Kali
06-01-2005, 05:35 PM
A Real American Hero
Eight Purple Hearts. Ten Silver Stars. Twice awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. And now a virtual shoe-in for the Medal of Honor. You name the honor, Colonel David Hackworth got it. And Monday, his buddies, his soldiers and his admirers gathered in an Arlington Cemetery chapel to pay homage and remember this most decorated of American soldiers.
<hr noshade="noshade" size="1" width="75"> 05-31-2005
A Final Farewell
ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY – It is my privilege to inform you that Hack is back on permanent duty. Col. David Haskell Hackworth USA (Ret.) has joined several hundred thousand of his fellow soldiers guarding the hallowed ground of Arlington after a Memorial Service at nearby Fort Myer this morning. More than 600 former comrades, fellow soldiers and friends gathered in the soaring Fort Myer Memorial Chapel to shed tears of sorrow over his passing, to hear some of his favorite songs and psalms, and to laugh and betimes listen in awed silence as fellow veterans and journalism colleagues recounted his bravery, his audacity, his integrity and his perennial smile. Full Story (http://www.sftt.org/main.cfm?actionId=globalShowStaticContent&screenKey=cmpDefense&htmlCategoryID=29&htmlId=2783)
<hr noshade="noshade" size="1" width="75"> Col. David. H. Hackworth, 1930-2005
Legendary U.S. Army Guerrilla Fighter,
Champion of the Ordinary Soldier
Washington, D.C., May 5, 2005 – Col. David H. Hackworth, the United States Army's legendary, highly decorated guerrilla fighter and lifelong champion of the doughboy and dogface, ground-pounder and grunt, died Wednesday in Mexico. He was 74 years old. The cause of death was a form of cancer now appearing with increasing frequency among Vietnam veterans exposed to the defoliants called Agents Orange and Blue.
Col. Hackworth spent more than half a century on the country’s hottest battlefields, first as a soldier, then as a writer, war correspondent and sharp-eyed critic of the Military-Industrial Complex and ticket-punching generals he dismissed as “Perfumed Princes.”
He preferred the combat style of World War II and Korean War heroes like James Gavin and Matthew Ridgeway and, during Vietnam, of Hank “The Gunfighter” Emerson and Hal Moore. General Moore, the co-author of We Were Soldiers Once and Young, called him “the Patton of Vietnam,” and Gen. Creighton Abrams, the last American commander in that disastrous war, described him as “the best battalion commander I ever saw in the United States Army.”
Col. Hackworth’s battlefield exploits put him on the line of American military heroes squarely next to Sgt. Alvin York and Audie Murphy. The novelist Ward Just, who knew him for forty years, described him as “the genuine article, a soldier’s soldier, a connoisseur of combat.” At 14, as World War II was sputtering out, he lied about his age to join the Merchant Marine, and at 15 he enlisted in the U.S. Army. Over the next 26 years he spent fully seven in combat. He was put in for the Medal of Honor three times; the last application is currently under review at the Pentagon. He was twice awarded the Army’s second highest honor for valor, the Distinguished Service Cross, along with 10 Silver Stars and eight Bronze Stars. When asked about his many awards, he always said he was proudest of his eight Purple Hearts and his Combat Infantryman’s Badge.
http://www.hackworth.com/
Eight Purple Hearts. Ten Silver Stars. Twice awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. And now a virtual shoe-in for the Medal of Honor. You name the honor, Colonel David Hackworth got it. And Monday, his buddies, his soldiers and his admirers gathered in an Arlington Cemetery chapel to pay homage and remember this most decorated of American soldiers.
<hr noshade="noshade" size="1" width="75"> 05-31-2005
A Final Farewell
ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY – It is my privilege to inform you that Hack is back on permanent duty. Col. David Haskell Hackworth USA (Ret.) has joined several hundred thousand of his fellow soldiers guarding the hallowed ground of Arlington after a Memorial Service at nearby Fort Myer this morning. More than 600 former comrades, fellow soldiers and friends gathered in the soaring Fort Myer Memorial Chapel to shed tears of sorrow over his passing, to hear some of his favorite songs and psalms, and to laugh and betimes listen in awed silence as fellow veterans and journalism colleagues recounted his bravery, his audacity, his integrity and his perennial smile. Full Story (http://www.sftt.org/main.cfm?actionId=globalShowStaticContent&screenKey=cmpDefense&htmlCategoryID=29&htmlId=2783)
<hr noshade="noshade" size="1" width="75"> Col. David. H. Hackworth, 1930-2005
Legendary U.S. Army Guerrilla Fighter,
Champion of the Ordinary Soldier
Washington, D.C., May 5, 2005 – Col. David H. Hackworth, the United States Army's legendary, highly decorated guerrilla fighter and lifelong champion of the doughboy and dogface, ground-pounder and grunt, died Wednesday in Mexico. He was 74 years old. The cause of death was a form of cancer now appearing with increasing frequency among Vietnam veterans exposed to the defoliants called Agents Orange and Blue.
Col. Hackworth spent more than half a century on the country’s hottest battlefields, first as a soldier, then as a writer, war correspondent and sharp-eyed critic of the Military-Industrial Complex and ticket-punching generals he dismissed as “Perfumed Princes.”
He preferred the combat style of World War II and Korean War heroes like James Gavin and Matthew Ridgeway and, during Vietnam, of Hank “The Gunfighter” Emerson and Hal Moore. General Moore, the co-author of We Were Soldiers Once and Young, called him “the Patton of Vietnam,” and Gen. Creighton Abrams, the last American commander in that disastrous war, described him as “the best battalion commander I ever saw in the United States Army.”
Col. Hackworth’s battlefield exploits put him on the line of American military heroes squarely next to Sgt. Alvin York and Audie Murphy. The novelist Ward Just, who knew him for forty years, described him as “the genuine article, a soldier’s soldier, a connoisseur of combat.” At 14, as World War II was sputtering out, he lied about his age to join the Merchant Marine, and at 15 he enlisted in the U.S. Army. Over the next 26 years he spent fully seven in combat. He was put in for the Medal of Honor three times; the last application is currently under review at the Pentagon. He was twice awarded the Army’s second highest honor for valor, the Distinguished Service Cross, along with 10 Silver Stars and eight Bronze Stars. When asked about his many awards, he always said he was proudest of his eight Purple Hearts and his Combat Infantryman’s Badge.
http://www.hackworth.com/