of Vietcong that was waiting.
It was the North Vietnamese Army, and they now surrounded
the convoy on three sides. The sky was suddenly filled
with eerie green lights falling towards the American tanks. They
were tracers which the North Vietnamese used to see where
(12:47):
their fire was going.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
And there's all these green craisiers coming out and all
these rockets coming in. Boom boom, boom boom, and I'm
thank you. What in the world's going on?
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Dwight's tank was at the very front of his platoon.
As the lead platoon exploded, his tank pulled in right
behind them. One of Dwight's friends, franklin Kuff, was in
the lead platoon. He and other veterans who knew Dwight
spoke about their experiences in a documentary made by Osio
voices of the Cherokee people. Frank remembers seeing Dwyke's tank
(13:21):
rattle into place.
Speaker 4 (13:23):
Man, it's seeing good. We gotta do something. And that's
when Sir Petun Comb pulling up and there's Doy like
a Knight in shining armor.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Almost instantly, Dwight's tank commander was hit a bloody hole
where his left eye had been. Dwight got down and
lifted his commander out of the tank under heavy fire
and put him in the ditch that ran just along
the side of the road. The injured gis from the
lead platoon were gathering there as well, and then Dwight
(13:55):
returned to his tank and took command. Every vehicle ahead
of him had been put out of action, and there
was no way to retreat. There were too many wounded
that would be left behind.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
I can't remember the bullet climb by my head, you know,
just thank boy, that's an unpleasant sounds. But I kept going.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
He started firing back. He didn't have time to fill
any fear. There was no place for it. He used
the tank's cannon, he used the tank's machine gun. His
head and torso were exposed to enemy fire, but somehow
the bullets didn't find him. In the meantime, more survivors
(14:39):
from the Leeds platoon were making their way to Dwight's position.
The ditch beside his tank was the only spot with
any kind of relative safety. Even though the enemy was
advancing close on Dwight's left, he couldn't fire the tank's
cannon in that direction because he would hit those wounded gis.
So instead, he got up on that tank, took aim
(15:03):
with his machine gun, and opened fire. David Young was
one of those soldiers taking cover in the ditch that day.
Speaker 4 (15:12):
If it hadn't been for these high fired rounds going
over my head the other way, I wouldn't be here today.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Dwight was fully exposed to enemy fire. Bullets whizzed by,
close enough to blow the communication device off of his
tanker helmet, but still he didn't get hit.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
What was going through my mind was to keep fighting
until I went down, and if I went down, I
wasn't gonna shop.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
Part of his helmet was shot off. He could no
longer provide battlefield updates to his commanders. He couldn't get
any guidance either. All he could do was shoot and
drive the enemy back until he used.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Up all my ammunition.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
There was a helicopter directly above him. It was the
three quarter Calves Commander Lieutenant Colonel Glenn Otis. He was
circling the action, leading from the sky. All of the
men in a three quarter Calve adored Otis. He was
a brilliant leader, fair and brave, ready to be as
(16:18):
much a part of the action as his men were.
And then Otis's helicopter took a direct hit. It was
about to crash, and it was heading straight for Dwight's position.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
You know, I'm watching a helicopter come down. It's thinking
this is not real.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
The helicopter hit the ground, bounced hard, and came to
a stop, the skids mashing down the bar wire fence
that ran alongside of the airport. Otis and his crew
got out and ran from the helicopter as fast as
they could in case it caught fire. Dwight watched them
scramble away, and then he thought that helicopter has something
(17:00):
that I need. He hopped down from the tank and
raced to the chopper, cutting his legs on the concertina wire.
Dwight made it to the chopper, pulled two machine guns out.
He passed one to a front, got the other back
on top of his tank and opened fire.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
He wasn't slowing down at all. He just kept doing
a job.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
He kept going, protecting those wounded men in the ditch
next to him, holding off the enemy. And then inevitably
he was hit.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
I just remember a big flash and Lord of blood
coming out of my head and down my face, at
my chest and what have you.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
He had shrump, no wounds. He was bleeding badly, but
Dwight wasn't worried about that. He didn't feel like he
was particularly injured. He was worried about his gun, and
of course.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
That sixty was in two pieces. I'm looking at my gun.
It's like a toy, you know. I had torn a hack.
What am I gonna do now?
Speaker 1 (18:12):
He only had the side arm in his holster. It
would have to be enough. They were shooting all around him,
and the enemy was still on every side. He was
bleeding from his head. He was majorly outnumbered, but he
hadn't lost his resolve.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
So I just felt like, I'm going to fight as
long as I can. I wasn't gonna say die until
I was dead.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
So I got off the tank and went down to
the ditch where the other soldiers were. He rallied three
of them to advance to the front of the column
of tanks to set up a defensive position. It was
a crazy move, four guys trying to hold off a
ton of enemy fighters, but to Dwight, it was the
only move, the only way to keep the enemy from
(18:58):
coming over the top and get into the wounded gis.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
One guy was a non Indian from our harbor Main,
and I got two Native Americans from Port Gambo Washington,
who was actually a medic Oliver Jones, and then there
was an Ottawa from Michigan, and we went down the ditch,
took up a position to hold off the North Vietnam mainons,
(19:23):
and we were pretty low in the ammunition and it
looked like that it was almost over with.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
They huddled in front of the convoys lead tank, but
little big tree that stood alone by the road. When
they peeked over the edge of the ditch, they could
see hundreds of enemy soldiers. They were massively outnumbered. Dwight
looked over at the airfield where he arrived in Vietnam
less than a year before, where he'd seen those green
(19:51):
body bags.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
It was an eerie feeling at that point because we
were right on the runway and these large airliners then
PanAm World air Waves were sitting out there just ready
to check off.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Those airplanes were filled with people getting out of Vietnam,
escaping from the war, going home to safety.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Here we were about to die looking at those big planes,
and just was very very strange. Failing.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Dwight and the other soldiers threw grenades at the enemy.
