July 3, 2024 • 33 mins
Henry Johnson, nicknamed Black Death, was one of the most famous American soldiers of World War I. He was part of the Harlem Hellfighters, the legendary all-Black U.S. Army unit, and awarded the French Croix de Guerre for single-handedly stopping an invading enemy force in the trenches. So how did he end up entirely forgotten? This is the story of one man’s inspiring fight – on and off the battlefield.
Special thanks to Washington University in St Louis Missouri for sharing archival material from the documentary Men of Bronze by William Miles.
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin Hello.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Hello.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
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(00:45):
Now onto the episode. It was a clear day in
New York City, February nineteen nineteen. The winter sun shone
down warmly on masters of people lining both sides of
Fifth Avenue. The parade route was seven miles long, and
(01:05):
they were cheering crowds along every inch of it. People
were john for a peak of thousands of soldiers who
were marching uptown in perfect military formation. These men were
just back from the most apocalyptic conflict the world had
ever seen, World War One, the Great War, as they
called it back then. The men were wearing dark wool
(01:27):
uniforms and steel helmets. The bayonets of their rifles gleamed
in the sun. Some of the men were shell shocked,
some were exhausted. All of them were grateful to have
made it back home, and all the men were black.
They were known as the Harlem Hell Fighters, the three
hundred and sixty ninth Infantry Regiment of the United States Army.
(01:50):
This parade was their triumphant return to New York City,
the city that had given them their unofficial name. In
nineteen nineteen, troops were still segregated. Discrimination wasn't confined to
the Jim Crow South. It reached all the way to
the trenches on the European Front. But the Harlem Hell
Fighters were some of the most highly decorated soldiers in
(02:12):
the Great War. They had seen one hundred and ninety
one days of combat, the longest of any regiment, and
they had never had a man taken prisoner or lost
a foot of ground. There were more than two thousand
Harlem Hell Fighters in that parade, all them heroes, but
as one in particular that I want to tell you about.
(02:33):
His name was Henry Johnson, but as he rode past,
the spectators called out to him by his nickname Black Death.
Of all the Harlem Hell Fighters, Henry Johnson had made
the biggest impression back home in the trenches of France.
In the dark of night. He had single handedly taken
(02:53):
on an invading enemy force. He had survived twenty one
near fatal wounds, and he had rescued another wounded soldier
who the Germans were trying to take prisoner. Every person
at that parade knew Henry Johnson's story made it back
to the US. Long before he did. Henry was featured
on army recruitment posters and advertisements. He was profiled in
(03:16):
newspapers and magazines. Out of a fighting force of millions,
Henry Johnson had become one of the most famous soldiers
in the entire war. Henry rolled up this avenue in
an open topped cadillac. He couldn't march with the rest
of the troops. His foot had been destroyed in the battle.
It was being held together by a metal plate. He
(03:39):
waved and smiled as the crowds shouted his name. At
that moment, Henry was the most famous person in New
York City. But only ten years later Henry Johnson would
die poor and broken, and soon enough his story would
be nearly forgotten. The Battle of Henry Johnson might have
(04:00):
started in France, but he kept going long after the war.
It went on, in fact, for ninety seven years until finally,
one of the most famous soldiers of World War I
would be awarded our country's highest recognition for courage, the
Medal of Honor, him Malcolm Gladwell. And this is Medal
(04:23):
of Honor Stories of Courage. The Medal of Honor is
the highest military decoration in the United States. It's awarded
for gallantry and bravery in 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 to the White House.
(04:45):
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 today. The never ending battle
of Henry Johnson. Let's start with the Harlem hell Fighters.
(05:11):
I mean, it's there in the name, right, total badasses.
Other regiments have nicknames like the Rock of the Marne,
the Liberators, the puzzlingly named Armorators, or my personal favorite,
the nickname for the one hundred and first Airborne Division,
which at some point during World War II became known
as the Battered Bastards of Best Doin. But to understand
(05:33):
Henry Johnson, you first have to understand the Harlem hell Fighters.
They started out as the fifteenth Infantry of the New
York National Guard. At the time, they were the only
black regiment in New York State. When the US went
to war in April nineteen seventeen, men rushed to join
the fifteenth. They came from across New York, but the
(05:55):
vast majority of them were from Harlem. There wasn't a
draft yet, they didn't have to go to war. They
wanted to go. All of them were volunteers, including Henry Johnson.
He was small, a slight man with a sweet disposition.
He had a massive smile and wore his army issue
cap at a rakish tilt to the side. He almost
(06:18):
hadn't met the physical requirements to enlist. You had to
be five foot four, and he was barely that. But
he was resourceful and he was tough. As his wife,
Edna Jackson would say, Henry wasn't big, but oh boy,
he can go some. Like a lot of the thirty
six hundred men of the fifteenth Infantry, Henry saw the
(06:39):
military as a chance to serve his country and have
steady work. It was risky, but if he survived, it
could mean a better life, so he joined up. Back
in the nineteen seventies, a documentary crew tracked down one
of the last surviving Harlem hell Fighters, a guy named
Melville Morris. He talked about the pride they all had
(06:59):
in the fifteenth.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Every man felt he was in the best squad, in
the best regiment of the whole game in United States.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
They set sail for France in the fall of nineteen seventeen,
but when they got there, instead of grenades and tanks,
they were handed shovels and wheelbarrows. The American Expeditionary Forces,
under the command of General John Pershing had no intention
of sending the fifteenth into battle. Instead, they would work
as stevedores, manual laborers. They were signed to lay railroad tracks.
(07:35):
Turns out Jim Crobb had followed the hell Fighters all
the way to Europe.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
And General Persian said, there had no fighting blacks in
this war.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
We train them in the stevedores.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Or send you back home. Were set downs on old
ships and do all kinds of details, but not fight
because Persian wanted he didn't want no puddles in his
division there or what lily white.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
The fifteenth were trained to fight, and they knew they
could make a difference. They also knew what fighting would mean,
not just the war, but afterwards, when they went back
to the United States. A lieutenant from the fifteenth wrote
home from France to say, if we can't fight and
die in this war as bravely as white men, then
we don't deserve equality. But if we can do things
(08:24):
at the front, if we can make ourselves felt, if
we can make America really proud, then it will be
the biggest possible step towards our equalization as citizens. Henry
had worked as a baggage handler in Albany before the war.
