Military History of African Americans - Vietnam War

Vietnam War

See also: List of African American MoH recipients from the Vietnam War

The Vietnam War saw many great accomplishments by many African Americans, including twenty who received the Medal of Honor for their actions. African Americans during the conflict suffered casualty rates slightly higher than their percentage of the total population.

In 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson presented the Medal of Honor to U.S. Army Specialist Five Lawrence Joel, for a "very special kind of courage—the unarmed heroism of compassion and service to others." Joel was the first living African American to receive the Medal of Honor since the Mexican–American War. He was a medic who in 1965 saved the lives of U.S. troops under ambush in Vietnam and defied direct orders to stay to the ground, walking through Viet Cong gunfire and tending to the troops despite being shot twice himself. The Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Winston-Salem, North Carolina is dedicated to his honor.

On August 21, 1968, with the posthumous award of the Medal of Honor, U.S. Marine James Anderson, Jr. became the first African-American U.S. Marine recipient of the Medal of Honor for his heroic actions and sacrifice of life.

On December 10, 1968, U.S. Army Captain Riley Leroy Pitts became the first African American commissioned officer to be awarded the Medal of Honor. His medal was presented posthumously to his wife, Mrs. Eula Pitts, by President Lyndon B. Johnson.

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Famous quotes containing the words vietnam war, vietnam and/or war:

    “No event in American history is more misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was misreported then, and it is misremembered now.”
    —Richard M. Nixon (b. 1913)

    “No event in American history is more misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was misreported then, and it is misremembered now.”
    —Richard M. Nixon (b. 1913)

    “The peace conference must not adjourn without the establishment of some ordered system of international government, backed by power enough to give authority to its decrees. ... Unless a league something like this results at our peace conference, we shall merely drop back into armed hostility and international anarchy. The war will have been fought in vain ...”
    —Virginia Crocheron Gildersleeve (1877–1965)