Machine gun rounds hit the tree above their heads. Showering
them with leaves and branches, and then they heard the
rumble of vehicles. Troop BE of the cavalry was coming
to help. Even with his life on the line, Dwight
saw some humor in that.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
You know in the movie the cab is always saving
nine Indians from Indians. Here's these three Indians being saved.
That wasn't a movie script. The cabs saving the Indians.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Helicopters flew low over the open fields. Dwight remembers them
laying down a smoke screen to conceal the arrival of troopy.
Then the air filled with the sound of American tanks
taking out the enemy positions. The wounded gi started getting
loaded onto Metavac helicopters. Dwight was ordered to board one too.
(21:24):
Remember he was bleeding from his head. He got on
it all right, but then he just slid across and
out the other side of the chopper and returned to
the fight.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
I had to get back on the battle. I could
still go.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
He helped the other men, those wounded guys in the ditch,
loading them onto helicopters, getting them to safety, and then
finally he was forced to get help himself.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
I've put on a helicopter and it was full of bodies.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
That helicopter felt like an airborne morgue. But it could
have been so much worse.
Speaker 4 (22:05):
He saved many, many, many lives that day. You just
can't believe what he did that name. It's hard for
me to believe it, and I saw it.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
The Army agreed with Frank. Dwight received a Silver Star
for his actions that day. He was, by all accounts,
a bone of fide hero. He knew that his survival
was nothing short of a miracle, but the thought of
the people he couldn't save nagged at him. And then,
(22:36):
several months later, on a creepily quiet night, it all caught.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Up with him.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
After ted the war and Vietnam changed, the enemy suddenly
seemed to be everywhere. Morale among the American troops was terrible.
Their focus went from winning the war, whatever that might mean,
to just surviving and getting home. Dwight had been a
true believer, but he began to feel dragged down and depressed.
(23:08):
All the same, he still had his unique capacity to
keep pushing forward, and even when he wavered, he took
his commitment to service seriously, which meant that his fight
of a lifetime kept happening. Here's his friend Ted Bagley,
who served with him, speaking on that Ossio documentary. We
talk about Tomson Knut and the things he did, but
(23:30):
he did that the whole time we were in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
It wasn't a one time as fair. That's what people
don't understand.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
Dwight received another Silver Star in July of sixty eight
for going back into an enemy occupied village to rescue
stranded American troops. Nobody had wanted that assignment, but Dwight
volunteered for it, not once, but twice, over and over again.
(23:59):
Dwight put his life on the line and survived. Birdie
had at least ten tons of news. He became commander
of a tank and was particularly close with two of
the soldiers that served with him, Bill Watts and Harold Donnelly.
Harold and Dwight were best friends, pretty much inseparable, and
(24:21):
Dwight looked up to Bill.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Bill Watch was very tender guy, very compassionate, had a
view of life that took me years to get.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Two Which brings us to that night by the road
in that little village, the one I told you about
at the start of the episode. A stifling hot July
night in nineteen sixty eight, Dwight's platoon was set up
along the roadside. The water buffaloes moved in their pen
as Dwight peered out into the darkness to figure out
(24:52):
what he was sensing, what felt wrong.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
I got bailed up and I put him in a turret.
I said, you take over. I'm gonna go out there
and do some recon. So I went out searching for
North Vietnam ass and I couldn't find anything.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
And that's when he turned and saw the RPGs hit
the tank and his friend Bill fall out of it
on fire from head to toe.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
Bill Wats came out of that tank tent a ball.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Of fire, just like in tons of nude. Dwight didn't hesitate,
so I run.
Speaker 2 (25:28):
Back to the tank, didn't get Bill. But as I'm
carrying him out, my friend Harold Donaldy said, Dwight, help me,
help me.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
I'm hurt.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
I said, Harold, I'll be back and help you when
I can. You be a man, you take that pain.
Speaker 1 (25:52):
Being a man taking that pain was the logic Dwight
had learned over all those months in Vietnam. But after
he got Bill out, of Harm's way and went back
for Harold. He saw what had become of his friend.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
So I got back after I'm taken care of Bill,
got Harold, picked him up. Harold was mangled his splash. Listen, patients, strings,
hang on, and forever to this day, feel bad about
what I said too. Hold on.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
I just want to pause here and point something out.
This recording was made more than fifty years after that
terrible traumatic night, and Dwight is still crying when he
remembers the way he spoke to his friend. I think
that tells you more than anything else. Who Dwight birdwill is.
(26:56):
A day or so later, he went to see Bill
in the hospital. He was racked with guilt. He kept
thinking it should have been me. I should have been
able to prevent this. He was looking for his friend,
not seeing them anywhere, when.
Speaker 2 (27:13):
I heard this boy and it was Bill. Don't you
recognize me? I didn't recognize the burns he had. I
were fierce, and I knew he was dying. And we
talked for a bet and afterwards went out. I sat down.