He was strong, he had grown up in hard scrabble
North Carolina. He knew adversity, and he was deeply proud
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to be an American soldier. Being kept out of the
fighting wasn't just frustrating, it was infuriating. And then in
March of nineteen eighteen, the fifteenth Infantry got their chance.
The French army was at its breaking point. They'd been
on the front lines for three years and lost more
than a million men. Look to the soldiers of the
(09:10):
fifteenth and figured, the white Americans don't want to fight
with him, so maybe we can so they requested their service.
The fifteenth was quickly renamed the three hundred and sixty
ninth Infantry Regiment of the United States Army, and they
went off to join the French. This, by the way,
was pretty much unheard of. The US military did not
(09:30):
lend out soldiers, but loaning the hell Fighters solved a problem.
General Pershing wouldn't have to worry about keeping his black
and white soldiers apart. Plus, it was a nice thing
for an ally to do, and as an extra neighborly act,
his staff sent their French liaison a document titled Secret
Information concerning Black American Troops. It warned about the dangers
(09:54):
of relying on quote unquote inferior black soldiers. It noted
that their quote vices were a quote constant menace, and
it asked the French not to treat the black soldiers
as equal warning against ea with them or even shaking
their hands otherwise, the document explained the men might expect
the same treatment when they got back to America. But
(10:19):
the French welcomed the newly christened three hundred and sixty
ninth Infantry into their army as fast as they possibly could.
In that nineteen seventies documentary I mentioned, you can hear
how excited Melville was about all things French.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
We got French helmets, French canteens, French rifles, and instead
of water canteen, where should French wine? And we joined
the fourth French Army.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
They were sent to the Argonne Forest in the northeastern
corner of France to join the beleaguered French troops in
the trenches. And when they got there, it turns out
that three hundred and sixty ninth weren't just ready to fight,
they were great at it, and soon enough, thanks to
their tenacity and their skill, they had earned their new name,
the Harlem hell Fighters. Back home, though, the truth of
(11:08):
what they face as black soldiers, that white American soldiers
did not want to serve alongside them, was being very
carefully hidden. We'll be back in a minute. In the
(11:31):
early hours of May fifteenth, nineteen eighteen, Henry Johnson and
his friend and fellow hell Fighter Needham Roberts, were sent
to a listening post in No Man's Land, the area
between the French trenches and the German position picture a
wide swath of desolate terrain parked with craters and burnt trees.
(11:51):
The French were holding the western side in deep trenches
rimmed with barbed wire. The Germans were holding the east.
Henry and Needham's job was to stay up through the
night and be the eyes and ears of their platoon.
If they heard or saw anything suspicious, they were to
alert the rest of the troops. The hell fighters had
(12:12):
seen two months of action, the Germans had seen three years.
They'd become experts at raiding trenches, coming by surprise, killing,
taking soldiers prisoner, and pumping them for intelligence. That night,
everyone was on edge. They were sure a raiding party
was going to come. So sure a French lieutenant ordered
(12:33):
Henry and Needham back to safety. Henry, as he told
reporters later, wasn't having it. Lieutenant, He said, I'm an
American and I never retreat. Henry and Needham stood watch
all through the pitch black night. Their ears were tuned
to everything around them, the wind whistling through no man's land,
a rustle in the leaves. Then at two or three
(12:56):
in the morning, they heard an ominous gnawing noise. Crunch, crunch, crunch.
It was the sound of wire cutters. Suddenly, an enemy
flare that the dark. The Germans had arrived. Grenades exploded,
and bullets cut through the night. Air Shrapnel tore through
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Henry and Needham's uniforms their skin. Henry threw grenades of
his own, his heart racing, he shouldered his rifle and
started shooting. Needham, meanwhile, had been wounded in the arm
and hip, and he lost consciousness. Henry was fighting alone.
In an instant, the Germans were on top of them.
Henry couldn't see how many ten twenty. He realized with
(13:39):
horror that they were going to drag need Him away.
The hell Fighters hadn't yet let a man be captured
as a prisoner. They prided themselves on that he had
to keep them from taking Needham. Henry had fired all
the rounds in his rifle, and when he went to
reload it, it jammed unusable, so he turned his rifle
around and swung it wildly. Alone and mobbed by the enemy,
(14:01):
he beat back the Germans until the butt of his
rifle broke. Then he remembered his bolo knife. If you
don't know what a bolo knife, let me put it
this way. You don't cut butter with it. Nine to
fourteen inches long, with a razor sharp blade along one side.
Henry swung the knife and took down one enemy's soldier.
Then another shots rang out. Henry was hit in the
(14:25):
right forearm, right hip, and left leg, but he kept stabbing.
He swung his knife till the Germans turned and ran
into the night. He slashed and thrust until he was
sure his friend was safe. Henry, as his wife Edna knew,
could go so he'd lost a lot of blood. He
struggled to stay conscious. He just couldn't, and as he
(14:48):
sank to the ground, Henry hurled one last grenade, hitting
and killing an enemy's soldier. As he fled, reinforcements reached
the listening post a few minutes later. Melville remembers it
Henry had been wounded twenty one times.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Well, he refused to die and took Johnson and Roberts.
We finally got out there in the morning, dragged their
bodies back. They weren't dead and both lived through it.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
The next morning, as the two recovered in the hospital,
their commanding officers surveyed the path of the Germans retreat.
His captain Arthur Little wrote, quote, we trailed the course
with the greatest of ease, by pulls of blood, blood
soaked bandages, and blood smeared logs with the routed party
had rested. They also discovered that the raiding party had
(15:38):
left behind a small but very valuable collection of weapons
and intelligence. They deduced that as many as twenty four
Germans had been on the scene, yet Henry had held
them off in hand to hand combat without a working firearm.
In the dark, he kept them from crossing the French line,
and just a few minutes of fighting he had defeated
(16:00):
an entire raiding party. That's why when Henry came back home,
everyone in America knew his name. The day after the battle,
three American reporters arrived at the scene. While General Pershing
had restricted news about American military operations overseas, the French
had no such rules, and the three hundred and sixty
(16:22):
ninth was, after all, embedded with the French. The journalists
raised to speak to Needham and Henry at the hospital.
They sent their reports back to the States, where people
were desperate for some news, any news of progress in
the war. Henry was happy to talk to the reporters
about that night and that Bolo knife. Each slash meant
(16:44):
something believe me, he told them, I just fought my life.
