The Battlefield Hero Who Refused to Kill

Written by Will Armstrong, History Associates Incorporated

Shortly after the Army drafted Desmond Doss for service in World War II, his superiors found themselves in a predicament: what to do with a superior soldier who refuses to kill the enemy?

Cpl. Doss was a devout Seventh Day Adventist to whom the Commandment “Thou Shalt Not Kill” was sacrosanct.  He was also a proud American, eager to serve his country.  Instead of seeking an exemption from the draft, Doss joined the Army as a conscientious objector.

Doss served as a combat medic, tasked with saving lives rather than taking them.  He was in many ways a model soldier, but his religious convictions stirred controversy.  Doss refused to violate the Sabbath, refused to train with or carry a weapon, and spent much of his spare time in solitude praying or reading the Bible.  Unwelcomed and resented by his fellow soldiers, at one point the Army threatened to dismiss Doss.

Those attitudes all changed, however, after Doss’ unit, the 307th Infantry Regiment, 77th Infantry Division, entered combat on Guam in 1944.  Doss quickly gained a reputation for heroism under fire, routinely placing himself in harm’s way to aid his wounded comrades.  During the liberation of the Philippines the unarmed medic was awarded the Bronze Star for gallantry in action.  He earned his greatest fame on Okinawa in May 1945, after a Japanese counterattack isolated a large group of wounded Americans on a ridge.  Doss moved the entire group to safety, one at a time, under constant enemy fire.  For that action and others throughout the following days, when Doss continued to put himself at grave risk and suffered serious wounds in order to rescue wounded men, he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor by President Truman on October 12, 1945.

“I wasn’t trying to be a hero,” he told a reporter after the war. “I was thinking about it from this standpoint — in a house on fire and a mother has a child in that house, what prompts her to go in and get that child?  Love.  I loved my men, and they loved me. I don’t consider myself a hero. I just couldn’t give them up, just like a mother couldn’t give up the child.”  Cpl. Doss, who never wavered in his convictions, nor in his devotion to his country, passed away in 2006.