(27:40):
I just cried and cried and cried.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
And then he noticed people next to him sitting in
that same waiting area.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
He's a bit a family, come I right, and they
had a young girl, probably six or seven years old.
Incredibly beautiful young lady. They're so pretty, and she was
so happy.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
Here is something Dwight hadn't seen for months, something beautiful
and peaceful and warm, an antidote to the pain of
seeing his dying friend.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
And then all of a sudden, she turned her whole
face to me, and it was blown away on the
right side of her face.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
The side of her face was a mass of scar tissue.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Her eye was gone, and I just thought, noted it out.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
No more.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
I can't take this anymore.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Dwight Birdwill, the truest of the true believers, the first
to volunteer for action. The warrior was done with the war,
just done. He served the rest of his tour, and
then he got out as as fast as he could.
When his flight left Vietnam, Dwight looked out the window.
(29:07):
The green paradise that had greeted him when he'd flown
in sixteen months before was gone, and its place was
a landscape that looked like the surface of the moon,
pock marked with craters, burned and destroyed. He wondered to himself,
what was it all for? Bill died of his injuries.
(29:31):
Harold Donnelly survived, but with medical issues that would plague
him the rest of his life. He and Dwight stayed
in touch until he died. Dwight always felt that he
had been bad luck for Harold. Dwight took Bill's dog
tags with him when he left Vietnam. He carried it
on his keychain for years, as a reminder, maybe or
(29:56):
a pendance Dwight's story does it end there? Of course,
the army gave him the ability to do the thing
everyone said he couldn't do, go to college become a lawyer.
(30:22):
He married a sweet girl named Virginia, who had also
grown up poor in a Cherokee community near his They
had two kids, a daughter and a son. But none
of it was easy for him. When Dwight first returned home,
he drank, He had nightmares. He carried those memories of
(30:43):
Bill and Harold, of the other men and the civilians
he couldn't save with him like a sack of stones,
And like so many veterans, he cannot talk about the
war at all.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
The war haunted me for years, particularly the salt of
why did I survive and so many other UH purists.
Speaker 1 (31:09):
Then, late one night in nineteen seventy nine, as Dwight
was drinking himself, as he puts it, to the bottom
of a fifth of bourbon, he decided two things. The
first to stop drinking. The second was to stop obsessing
over the things he could have done differently in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
I had a reckoning. I came to the conclusion that
there was nothing I could do about the past. I
could just live for the future.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Right around that time, something else happened. Dwight saw his
old commander, Glenn Otis again in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
He had told me a few days after talk said,
he said, I'm going to recommend you for the Medal.
Speaker 1 (31:56):
Of Honor, but nothing had ever come of it. No
out here was Otis, who had become a four star
general since the two had parted ways in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
He asked me, what happened to the medal of honor?
Are not? Probably me said we're going to have to
do something about that, And I just felt like that,
you know, if that's one of those changes would never happened.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
The years kept going by. In addition to his law practice,
Dwight went to work for the Cherokee Nation, serving as
one of three justices of the Supreme Court. Eventually he
served two terms as Chief Justice of the Cherokee Nation.
It's a fitting role for a man who could so
clearly see both sides of a conflict, and all during
(32:41):
that time and for long afterwards, General Otis worked to
get Dwight his Medal of Honor for his brave stand
at the airport that first day of the Tech offensive.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
I never wanted the medal of honor. All I wanted
was a fair consideration. General ODIs got me that per consideration.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Finally, in May of twenty twenty two, more than five
decades is that action at Tons newd It happened.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
I got a call from President Biden and he said,
I'm going to award to you Adelbonner, and he talked
to me very graciously for about ten minutes. Going into
the conversation, he said, this is a big deal. And
then somewhere else in the conversation on down the road,
(33:34):
he said, this is a big deal.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
It is a big deal. But like so many men
who have been awarded the medal, Dwight doesn't see it
as something for him. He sees it as something for
all those other men who fought and didn't survive.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
This medal is for the men who went down that day.
It's for the family except those who didn't make it.
It's for those who were injured and later died or
later lived impaired lives. I'm thankful for it. I don't
mean to show you that I'm not thankful, but for
(34:12):
doth Men, their family, for the Tree Quarter k and
the twenty fifth Temperantry Division.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
President Biden put the medal around Dwight's neck.
Speaker 5 (34:22):
And at a long last, at long last, your story
is being honored as it should have been always.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Some of Dwight's friends from the calv were there at
the ceremony. So was his daughter, Stephanie, who currently serves
as the director of the Office of Tribal Government Relations
at the Department of Veteran Affairs.
Speaker 5 (34:43):
And I might know, Native American communities serve in the
United States Armed Forces at a higher percentage rate than
any other cohort in America.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Dwight's daughter thinks she understands why.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
That might be. Native people, as the original inhabit to
this land, have an especially strong connection.
Speaker 4 (35:02):
To the land we live on.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
It is truly our homeland, and that can be a
powerful inspiration and source of motivation to serve.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
When Dwight walked away from the war in Vietnam, he
stopped doing one kind of service, but he didn't stop serving.
He worked to help the Cherokee nation as persistent as
he ever was on the battlefield. I think his devotion
to service must stem in part from the guilt that
he still carries even today about the people he wasn't
(35:32):
able to save. But it also stems from his deep
bedrock of faith. He believes that when his time comes,
he will stand before his God and maybe then finally
he will find the absolution that he can't give himself.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
And then, but I did go up for Judge Vun.