A rabbit would have done that. His actions, wrote the
Saturday Evening Post, were proof that the color of a
man's skin has nothing to do with the color of
his soul. Two days after the attack, the French sixteenth Division,
which commanded the hell Fighters, officially recognized the actions of
(17:07):
Needham and Henry. Both received the French Quadiguere, the country's
highest military honor. They were some of the first U.
S soldiers ever to earn this distinction. Henry's medal also
included the Bronze Palm for extraordinary valor, and that's when
he got his nickname Black Death. It took two days
(17:28):
for the French to award Henry's courage. It would take
decades for the United States to do the same. Henry
spent the rest of the war in a French hospital
recovering from his injuries. His foot had been destroyed, and
the army awarded him the Wounded Chevron, an acknowledgment of
(17:50):
his disabilities. They also upgraded his rank from private to sergeant.
But while the French were willing to honor his courage
and valor with a medal, the American military would not,
even though by the end of the war in the
winter of nineteen eighteen, the Harlem hell Fighters had served
longer in the trench, which is than any other American regiment,
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and they had suffered the most losses, with fifteen hundred casualties.
A reporter from a local paper found Henry at the
pier as he got off the steamer coming home to
New York and described him this way. His lip is
scarred by a knife slash, his head holds a dent
made by a rifle butt. In his hand is the
(18:32):
welt of a bayonet's slash, and a silver plate keeps
his left foot in place. He got his heroes welcome.
Henry rode in a place of honor in the parade
up Fifth Avenue, carrying a bouquet of lilies. Melville remembered it, well.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Everybody wanted to see Henry Johnson. Everybody wanted to shakers here.
That's one day that it wasn't a sighted bit.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Of prejudice in New York City. Henry was featured on
an ad for war stamps. It read Henry Johnson licked
a dozen Germans. How many stamps have you licked? But
Henry was exhausted, physically broken. When he got off the
train in Albany, finally home, he was greeted by New
York Governor L Smith and a group of cheering fans.
(19:19):
He was grateful, of course, but pay attention to what
he said to the reporters quote, I am very proud
of all of you, but I am sick and tired.
I just want to say that I am glad to
get back home. He didn't want to be celebrated, but
the welcoming party wouldn't take no for an answer, and
Henry was paraded around the city and hustled to get
(19:40):
another fancy dinner. Governor Smith promised to name a street
after him, and then the Attorney General's office started raising
funds to build a new house for Henry too, but
those things came at a price. He was asked to
speak before the New York State Senate Judiciary Committee, and
he had terrible stage fright, sweating and stammering. Afterwards, the
(20:03):
papers announced hero flunks in speech effort, and maybe because
the real Henry wasn't so keen on public appearances, fake
Henry Johnson's started popping up to take his place and
make money off it. Two fake Henry's were arrested in
Albany selling photographs. Henry asked the judge to go easy
on them and offered to lend the impersonator's money if
(20:26):
they needed it. The newspapers noted that quote, he doesn't
care for the honors himself, but he hates to have
the public imposed upon Then another fake Henry appeared in
Saint Louis before thousands of fans and the city's mayor.
That one was hauled off to jail. So now the
pressure was on the real Henry to get out there
(20:48):
and speak for himself. The organizers of the Saint Louis
event pleaded with him to come and speak, and, maybe
because he felt badly that they had been deceived, or
maybe because he needed the money, he went to be
the star attraction in an evening celebrating black contributions to
the war effort. It was held in the Colosseum, the
(21:10):
largest and most luxurious venue in all of Saint Louis.
Five thousand people gathered to hear him tell his story.
He was walking into an atmosphere bubbling with racial tension
in Saint Louis and across the country. Lynchings were in
the news constantly. The klu Kluck's Klan was on the rise,
(21:30):
not just in the South, but stretching the whole width
of the United States, from New Jersey to Oregon. So
the evening of Friday, March twenty eighth, nineteen nineteen was
meant to be a joyful one, but also to walk
a very thin line on the question of race. Dramatic oratory,
heroic stories, a tribute to the sacrifice of a community,
(21:53):
and a small request for rights. It started out the
usual way. First there was a welcome from the mayor
of Saint Louis that was followed by speeches from a
Missouri senator, the president of the city's board of aldermen,
a congressman, and more. Then a series of black preachers spoke,
and one, a minister for Mississippi, called for the enfranchisement
(22:18):
of black voters in his home state. The man who
is good enough to carry a musket in no Man's
Land is good enough to carry a ballot in the
state of Mississippi, he said. Another preacher made the case
that black people should be included in the new wave
of post war industry, each one of them asking politely
for those things that were supposed to be their ineligenable rights,
(22:41):
not being too controversial. And then it was Henry's turn.
He was supposed to get up on stage and smile
and wave, just like he did during that parade. We
don't have Henry's personal letters or his diaries. We can't
know exactly what he was thinking, but here's a clue.
He kept the dignitaries and the politicians waiting on the
(23:04):
stage to begin the event for an hour, the mayor,
the senator, five thousand people, all them waiting. What was
he doing pacing in the hall, back and forth, back
and forth, thinking about something. Maybe he still had terrible
(23:25):
stage fright. Maybe he was worn out from being carted
around like a curiosity. Or maybe what he was exhausted
by was all this politeness and forbearance. Maybe he was
sick of pleading for equality from the country the Harlem
hell fighters had been willing to fight and die for.
We can't know, but what happened next changed the trajectory
(23:47):
of Henry Johnson's life. He made his triumphant entrance, hobbling
on his shattered foot. The crowd went absolutely nuts. He
stepped to the mic alone like he'd been that night
in no man's land, and whatever upbeat, happy thing he
was meant to say, he didn't say it. His tone
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was bitter. Equal treatment in the war was a lie.
He said, there was no racial friendship. In the trenches.
Black troops suffered prejudicial treatment from white American soldiers, and
those white soldiers weren't just bigots, they were cowards. Henry
told the colosseum that a white major had said, and
(24:29):
I'm quoting here, send the Negro troops to the front.
There are two darn many negroes in New York anyway.
And then Henry added, if I were a white man
in Albany, I would have so much metal that I
would be the next governor of New York State. The
audience was stunned. Some uniform black officers left the stage
(24:51):
in protest. Others in the audience cheered. It was complete chaos.