If I had the courage, I would ask God, why
did you let me lay up? Did I fulfill your flirtation?
Speaker 1 (36:02):
The Medal of Honor, by definition, tells the world that
Dwight Birdwill didn't just fulfill expectations. He went far, far
above and beyond them. I can't imagine his Maker will disagree.
(36:38):
Medal of Honor. Stories of Courage is written by Meredith
Rollins and produced by Mereth Rollins, Jess Shane and Suzanne Gabber.
Our editor is Ben Adolf Hoffrey. Sound design and additional
music by Jake Gorsky. Our executive producer is Constanza Gallardo.
Fact checking by Arthur Gomperts. Original the music by Eric Phillips.
(37:02):
Special thanks to the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, the
US Department of Veteran Affairs, and Cherokee Film Productions for
sharing material from At Long Last, Dwight Birdwell's Medal of
Honor from the docu series Oscio Voices of the Cherokee People.
We also want to hear from you, so send us
your personal story of courage or highlight someone else's bravery.
(37:27):
Email us at Medal of Honor at Pushkin dot fm.
You might hear your stories on future episodes of Metal
of Honor or see them on our social channels at
Pushkin Pods. I'm your host, JR. Martinez
Hey everyone, We've put together a survey for listeners of
Medal of Honor and we want to hear from you.
Tell us what you love about the show, what we
can improve on, or stories you think we've missed. We're
committed to making this show even better and you can
help to take the survey. Visit bit dot lee slash
h survey. That's bit dot l y slash mh survey.
(00:27):
The link is also in our show notes below. Pushkin.
It was late on a summer night, and Dwight Birdwill
(00:49):
could sense something was wrong. He was a specialist in
the Army in command of a tank, and that tank
was parked alongside a main supply out near a little
village in South Vietnam. The year was nineteen sixty eight.
Dwight could hear a group of water buffaloes shuffling and
(01:11):
grunting in a pen nearby. He had grown up in
the Oklahoma countryside, and he knew that livestock wouldn't move
at night unless something was disturbing them. He knew in
his bones that something was wrong. He peered out of
the turret of the tank, using his starlight scope to
cut through the blackness of the night nothing, but he
(01:35):
couldn't shake the feeling. He decided to go out and look.
He woke up the driver of his tank, a gentle
guy named Bill Watts, and asked him to take his
place at the turret, and then Dwight headed out into
the night. He crossed the road, moving quietly through the brush,
(01:56):
listening intently to see if he could hear whatever it
was he felt. He crept house to house in the village,
shining his flashlight over families sleeping on bamboo platforms, finding nothing,
hearing nothing, just the slow breathing of sleeping civilians and
(02:19):
the sound of the insects in the night. So Dwight
turned to head back to the tank, and at that
very moment, three or four rocket propelled grenades flashed by him,
hissing as they went. It was a sound that Dwight
was horrifyingly familiar with. Dwight watched as they hit his
(02:40):
take the tank's cash of ammunition was set off, fueling
the explosion. The noise of the blast rocked a little village.
Then he saw something bright like a comet, fall from
the tank. It was Bill Watts. He was on fire,
and Dwight bird well started running I'm j R. Martinez
(03:11):
and this is Medal of Honor Stories of Courage. The
Medal of Honor is the highest military decoration in the
United States, awarded for gallantry and bravery and combat at
the risk of life, above and beyond the call of duty.
Each candidate must be approved all the way up the
chain of command, from the supervisory officer in the field
(03:33):
to the White House. This show is about those heroes,
what they did, what it meant, and what their stories
tell us about the nature of courage and sacrifice. That moment,
that night at the tank changed the course of Dwight
Birdwell's life. It transformed him from a tough twenty year
(03:54):
old determined to fight into someone who could not look
away from the terrible cost of war, someone who would
ask God at that moment and for many years afterwards,
why was I the one to survive? Dwight's story is
about a lot of things. It's about the prior he
(04:16):
feels in being part of the Cherokee Nation, a community
with a remarkable history of military service. It's about his
extraordinary bravery in the battlefield. An episode that feels like
it's straight out of a Rambo movie. Dwight it turns out,
is a guy who put himself in harm's way over
and over again because that's where he felt he belonged.
(04:41):
But most of all, it's the story of a man
coming to grips with the feeling of guilt that even
the highest honor in the military cannot absolve. Dwight Birdwell
(05:03):
never really knew his father. His dad was an oil
filled worker of Cherokee descent, a hard drinking man who
was in and out of jail a lot. He pretty
much disappeared from Dwight's life when he was little. When
Dwight was three, his mother met and married Ed Birdwell.
They settled in Oklahoma in a town called Bell Here's
(05:26):
Dwight remembering.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
The community was about ninety percent Cherokee, maybe more. It
was a very very rural area, an area of poverty.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
It was a hard life what people may do.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
I lived right on a creek, and every morning I
remember a Cherokee lady coming down the creek. In the evening,
she would come back and she would have a shring
of fish over her shoulder that she had caught to
feed her family.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
Dwight's stepdad was a farmer and his mother worked in
the fields picking beans and strawberries. Even though Dwight was
a talented student, he was discouraged from even thinking about
going to college. The message from his high school counselor
was essentially, you're an Indian, you won't amount to anything.
(06:15):
But Dwight was determined. He decided to find his own
way out by joining the military. He knew the GI
bill would send him to school, and he liked the
idea of service.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
A lot of the Cherokee man in the community and
area had served in World War Two and served in Korea,
and they emphasized that it was a Cherokee tradition to serve.
So I did it out of a sense of duty
to the country and out of a sense of obligation
(06:48):
to Cherokee ancestors.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Dwight was eighteen, with deep set eyes and a crooked smile,
and dark hair parted on the side. He was already
fit for the army, but not because he played football
or basketball or wrestled. Get this, because he worked chasing
chickens six nights a week.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
We left home about five retractions in the evening and
went to northwest Arkansas and caught chickens all night until daybreak.
You go in and catch the chickens, and then you
would run outside and you would climb up onto a
flatbed truck and load the chickens, run back down and
go get another bat. Shopping all night long.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
That's a random detail, but I love it. I'm just
not sure I've ever heard of a night time chicken
catcher before. What even is that? Anyways, back to Dwight
in the Army. When he enlisted, he asked to be
sent straight to Vietnam. This was spring of nineteen sixty
six and the war was just warming up. Even though
(07:57):
Dwight tested so well that he could have gone to
office a tree and at West Point, he chose combat instead.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
I felt like that was my duty, my mission, to
go where I was most neated, and I felt like
I was most neated in Vietnam. Of course, I didn't
necessarily want to die, but if that was my destiny,
that would be my destiny.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
In September of nineteen sixty seven, Dwight landed at Tunsut
Airport outside of Saigon. He remembers marveling and how beautiful
and green the countryside looked from the plane, and he
remembers seeing a line of body bags on the side
of the runway and thinking this is it. I'm here.
(08:45):
Dwight was assigned to Troop C, third Squadron, fourth Cavalry,
twenty fifth Infantry Division, which we're going to refer to
the way that he did as the three quarter calf.
It was task was securing Highway One, the main supply
route running north from Saigon to the Cambodian border. Dwight
was well liked and for once his intelligence was recognized,
(09:08):
he was given a spot doing radio repair, but he
didn't like the relative safety of the rare echelon. He
wanted to fight, and before long he joined a tank
crew as a gunner. He knew exactly how dangerous it
would be.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
If you're going to tank you've got an iron coffin.
It's just a matter of time.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
Dwight was convinced that the US was right to be
in Vietnam. He saw the bodies of town officials assassinated
by the National Liberation Front. He knew how brave they
must have been to stand up for their values. But
he saw dead via Con guerrillas too. They were young,
about his age, and Dwight looked at them and thought
(09:50):
they aren't evil. They're just as idealistic as I am.
But as nineteen sixty seven turned to nineteen sixty eight,
Dwight and his this platoon began to stumble across well
hidden bunkers, caches of weapons, signs of movement of change,
And then the early morning of January thirty first, it
(10:12):
happened a coordinated attack throughout South Vietnam. It would be
known as the Tet Offensive. Here's a news report describing
the situation in nineteen sixty eight.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
It all amounts to the most ambitious series of communist
attacks yet mounted, spreading violence into at least ten provincial capitals,
plus American air bases and civilian installations, stretching the entire
length of the country.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
The order came down to Dwight and the three quarter
Calf to get to Tan Sanute Airport. It was the
most active air base in the country.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
They said, there is a squad of VC breaking into
the wire at Tan Shanut with preeport. Cab was so
confident that we sent two turns down. There were only
about sixty off. It went down and overtook ptains.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
They thought they would only be fighting a ragged handful
of viacom. They'd outpowered and outgunned. That kind of enemy
forced before. So the men got into their tanks and
went But what awaited was in a skirmish. It was
an ambush. The tanks of the three quarter calf barreled
(11:33):
down Highway one toward the Tansanute airfield. The second platoon
was at the lead, third platoon Twipe's platoon followed behind.
Third tracks kicked up dust as they rumbled forward. Through
their early morning hours, the sky grew lighter and overcast gray.
The trip down was abnormally quiet. The convoy passed no
(11:55):
civilian traffic on the road, and the nearby houses seemed
to be deserted. It was almost peaceful. Then the lead
tank reached the airport and a wall of fire erupted
from a hamlet along the side of the road.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Chaos. They let us go right into the middle and
then cut loose, and within a very short period of
time a couple of minutes to laid patone was pretty
much wiped out.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
It wasn't a scrappy group of Vietcong that was waiting.
It was the North Vietnamese Army, and they now surrounded
the convoy on three sides. The sky was suddenly filled
with eerie green lights falling towards the American tanks. They
were tracers which the North Vietnamese used to see where
(12:47):
their fire was going.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
And there's all these green craisiers coming out and all
these rockets coming in. Boom boom, boom boom, and I'm
thank you. What in the world's going on?
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Dwight's tank was at the very front of his platoon.
As the lead platoon exploded, his tank pulled in right
behind them. One of Dwight's friends, franklin Kuff, was in
the lead platoon. He and other veterans who knew Dwight
spoke about their experiences in a documentary made by Osio
voices of the Cherokee people. Frank remembers seeing Dwyke's tank
(13:21):
rattle into place.