What they all felt was shock. This guy was famous,
which in America means you're supposed to be happy, right
that did say this and say it in front of
white dignitaries. It simply was done. But Henry was used
(25:12):
to fighting alone. The Saint Louis Argus, the preeminent black
paper in the city reported on the evening with horror.
Remember times were precarious for black people, being outspoken like
Henry was a risk to the community's safety. The front
page blared Henry Johnson's speech insults Colosseum crowd. Missus Victoria
(25:36):
Clay Hayley, who had brought Henry to Saint Louis for
the event, swore, quote, of course we didn't know what
the man was going to say. We wouldn't have had
him come here to insult the white people of our
city for anything. He did us more harm than good,
and no one was more at risk of harm than
Henry himself. A group of angry Marines visited him at
(25:57):
his hotel, demanding that he'd take back what he had
said about cowardice among white troops, and the threats kept coming.
Henry escaped the city that evening in disguise. The military
Mary wanted nothing more to do with him. A federal
warrant was issued for his arrest, based on the complaint
of white soldiers who had said that Henry had quote
disparaged their valor unquote. The technical charge on the warrant
(26:23):
wearing the uniform after a prescribed time, whatever that means
The promised house in Albody never materialized. No street was
named after him. The most famous soldier in the world.
I'm going to bet you've never heard of him, but
I want you to think about that night. We tell
stories about war because the battlefield intensifies bravery. But that's
(26:45):
not the only place we're brave. It turns out sometimes
speaking of truth is the bravest and most dangerous act
of all. The years that followed pushed Henry into obscurity.
(27:15):
His marriage to Edna ended. He was permanently disabled by
his battle wounds. Unable to find steady work, he was
in and out of hospitals, and his tiny Army disability
payment wasn't enough to live off of His health declined,
he moved from Albany to Washington, d c. Then, in
nineteen twenty nine, just ten years after that grand parade
(27:37):
up Fifth Avenue, he passed away. He was only in
his thirties. The cause of death was myocarditis, a weakening
of the heart muscle. The papers covered his death in
a minor way. He was buried at Arlington Cemetery. Once again,
he was surrounded by black soldiers. The burial ground, like
(27:59):
the military, was still segregated back then. The practice wouldn't
end until nineteen forty eight. That might have been the
end of Henry Johnson's story, his bravery in the trenches
forever overshadowed by his bravery on that stage in Saint Louis.
At least you could say he went down swinging. He
insisted on being seen for who he was, Not a
(28:22):
mythical soldier who licked a dozen Germans, but a man
who was frustrated by the limitations of his country. And
then that country turned away from him. But some people
remembered years after Henry's actions in France. Teddy Roosevelt Junior,
the son of the former president and the future Medal
(28:43):
of Honor recipient himself, described Henry as one of the
five bravest soldiers in the war. In the nineteen fifties,
Langston Hughes, the great Black poet and playwright, considered writing
a book about him. Then in the early nineteen seventies,
a group of veterans of the three hundred and sixty
ninth Regiment decided to push for more. Henry had been
(29:06):
one of them. After all, we wanted to write a
wrong they said, So they started a movement for Henry
to get the recognition he deserved. Led by two Vietnam vets,
the group started lobbying Congress. They brought local, state, and
federal officials into the fight. Slowly, slowly, they made progress.
(29:26):
In nineteen ninety one, a memorial to Henry was erected
in Albany, and a section of the city's northern boulevard
was renamed Henry Johnson Boulevard. Finally, he had a street
named after him in his hometown, one long forgotten promise kept.
In nineteen ninety six, President Bill Clinton posthumously awarded Henry
(29:47):
Johnson the Purple Heart. In two thousand and two, the
Army gave him their second highest military honor, the Distinguished
Service Cross. Then Senator Chuck Schumer of New York threw
his weight behind the ultimate goal, recognizing Henry with the
Medal of Honor. In twenty eleven, a Schumer stafford discovered
(30:08):
a long lost memo from General John Pershing, dated May
nineteen eighteen, just after Henry's heroic stand. Even Pershing was
impressed by Henry's actions, and he described them as quote
a notable instance of bravery and devotion. A Medal of
Honor recipient has to be approved all the way up
(30:29):
the chain of command. Remember, with this letter from Pershing,
they had the evidence they needed to make their case.
Senator Schumer's office submitted a nearly thirteen hundred page request
to the military and support of Henry's Medal of Honor
and launched a petition to build support. After decades of
calls and advocacy, something broke through. Henry would have his
(30:54):
Medal of Honor. His battle was finally coming to a close.
Soldiers don't go into combat with the hopes of being celebrated.
Soldiers sacrifice because it's what they do. They act on principle,
maybe to stand for a country they love as it is,
or fight for a country they hope it can become.
(31:15):
For Henry Johnson, that hope became a little closer to reality.
Almost a century after his bravery in France and his
battles on the home front. On Jine's second twenty fifteen,
President Barack Obama awarded Henry his Medal of Honor.
Speaker 4 (31:32):
America can't change what happened to Henry Johnson. We can't
change what happened to too many soldiers like him who
went uncelebrated because our nation judged them by the color
of their skin and not the content of their character.
But we can do our best to make it right.
And today, ninety seven years after his extraordinary acts of
(31:53):
courage and selflessness, I'm proud to award him the Medal
of Honor.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
That night in the trenches back in nineteen eighteen, Henry
fought hand to hand so that his brother in arms
wasn't taken prisoner. When he got home. He fought to
make sure that none of his comrades would be prisoners
of a society that sought to keep them down. They
called him black death, but I don't think black or
death should be the first words we think of when
(32:21):
we think of Henry Johnson. I prefer hell Fighter. Medal
(32:42):
of Honor. Stories of Courage is written by Meredith Rollins
and produced by Meredith Rollins, Constanza Galardo, and Izzy Carter.
The show is edited by Ben Daph Haffrey, Sound design
and additional music by Jake Gorski, recording engineering by Nina Lawrence,
fact checking by Arthur Gombert's original music by Eric Phillips.
(33:04):
Special thanks to Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri for
sharing archive material from the documentary Men of Bronze by
William Miles. And if you want to learn more about
our Medal of Honor recipients, follow us on Instagram and Twitter.