Speaker 4 (13:23):
Man, it's seeing good. We gotta do something. And that's
when Sir Petun Comb pulling up and there's Doy like
a Knight in shining armor.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Almost instantly, Dwight's tank commander was hit a bloody hole
where his left eye had been. Dwight got down and
lifted his commander out of the tank under heavy fire
and put him in the ditch that ran just along
the side of the road. The injured gis from the
lead platoon were gathering there as well, and then Dwight
(13:55):
returned to his tank and took command. Every vehicle ahead
of him had been put out of action, and there
was no way to retreat. There were too many wounded
that would be left behind.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
I can't remember the bullet climb by my head, you know,
just thank boy, that's an unpleasant sounds. But I kept going.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
He started firing back. He didn't have time to fill
any fear. There was no place for it. He used
the tank's cannon, he used the tank's machine gun. His
head and torso were exposed to enemy fire, but somehow
the bullets didn't find him. In the meantime, more survivors
(14:39):
from the Leeds platoon were making their way to Dwight's position.
The ditch beside his tank was the only spot with
any kind of relative safety. Even though the enemy was
advancing close on Dwight's left, he couldn't fire the tank's
cannon in that direction because he would hit those wounded gis.
So instead, he got up on that tank, took aim
(15:03):
with his machine gun, and opened fire. David Young was
one of those soldiers taking cover in the ditch that day.
Speaker 4 (15:12):
If it hadn't been for these high fired rounds going
over my head the other way, I wouldn't be here today.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Dwight was fully exposed to enemy fire. Bullets whizzed by,
close enough to blow the communication device off of his
tanker helmet, but still he didn't get hit.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
What was going through my mind was to keep fighting
until I went down, and if I went down, I
wasn't gonna shop.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
Part of his helmet was shot off. He could no
longer provide battlefield updates to his commanders. He couldn't get
any guidance either. All he could do was shoot and
drive the enemy back until he used.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Up all my ammunition.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
There was a helicopter directly above him. It was the
three quarter Calves Commander Lieutenant Colonel Glenn Otis. He was
circling the action, leading from the sky. All of the
men in a three quarter Calve adored Otis. He was
a brilliant leader, fair and brave, ready to be as
(16:18):
much a part of the action as his men were.
And then Otis's helicopter took a direct hit. It was
about to crash, and it was heading straight for Dwight's position.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
You know, I'm watching a helicopter come down. It's thinking
this is not real.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
The helicopter hit the ground, bounced hard, and came to
a stop, the skids mashing down the bar wire fence
that ran alongside of the airport. Otis and his crew
got out and ran from the helicopter as fast as
they could in case it caught fire. Dwight watched them
scramble away, and then he thought that helicopter has something
(17:00):
that I need. He hopped down from the tank and
raced to the chopper, cutting his legs on the concertina wire.
Dwight made it to the chopper, pulled two machine guns out.
He passed one to a front, got the other back
on top of his tank and opened fire.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
He wasn't slowing down at all. He just kept doing
a job.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
He kept going, protecting those wounded men in the ditch
next to him, holding off the enemy. And then inevitably
he was hit.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
I just remember a big flash and Lord of blood
coming out of my head and down my face, at
my chest and what have you.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
He had shrump, no wounds. He was bleeding badly, but
Dwight wasn't worried about that. He didn't feel like he
was particularly injured. He was worried about his gun, and
of course.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
That sixty was in two pieces. I'm looking at my gun.
It's like a toy, you know. I had torn a hack.
What am I gonna do now?
Speaker 1 (18:12):
He only had the side arm in his holster. It
would have to be enough. They were shooting all around him,
and the enemy was still on every side. He was
bleeding from his head. He was majorly outnumbered, but he
hadn't lost his resolve.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
So I just felt like, I'm going to fight as
long as I can. I wasn't gonna say die until
I was dead.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
So I got off the tank and went down to
the ditch where the other soldiers were. He rallied three
of them to advance to the front of the column
of tanks to set up a defensive position. It was
a crazy move, four guys trying to hold off a
ton of enemy fighters, but to Dwight, it was the
only move, the only way to keep the enemy from
(18:58):
coming over the top and get into the wounded gis.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
One guy was a non Indian from our harbor Main,
and I got two Native Americans from Port Gambo Washington,
who was actually a medic Oliver Jones, and then there
was an Ottawa from Michigan, and we went down the ditch,
took up a position to hold off the North Vietnam mainons,
(19:23):
and we were pretty low in the ammunition and it
looked like that it was almost over with.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
They huddled in front of the convoys lead tank, but
little big tree that stood alone by the road. When
they peeked over the edge of the ditch, they could
see hundreds of enemy soldiers. They were massively outnumbered. Dwight
looked over at the airfield where he arrived in Vietnam
less than a year before, where he'd seen those green
(19:51):
body bags.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
It was an eerie feeling at that point because we
were right on the runway and these large airliners then
PanAm World air Waves were sitting out there just ready
to check off.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Those airplanes were filled with people getting out of Vietnam,
escaping from the war, going home to safety.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Here we were about to die looking at those big planes,
and just was very very strange. Failing.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Dwight and the other soldiers threw grenades at the enemy.
Machine gun rounds hit the tree above their heads. Showering
them with leaves and branches, and then they heard the
rumble of vehicles. Troop BE of the cavalry was coming
to help. Even with his life on the line, Dwight
saw some humor in that.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
You know in the movie the cab is always saving
nine Indians from Indians. Here's these three Indians being saved.
That wasn't a movie script. The cabs saving the Indians.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Helicopters flew low over the open fields. Dwight remembers them
laying down a smoke screen to conceal the arrival of troopy.
Then the air filled with the sound of American tanks
taking out the enemy positions. The wounded gi started getting
loaded onto Metavac helicopters. Dwight was ordered to board one too.