We'll be sharing photos and videos of the heroes featured
on the show. We'd also love to hear from you
(33:25):
dm us with a story about a courageous veteran in
your life. If you don't know a veteran, we would
love to hear a story of how courage was contagious
in your own life. You can find us at Pushkinbods.
I'm your host, Malcolm Gampo
Pushkin Hello.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Hello.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Before we get on with our show, I want you
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(00:45):
Now onto the episode. It was a clear day in
New York City, February nineteen nineteen. The winter sun shone
down warmly on masters of people lining both sides of
Fifth Avenue. The parade route was seven miles long, and
(01:05):
they were cheering crowds along every inch of it. People
were john for a peak of thousands of soldiers who
were marching uptown in perfect military formation. These men were
just back from the most apocalyptic conflict the world had
ever seen, World War One, the Great War, as they
called it back then. The men were wearing dark wool
(01:27):
uniforms and steel helmets. The bayonets of their rifles gleamed
in the sun. Some of the men were shell shocked,
some were exhausted. All of them were grateful to have
made it back home, and all the men were black.
They were known as the Harlem Hell Fighters, the three
hundred and sixty ninth Infantry Regiment of the United States Army.
(01:50):
This parade was their triumphant return to New York City,
the city that had given them their unofficial name. In
nineteen nineteen, troops were still segregated. Discrimination wasn't confined to
the Jim Crow South. It reached all the way to
the trenches on the European Front. But the Harlem Hell
Fighters were some of the most highly decorated soldiers in
(02:12):
the Great War. They had seen one hundred and ninety
one days of combat, the longest of any regiment, and
they had never had a man taken prisoner or lost
a foot of ground. There were more than two thousand
Harlem Hell Fighters in that parade, all them heroes, but
as one in particular that I want to tell you about.
(02:33):
His name was Henry Johnson, but as he rode past,
the spectators called out to him by his nickname Black Death.
Of all the Harlem Hell Fighters, Henry Johnson had made
the biggest impression back home in the trenches of France.
In the dark of night. He had single handedly taken
(02:53):
on an invading enemy force. He had survived twenty one
near fatal wounds, and he had rescued another wounded soldier
who the Germans were trying to take prisoner. Every person
at that parade knew Henry Johnson's story made it back
to the US. Long before he did. Henry was featured
on army recruitment posters and advertisements. He was profiled in
(03:16):
newspapers and magazines. Out of a fighting force of millions,
Henry Johnson had become one of the most famous soldiers
in the entire war. Henry rolled up this avenue in
an open topped cadillac. He couldn't march with the rest
of the troops. His foot had been destroyed in the battle.
It was being held together by a metal plate. He
(03:39):
waved and smiled as the crowds shouted his name. At
that moment, Henry was the most famous person in New
York City. But only ten years later Henry Johnson would
die poor and broken, and soon enough his story would
be nearly forgotten. The Battle of Henry Johnson might have
(04:00):
started in France, but he kept going long after the war.
It went on, in fact, for ninety seven years until finally,
one of the most famous soldiers of World War I
would be awarded our country's highest recognition for courage, the
Medal of Honor, him Malcolm Gladwell. And this is Medal
(04:23):
of Honor Stories of Courage. The Medal of Honor is
the highest military decoration in the United States. It's awarded
for gallantry and bravery in 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 to the White House.
(04:45):
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 today. The never ending battle
of Henry Johnson. Let's start with the Harlem hell Fighters.
(05:11):
I mean, it's there in the name, right, total badasses.
Other regiments have nicknames like the Rock of the Marne,
the Liberators, the puzzlingly named Armorators, or my personal favorite,
the nickname for the one hundred and first Airborne Division,
which at some point during World War II became known
as the Battered Bastards of Best Doin. But to understand
(05:33):
Henry Johnson, you first have to understand the Harlem hell Fighters.
They started out as the fifteenth Infantry of the New
York National Guard. At the time, they were the only
black regiment in New York State. When the US went
to war in April nineteen seventeen, men rushed to join
the fifteenth. They came from across New York, but the
(05:55):
vast majority of them were from Harlem. There wasn't a
draft yet, they didn't have to go to war. They
wanted to go. All of them were volunteers, including Henry Johnson.
He was small, a slight man with a sweet disposition.
He had a massive smile and wore his army issue
cap at a rakish tilt to the side. He almost
(06:18):
hadn't met the physical requirements to enlist. You had to
be five foot four, and he was barely that. But
he was resourceful and he was tough. As his wife,
Edna Jackson would say, Henry wasn't big, but oh boy,
he can go some. Like a lot of the thirty
six hundred men of the fifteenth Infantry, Henry saw the
(06:39):
military as a chance to serve his country and have
steady work. It was risky, but if he survived, it
could mean a better life, so he joined up. Back
in the nineteen seventies, a documentary crew tracked down one
of the last surviving Harlem hell Fighters, a guy named
Melville Morris. He talked about the pride they all had
(06:59):
in the fifteenth.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Every man felt he was in the best squad, in
the best regiment of the whole game in United States.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
They set sail for France in the fall of nineteen seventeen,
but when they got there, instead of grenades and tanks,
they were handed shovels and wheelbarrows. The American Expeditionary Forces,
under the command of General John Pershing had no intention
of sending the fifteenth into battle. Instead, they would work
as stevedores, manual laborers. They were signed to lay railroad tracks.
(07:35):
Turns out Jim Crobb had followed the hell Fighters all
the way to Europe.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
And General Persian said, there had no fighting blacks in
this war.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
We train them in the stevedores.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Or send you back home. Were set downs on old
ships and do all kinds of details, but not fight
because Persian wanted he didn't want no puddles in his
division there or what lily white.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
The fifteenth were trained to fight, and they knew they
could make a difference. They also knew what fighting would mean,
not just the war, but afterwards, when they went back
to the United States. A lieutenant from the fifteenth wrote
home from France to say, if we can't fight and
die in this war as bravely as white men, then
we don't deserve equality. But if we can do things
(08:24):
at the front, if we can make ourselves felt, if
we can make America really proud, then it will be
the biggest possible step towards our equalization as citizens. Henry
had worked as a baggage handler in Albany before the war.
He was strong, he had grown up in hard scrabble
North Carolina. He knew adversity, and he was deeply proud
(08:47):
to be an American soldier. Being kept out of the
fighting wasn't just frustrating, it was infuriating. And then in
March of nineteen eighteen, the fifteenth Infantry got their chance.
The French army was at its breaking point. They'd been
on the front lines for three years and lost more
than a million men. Look to the soldiers of the
(09:10):
fifteenth and figured, the white Americans don't want to fight
with him, so maybe we can so they requested their service.
The fifteenth was quickly renamed the three hundred and sixty
ninth Infantry Regiment of the United States Army, and they
went off to join the French. This, by the way,
was pretty much unheard of. The US military did not
(09:30):
lend out soldiers, but loaning the hell Fighters solved a problem.
General Pershing wouldn't have to worry about keeping his black
and white soldiers apart. Plus, it was a nice thing
for an ally to do, and as an extra neighborly act,
his staff sent their French liaison a document titled Secret
Information concerning Black American Troops. It warned about the dangers
(09:54):
of relying on quote unquote inferior black soldiers. It noted
that their quote vices were a quote constant menace, and
it asked the French not to treat the black soldiers
as equal warning against ea with them or even shaking
their hands otherwise, the document explained the men might expect
the same treatment when they got back to America. But
(10:19):
the French welcomed the newly christened three hundred and sixty
ninth Infantry into their army as fast as they possibly could.
In that nineteen seventies documentary I mentioned, you can hear
how excited Melville was about all things French.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
We got French helmets, French canteens, French rifles, and instead
of water canteen, where should French wine? And we joined
the fourth French Army.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
They were sent to the Argonne Forest in the northeastern
corner of France to join the beleaguered French troops in
the trenches. And when they got there, it turns out
that three hundred and sixty ninth weren't just ready to fight,
they were great at it, and soon enough, thanks to
their tenacity and their skill, they had earned their new name,
the Harlem hell Fighters. Back home, though, the truth of
(11:08):
what they face as black soldiers, that white American soldiers
did not want to serve alongside them, was being very
carefully hidden. We'll be back in a minute. In the
(11:31):
early hours of May fifteenth, nineteen eighteen, Henry Johnson and
his friend and fellow hell Fighter Needham Roberts, were sent
to a listening post in No Man's Land, the area
between the French trenches and the German position picture a
wide swath of desolate terrain parked with craters and burnt trees.
(11:51):
The French were holding the western side in deep trenches
rimmed with barbed wire. The Germans were holding the east.
Henry and Needham's job was to stay up through the
night and be the eyes and ears of their platoon.
If they heard or saw anything suspicious, they were to
alert the rest of the troops. The hell fighters had
(12:12):
seen two months of action, the Germans had seen three years.
They'd become experts at raiding trenches, coming by surprise, killing,
taking soldiers prisoner, and pumping them for intelligence. That night,
everyone was on edge. They were sure a raiding party
was going to come. So sure a French lieutenant ordered
(12:33):
Henry and Needham back to safety. Henry, as he told
reporters later, wasn't having it. Lieutenant, He said, I'm an
American and I never retreat. Henry and Needham stood watch
all through the pitch black night. Their ears were tuned
to everything around them, the wind whistling through no man's land,
a rustle in the leaves. Then at two or three
(12:56):
in the morning, they heard an ominous gnawing noise. Crunch, crunch, crunch.
It was the sound of wire cutters. Suddenly, an enemy
flare that the dark. The Germans had arrived. Grenades exploded,
and bullets cut through the night. Air Shrapnel tore through
(13:17):
Henry and Needham's uniforms their skin. Henry threw grenades of
his own, his heart racing, he shouldered his rifle and
started shooting. Needham, meanwhile, had been wounded in the arm
and hip, and he lost consciousness. Henry was fighting alone.
In an instant, the Germans were on top of them.
Henry couldn't see how many ten twenty. He realized with
(13:39):
horror that they were going to drag need Him away.
The hell Fighters hadn't yet let a man be captured
as a prisoner. They prided themselves on that he had
to keep them from taking Needham. Henry had fired all
the rounds in his rifle, and when he went to
reload it, it jammed unusable, so he turned his rifle
around and swung it wildly. Alone and mobbed by the enemy,
(14:01):
he beat back the Germans until the butt of his
rifle broke. Then he remembered his bolo knife. If you
don't know what a bolo knife, let me put it
this way. You don't cut butter with it. Nine to
fourteen inches long, with a razor sharp blade along one side.
Henry swung the knife and took down one enemy's soldier.
Then another shots rang out. Henry was hit in the
(14:25):
right forearm, right hip, and left leg, but he kept stabbing.
He swung his knife till the Germans turned and ran
into the night. He slashed and thrust until he was
sure his friend was safe. Henry, as his wife Edna knew,
could go so he'd lost a lot of blood. He
struggled to stay conscious. He just couldn't, and as he
(14:48):
sank to the ground, Henry hurled one last grenade, hitting
and killing an enemy's soldier. As he fled, reinforcements reached
the listening post a few minutes later. Melville remembers it
Henry had been wounded twenty one times.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Well, he refused to die and took Johnson and Roberts.
We finally got out there in the morning, dragged their
bodies back. They weren't dead and both lived through it.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
The next morning, as the two recovered in the hospital,
their commanding officers surveyed the path of the Germans retreat.
His captain Arthur Little wrote, quote, we trailed the course
with the greatest of ease, by pulls of blood, blood
soaked bandages, and blood smeared logs with the routed party
had rested. They also discovered that the raiding party had
(15:38):
left behind a small but very valuable collection of weapons
and intelligence. They deduced that as many as twenty four
Germans had been on the scene, yet Henry had held
them off in hand to hand combat without a working firearm.
In the dark, he kept them from crossing the French line,
and just a few minutes of fighting he had defeated
(16:00):
an entire raiding party. That's why when Henry came back home,
everyone in America knew his name. The day after the battle,
three American reporters arrived at the scene. While General Pershing
had restricted news about American military operations overseas, the French
had no such rules, and the three hundred and sixty
(16:22):
ninth was, after all, embedded with the French. The journalists
raised to speak to Needham and Henry at the hospital.
They sent their reports back to the States, where people
were desperate for some news, any news of progress in
the war. Henry was happy to talk to the reporters
about that night and that Bolo knife. Each slash meant
(16:44):
something believe me, he told them, I just fought my life.
A rabbit would have done that. His actions, wrote the
Saturday Evening Post, were proof that the color of a
man's skin has nothing to do with the color of
his soul. Two days after the attack, the French sixteenth Division,
which commanded the hell Fighters, officially recognized the actions of
(17:07):
Needham and Henry. Both received the French Quadiguere, the country's
highest military honor. They were some of the first U.