(21:24):
Remember he was bleeding from his head. He got on
it all right, but then he just slid across and
out the other side of the chopper and returned to
the fight.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
I had to get back on the battle. I could
still go.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
He helped the other men, those wounded guys in the ditch,
loading them onto helicopters, getting them to safety, and then
finally he was forced to get help himself.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
I've put on a helicopter and it was full of bodies.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
That helicopter felt like an airborne morgue. But it could
have been so much worse.
Speaker 4 (22:05):
He saved many, many, many lives that day. You just
can't believe what he did that name. It's hard for
me to believe it, and I saw it.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
The Army agreed with Frank. Dwight received a Silver Star
for his actions that day. He was, by all accounts,
a bone of fide hero. He knew that his survival
was nothing short of a miracle, but the thought of
the people he couldn't save nagged at him. And then,
(22:36):
several months later, on a creepily quiet night, it all caught.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Up with him.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
After ted the war and Vietnam changed, the enemy suddenly
seemed to be everywhere. Morale among the American troops was terrible.
Their focus went from winning the war, whatever that might mean,
to just surviving and getting home. Dwight had been a
true believer, but he began to feel dragged down and depressed.
(23:08):
All the same, he still had his unique capacity to
keep pushing forward, and even when he wavered, he took
his commitment to service seriously, which meant that his fight
of a lifetime kept happening. Here's his friend Ted Bagley,
who served with him, speaking on that Ossio documentary. We
talk about Tomson Knut and the things he did, but
(23:30):
he did that the whole time we were in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
It wasn't a one time as fair. That's what people
don't understand.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
Dwight received another Silver Star in July of sixty eight
for going back into an enemy occupied village to rescue
stranded American troops. Nobody had wanted that assignment, but Dwight
volunteered for it, not once, but twice, over and over again.
(23:59):
Dwight put his life on the line and survived. Birdie
had at least ten tons of news. He became commander
of a tank and was particularly close with two of
the soldiers that served with him, Bill Watts and Harold Donnelly.
Harold and Dwight were best friends, pretty much inseparable, and
(24:21):
Dwight looked up to Bill.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Bill Watch was very tender guy, very compassionate, had a
view of life that took me years to get.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Two Which brings us to that night by the road
in that little village, the one I told you about
at the start of the episode. A stifling hot July
night in nineteen sixty eight, Dwight's platoon was set up
along the roadside. The water buffaloes moved in their pen
as Dwight peered out into the darkness to figure out
(24:52):
what he was sensing, what felt wrong.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
I got bailed up and I put him in a turret.
I said, you take over. I'm gonna go out there
and do some recon. So I went out searching for
North Vietnam ass and I couldn't find anything.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
And that's when he turned and saw the RPGs hit
the tank and his friend Bill fall out of it
on fire from head to toe.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
Bill Wats came out of that tank tent a ball.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Of fire, just like in tons of nude. Dwight didn't hesitate,
so I run.
Speaker 2 (25:28):
Back to the tank, didn't get Bill. But as I'm
carrying him out, my friend Harold Donaldy said, Dwight, help me,
help me.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
I'm hurt.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
I said, Harold, I'll be back and help you when
I can. You be a man, you take that pain.
Speaker 1 (25:52):
Being a man taking that pain was the logic Dwight
had learned over all those months in Vietnam. But after
he got Bill out, of Harm's way and went back
for Harold. He saw what had become of his friend.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
So I got back after I'm taken care of Bill,
got Harold, picked him up. Harold was mangled his splash. Listen, patients, strings,
hang on, and forever to this day, feel bad about
what I said too. Hold on.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
I just want to pause here and point something out.
This recording was made more than fifty years after that
terrible traumatic night, and Dwight is still crying when he
remembers the way he spoke to his friend. I think
that tells you more than anything else. Who Dwight birdwill is.
(26:56):
A day or so later, he went to see Bill
in the hospital. He was racked with guilt. He kept
thinking it should have been me. I should have been
able to prevent this. He was looking for his friend,
not seeing them anywhere, when.
Speaker 2 (27:13):
I heard this boy and it was Bill. Don't you
recognize me? I didn't recognize the burns he had. I
were fierce, and I knew he was dying. And we
talked for a bet and afterwards went out. I sat down.
(27:40):
I just cried and cried and cried.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
And then he noticed people next to him sitting in
that same waiting area.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
He's a bit a family, come I right, and they
had a young girl, probably six or seven years old.
Incredibly beautiful young lady. They're so pretty, and she was
so happy.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
Here is something Dwight hadn't seen for months, something beautiful
and peaceful and warm, an antidote to the pain of
seeing his dying friend.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
And then all of a sudden, she turned her whole
face to me, and it was blown away on the
right side of her face.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
The side of her face was a mass of scar tissue.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Her eye was gone, and I just thought, noted it out.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
No more.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
I can't take this anymore.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Dwight Birdwill, the truest of the true believers, the first
to volunteer for action. The warrior was done with the war,
just done. He served the rest of his tour, and
then he got out as as fast as he could.
When his flight left Vietnam, Dwight looked out the window.
(29:07):
The green paradise that had greeted him when he'd flown
in sixteen months before was gone, and its place was
a landscape that looked like the surface of the moon,
pock marked with craters, burned and destroyed. He wondered to himself,
what was it all for? Bill died of his injuries.