S soldiers ever to earn this distinction. Henry's medal also
included the Bronze Palm for extraordinary valor, and that's when
he got his nickname Black Death. It took two days
(17:28):
for the French to award Henry's courage. It would take
decades for the United States to do the same. Henry
spent the rest of the war in a French hospital
recovering from his injuries. His foot had been destroyed, and
the army awarded him the Wounded Chevron, an acknowledgment of
(17:50):
his disabilities. They also upgraded his rank from private to sergeant.
But while the French were willing to honor his courage
and valor with a medal, the American military would not,
even though by the end of the war in the
winter of nineteen eighteen, the Harlem hell Fighters had served
longer in the trench, which is than any other American regiment,
(18:12):
and they had suffered the most losses, with fifteen hundred casualties.
A reporter from a local paper found Henry at the
pier as he got off the steamer coming home to
New York and described him this way. His lip is
scarred by a knife slash, his head holds a dent
made by a rifle butt. In his hand is the
(18:32):
welt of a bayonet's slash, and a silver plate keeps
his left foot in place. He got his heroes welcome.
Henry rode in a place of honor in the parade
up Fifth Avenue, carrying a bouquet of lilies. Melville remembered it, well.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Everybody wanted to see Henry Johnson. Everybody wanted to shakers here.
That's one day that it wasn't a sighted bit.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Of prejudice in New York City. Henry was featured on
an ad for war stamps. It read Henry Johnson licked
a dozen Germans. How many stamps have you licked? But
Henry was exhausted, physically broken. When he got off the
train in Albany, finally home, he was greeted by New
York Governor L Smith and a group of cheering fans.
(19:19):
He was grateful, of course, but pay attention to what
he said to the reporters quote, I am very proud
of all of you, but I am sick and tired.
I just want to say that I am glad to
get back home. He didn't want to be celebrated, but
the welcoming party wouldn't take no for an answer, and
Henry was paraded around the city and hustled to get
(19:40):
another fancy dinner. Governor Smith promised to name a street
after him, and then the Attorney General's office started raising
funds to build a new house for Henry too, but
those things came at a price. He was asked to
speak before the New York State Senate Judiciary Committee, and
he had terrible stage fright, sweating and stammering. Afterwards, the
(20:03):
papers announced hero flunks in speech effort, and maybe because
the real Henry wasn't so keen on public appearances, fake
Henry Johnson's started popping up to take his place and
make money off it. Two fake Henry's were arrested in
Albany selling photographs. Henry asked the judge to go easy
on them and offered to lend the impersonator's money if
(20:26):
they needed it. The newspapers noted that quote, he doesn't
care for the honors himself, but he hates to have
the public imposed upon Then another fake Henry appeared in
Saint Louis before thousands of fans and the city's mayor.
That one was hauled off to jail. So now the
pressure was on the real Henry to get out there
(20:48):
and speak for himself. The organizers of the Saint Louis
event pleaded with him to come and speak, and, maybe
because he felt badly that they had been deceived, or
maybe because he needed the money, he went to be
the star attraction in an evening celebrating black contributions to
the war effort. It was held in the Colosseum, the
(21:10):
largest and most luxurious venue in all of Saint Louis.
Five thousand people gathered to hear him tell his story.
He was walking into an atmosphere bubbling with racial tension
in Saint Louis and across the country. Lynchings were in
the news constantly. The klu Kluck's Klan was on the rise,
(21:30):
not just in the South, but stretching the whole width
of the United States, from New Jersey to Oregon. So
the evening of Friday, March twenty eighth, nineteen nineteen was
meant to be a joyful one, but also to walk
a very thin line on the question of race. Dramatic oratory,
heroic stories, a tribute to the sacrifice of a community,
(21:53):
and a small request for rights. It started out the
usual way. First there was a welcome from the mayor
of Saint Louis that was followed by speeches from a
Missouri senator, the president of the city's board of aldermen,
a congressman, and more. Then a series of black preachers spoke,
and one, a minister for Mississippi, called for the enfranchisement
(22:18):
of black voters in his home state. The man who
is good enough to carry a musket in no Man's
Land is good enough to carry a ballot in the
state of Mississippi, he said. Another preacher made the case
that black people should be included in the new wave
of post war industry, each one of them asking politely
for those things that were supposed to be their ineligenable rights,
(22:41):
not being too controversial. And then it was Henry's turn.
He was supposed to get up on stage and smile
and wave, just like he did during that parade. We
don't have Henry's personal letters or his diaries. We can't
know exactly what he was thinking, but here's a clue.
He kept the dignitaries and the politicians waiting on the
(23:04):
stage to begin the event for an hour, the mayor,
the senator, five thousand people, all them waiting. What was
he doing pacing in the hall, back and forth, back
and forth, thinking about something. Maybe he still had terrible
(23:25):
stage fright. Maybe he was worn out from being carted
around like a curiosity. Or maybe what he was exhausted
by was all this politeness and forbearance. Maybe he was
sick of pleading for equality from the country the Harlem
hell fighters had been willing to fight and die for.
We can't know, but what happened next changed the trajectory
(23:47):
of Henry Johnson's life. He made his triumphant entrance, hobbling
on his shattered foot. The crowd went absolutely nuts. He
stepped to the mic alone like he'd been that night
in no man's land, and whatever upbeat, happy thing he
was meant to say, he didn't say it. His tone
(24:08):
was bitter. Equal treatment in the war was a lie.
He said, there was no racial friendship. In the trenches.
Black troops suffered prejudicial treatment from white American soldiers, and
those white soldiers weren't just bigots, they were cowards. Henry
told the colosseum that a white major had said, and
(24:29):
I'm quoting here, send the Negro troops to the front.
There are two darn many negroes in New York anyway.
And then Henry added, if I were a white man
in Albany, I would have so much metal that I
would be the next governor of New York State. The
audience was stunned. Some uniform black officers left the stage
(24:51):
in protest. Others in the audience cheered. It was complete chaos.
What they all felt was shock. This guy was famous,
which in America means you're supposed to be happy, right
that did say this and say it in front of
white dignitaries. It simply was done. But Henry was used
(25:12):
to fighting alone. The Saint Louis Argus, the preeminent black
paper in the city reported on the evening with horror.