(29:31):
Harold Donnelly survived, but with medical issues that would plague
him the rest of his life. He and Dwight stayed
in touch until he died. Dwight always felt that he
had been bad luck for Harold. Dwight took Bill's dog
tags with him when he left Vietnam. He carried it
on his keychain for years, as a reminder, maybe or
(29:56):
a pendance Dwight's story does it end there? Of course,
the army gave him the ability to do the thing
everyone said he couldn't do, go to college become a lawyer.
(30:22):
He married a sweet girl named Virginia, who had also
grown up poor in a Cherokee community near his They
had two kids, a daughter and a son. But none
of it was easy for him. When Dwight first returned home,
he drank, He had nightmares. He carried those memories of
(30:43):
Bill and Harold, of the other men and the civilians
he couldn't save with him like a sack of stones,
And like so many veterans, he cannot talk about the
war at all.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
The war haunted me for years, particularly the salt of
why did I survive and so many other UH purists.
Speaker 1 (31:09):
Then, late one night in nineteen seventy nine, as Dwight
was drinking himself, as he puts it, to the bottom
of a fifth of bourbon, he decided two things. The
first to stop drinking. The second was to stop obsessing
over the things he could have done differently in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
I had a reckoning. I came to the conclusion that
there was nothing I could do about the past. I
could just live for the future.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Right around that time, something else happened. Dwight saw his
old commander, Glenn Otis again in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
He had told me a few days after talk said,
he said, I'm going to recommend you for the Medal.
Speaker 1 (31:56):
Of Honor, but nothing had ever come of it. No
out here was Otis, who had become a four star
general since the two had parted ways in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
He asked me, what happened to the medal of honor?
Are not? Probably me said we're going to have to
do something about that, And I just felt like that,
you know, if that's one of those changes would never happened.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
The years kept going by. In addition to his law practice,
Dwight went to work for the Cherokee Nation, serving as
one of three justices of the Supreme Court. Eventually he
served two terms as Chief Justice of the Cherokee Nation.
It's a fitting role for a man who could so
clearly see both sides of a conflict, and all during
(32:41):
that time and for long afterwards, General Otis worked to
get Dwight his Medal of Honor for his brave stand
at the airport that first day of the Tech offensive.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
I never wanted the medal of honor. All I wanted
was a fair consideration. General ODIs got me that per consideration.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Finally, in May of twenty twenty two, more than five
decades is that action at Tons newd It happened.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
I got a call from President Biden and he said,
I'm going to award to you Adelbonner, and he talked
to me very graciously for about ten minutes. Going into
the conversation, he said, this is a big deal. And
then somewhere else in the conversation on down the road,
(33:34):
he said, this is a big deal.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
It is a big deal. But like so many men
who have been awarded the medal, Dwight doesn't see it
as something for him. He sees it as something for
all those other men who fought and didn't survive.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
This medal is for the men who went down that day.
It's for the family except those who didn't make it.
It's for those who were injured and later died or
later lived impaired lives. I'm thankful for it. I don't
mean to show you that I'm not thankful, but for
(34:12):
doth Men, their family, for the Tree Quarter k and
the twenty fifth Temperantry Division.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
President Biden put the medal around Dwight's neck.
Speaker 5 (34:22):
And at a long last, at long last, your story
is being honored as it should have been always.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Some of Dwight's friends from the calv were there at
the ceremony. So was his daughter, Stephanie, who currently serves
as the director of the Office of Tribal Government Relations
at the Department of Veteran Affairs.
Speaker 5 (34:43):
And I might know, Native American communities serve in the
United States Armed Forces at a higher percentage rate than
any other cohort in America.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Dwight's daughter thinks she understands why.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
That might be. Native people, as the original inhabit to
this land, have an especially strong connection.
Speaker 4 (35:02):
To the land we live on.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
It is truly our homeland, and that can be a
powerful inspiration and source of motivation to serve.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
When Dwight walked away from the war in Vietnam, he
stopped doing one kind of service, but he didn't stop serving.
He worked to help the Cherokee nation as persistent as
he ever was on the battlefield. I think his devotion
to service must stem in part from the guilt that
he still carries even today about the people he wasn't
(35:32):
able to save. But it also stems from his deep
bedrock of faith. He believes that when his time comes,
he will stand before his God and maybe then finally
he will find the absolution that he can't give himself.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
And then, but I did go up for Judge Vun.
If I had the courage, I would ask God, why
did you let me lay up? Did I fulfill your flirtation?
Speaker 1 (36:02):
The Medal of Honor, by definition, tells the world that
Dwight Birdwill didn't just fulfill expectations. He went far, far
above and beyond them. I can't imagine his Maker will disagree.
(36:38):
Medal of Honor. Stories of Courage is written by Meredith
Rollins and produced by Mereth Rollins, Jess Shane and Suzanne Gabber.
Our editor is Ben Adolf Hoffrey. Sound design and additional
music by Jake Gorsky. Our executive producer is Constanza Gallardo.
Fact checking by Arthur Gomperts. Original the music by Eric Phillips.
(37:02):
Special thanks to the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, the
US Department of Veteran Affairs, and Cherokee Film Productions for
sharing material from At Long Last, Dwight Birdwell's Medal of
Honor from the docu series Oscio Voices of the Cherokee People.
We also want to hear from you, so send us
your personal story of courage or highlight someone else's bravery.
(37:27):
Email us at Medal of Honor at Pushkin dot fm.
You might hear your stories on future episodes of Metal
of Honor or see them on our social channels at
Pushkin Pods. I'm your host, JR. Martinez
Host
Malcolm Gladwell
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