Remember times were precarious for black people, being outspoken like
Henry was a risk to the community's safety. The front
page blared Henry Johnson's speech insults Colosseum crowd. Missus Victoria
(25:36):
Clay Hayley, who had brought Henry to Saint Louis for
the event, swore, quote, of course we didn't know what
the man was going to say. We wouldn't have had
him come here to insult the white people of our
city for anything. He did us more harm than good,
and no one was more at risk of harm than
Henry himself. A group of angry Marines visited him at
(25:57):
his hotel, demanding that he'd take back what he had
said about cowardice among white troops, and the threats kept coming.
Henry escaped the city that evening in disguise. The military
Mary wanted nothing more to do with him. A federal
warrant was issued for his arrest, based on the complaint
of white soldiers who had said that Henry had quote
disparaged their valor unquote. The technical charge on the warrant
(26:23):
wearing the uniform after a prescribed time, whatever that means
The promised house in Albody never materialized. No street was
named after him. The most famous soldier in the world.
I'm going to bet you've never heard of him, but
I want you to think about that night. We tell
stories about war because the battlefield intensifies bravery. But that's
(26:45):
not the only place we're brave. It turns out sometimes
speaking of truth is the bravest and most dangerous act
of all. The years that followed pushed Henry into obscurity.
(27:15):
His marriage to Edna ended. He was permanently disabled by
his battle wounds. Unable to find steady work, he was
in and out of hospitals, and his tiny Army disability
payment wasn't enough to live off of His health declined,
he moved from Albany to Washington, d c. Then, in
nineteen twenty nine, just ten years after that grand parade
(27:37):
up Fifth Avenue, he passed away. He was only in
his thirties. The cause of death was myocarditis, a weakening
of the heart muscle. The papers covered his death in
a minor way. He was buried at Arlington Cemetery. Once again,
he was surrounded by black soldiers. The burial ground, like
(27:59):
the military, was still segregated back then. The practice wouldn't
end until nineteen forty eight. That might have been the
end of Henry Johnson's story, his bravery in the trenches
forever overshadowed by his bravery on that stage in Saint Louis.
At least you could say he went down swinging. He
insisted on being seen for who he was, Not a
(28:22):
mythical soldier who licked a dozen Germans, but a man
who was frustrated by the limitations of his country. And
then that country turned away from him. But some people
remembered years after Henry's actions in France. Teddy Roosevelt Junior,
the son of the former president and the future Medal
(28:43):
of Honor recipient himself, described Henry as one of the
five bravest soldiers in the war. In the nineteen fifties,
Langston Hughes, the great Black poet and playwright, considered writing
a book about him. Then in the early nineteen seventies,
a group of veterans of the three hundred and sixty
ninth Regiment decided to push for more. Henry had been
(29:06):
one of them. After all, we wanted to write a
wrong they said, So they started a movement for Henry
to get the recognition he deserved. Led by two Vietnam vets,
the group started lobbying Congress. They brought local, state, and
federal officials into the fight. Slowly, slowly, they made progress.
(29:26):
In nineteen ninety one, a memorial to Henry was erected
in Albany, and a section of the city's northern boulevard
was renamed Henry Johnson Boulevard. Finally, he had a street
named after him in his hometown, one long forgotten promise kept.
In nineteen ninety six, President Bill Clinton posthumously awarded Henry
(29:47):
Johnson the Purple Heart. In two thousand and two, the
Army gave him their second highest military honor, the Distinguished
Service Cross. Then Senator Chuck Schumer of New York threw
his weight behind the ultimate goal, recognizing Henry with the
Medal of Honor. In twenty eleven, a Schumer stafford discovered
(30:08):
a long lost memo from General John Pershing, dated May
nineteen eighteen, just after Henry's heroic stand. Even Pershing was
impressed by Henry's actions, and he described them as quote
a notable instance of bravery and devotion. A Medal of
Honor recipient has to be approved all the way up
(30:29):
the chain of command. Remember, with this letter from Pershing,
they had the evidence they needed to make their case.
Senator Schumer's office submitted a nearly thirteen hundred page request
to the military and support of Henry's Medal of Honor
and launched a petition to build support. After decades of
calls and advocacy, something broke through. Henry would have his
(30:54):
Medal of Honor. His battle was finally coming to a close.
Soldiers don't go into combat with the hopes of being celebrated.
Soldiers sacrifice because it's what they do. They act on principle,
maybe to stand for a country they love as it is,
or fight for a country they hope it can become.
(31:15):
For Henry Johnson, that hope became a little closer to reality.
Almost a century after his bravery in France and his
battles on the home front. On Jine's second twenty fifteen,
President Barack Obama awarded Henry his Medal of Honor.
Speaker 4 (31:32):
America can't change what happened to Henry Johnson. We can't
change what happened to too many soldiers like him who
went uncelebrated because our nation judged them by the color
of their skin and not the content of their character.
But we can do our best to make it right.
And today, ninety seven years after his extraordinary acts of
(31:53):
courage and selflessness, I'm proud to award him the Medal
of Honor.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
That night in the trenches back in nineteen eighteen, Henry
fought hand to hand so that his brother in arms
wasn't taken prisoner. When he got home. He fought to
make sure that none of his comrades would be prisoners
of a society that sought to keep them down. They
called him black death, but I don't think black or
death should be the first words we think of when
(32:21):
we think of Henry Johnson. I prefer hell Fighter. Medal
(32:42):
of Honor. Stories of Courage is written by Meredith Rollins
and produced by Meredith Rollins, Constanza Galardo, and Izzy Carter.
The show is edited by Ben Daph Haffrey, Sound design
and additional music by Jake Gorski, recording engineering by Nina Lawrence,
fact checking by Arthur Gombert's original music by Eric Phillips.
(33:04):
Special thanks to Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri for
sharing archive material from the documentary Men of Bronze by
William Miles. And if you want to learn more about
our Medal of Honor recipients, follow us on Instagram and Twitter.
We'll be sharing photos and videos of the heroes featured
on the show. We'd also love to hear from you
(33:25):
dm us with a story about a courageous veteran in
your life. If you don't know a veteran, we would
love to hear a story of how courage was contagious
in your own life. You can find us at Pushkinbods.
I'm your host, Malcolm Gampo
Host
Malcolm Gladwell
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Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!