This 2016 episode covers Desmond T. Doss, the first conscientious objector to be awarded the Medal of Honor.
Happy Saturday. On October twelfth, nineteen forty five, or seventy nine years ago today, Desmond T. Doss was awarded the Medal of Honor, making him the first conscientious objector to receive that award.
Our episode on Desmond T. Doss originally came out on July twenty fifth, twenty sixteen, and it is Today's Saturday Classic Enjoy Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy B. Wilson. I'm Holly Fryme.
We pretty recently did two episodes on Byered Restin, and in those episodes we talked a little bit about conscience objection to military service. Byed Restin was a Quaker, and because he was a pacifist, his conscience objection to war also evolved to include an objection to conscripting people into the military. So at one point he had actually registered as a conscientious objector, which meant that if he had been drafted, he could be assigned to alternate non combat service. But after this evolution in his views, he instead rescinded his registration and went to federal prison instead. Some of the response that we got to that episode, moved today's topic farther up ahead on my shortlist of subjects. My shortlist is like fifty things long. Yeah, my shortlist has a very similar number. It's fart with the air course. Oh yeah, it's the whole year worth of podcasts.
Uh. So it moved this topic ahead in that in that shortlist. A. Desmond T.
Doss was also a conscientious objector, but his choices relating to this objection took a really different form from buyered restins. Doss did serve in the military in a non combat role, and he was the first conscientious objector to be awarded the Medal of Honor. So today we're going to talk about him, as well as a little bit about two other conscientious objectors who have also been awarded the same honor.
Before we get into DOS's story, we're going to level set a little bit with a look at some of the history of conscience objection in the Western world. Das and both of the other men that we're going to talk about were from the United States, but conscience objection in general is something that exists in a lot of other nations as well. So although the basic idea is a whole lot older. The term conscientious objector seems to have been coined sometime in the early nineteenth century to describe a person who refuses to comply with the requirement because doing so would violate their conscience. So this term has been applied to all kinds of requirements related to lots of different services and fields and circumstances. This includes medicine and law, but today we are really sticking to the context of conscience and military service. Issues of conscience objection typically only come up when military service is mandatory in some way. This was true of the person typically cited as history's first conscientious subjector. That was Maximilianus, who was the son of a Roman army veteran. He was required to join the military when he turned twenty one, and this was back in the year two ninety five. Maximilianus refused, citing his Christian beliefs as his reason for refusal, and he was beheaded for doing so.
Historically, conscience objection to military service has usually not always been connected to pacifist religions, and this meant that in Europe conscience subjection became a lot more common following the Protestant Reformation. After the Reformation, the number and focus of religious denominations became a lot more diverse, and a lot more people began to choose which faith to belong to rather than following a state sponsored or nationally consistent religion. So Mennonites, for example, were exempt from mandatory guard duties because of their pacifist beliefs. During the Dutch Wars of Independence in the sixteenth century.
Standards and rules about how to handle conscience objections also spread, along with conscription into standing armies in Europe following the French Revolution. Nations saw a need to establish and maintain a standing army, but they also saw a need not to force their citizens to violate their religious principles in doing so. It was really the twentieth century before conscience objection sort of coalesced into an anti war movement strategy. That was when people really started to describe themselves as conscientious objectors rather than describing conscription or military service or a specific war as something that was against their religion. And the idea that someone could have a conscious objection to war personally without being without it being based in a very specific organized religion started to become more common around the First World War as well, and at the start of World War One, many European nations and the United States added specific conscience objection rules to their conscription policies, in part because of advocacy on the part of pacifist religious groups. When World War One ended, most but not all European nations ended their conscription programs, which temporarily tabled the issue of conscience objection. When conscriptions started up again. Before and during World War II, a lot of nations again offered alternative service to conscientious objectors, although people who felt like their conscience wouldn't allow them to support the war in any way, even if it were in a non combat role, still usually wound up being sentenced to time in prison. Today, many nations around the world view conscience objection as a fundamental human right protected by international law. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December tenth of nineteen forty eight in the wake of World War II. Article eighteen of that declaration reads quote, everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion. This right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom either alone or in a community with others, and in public or private to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance.
Article eighteen of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which is adopted in nineteen sixty six, builds on this idea. Further Part one of that article is really similar to what Holly just read, and then it continues too. No one shall be subject to coercion which would impair his freedom to have or adopt a religion or belief.
Of his choice. Three.
Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs may be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to protect public safety, order, health, or morals, or the fundamental right and freedoms of others. Although this Declaration and Covenant don't specifically mention conscience objection, many nations have interpreted conscience subjection as an aspect of the freedom of thought, conscience, and religion. Also, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, which was replaced by the Human Rights Council in two thousand and six, has issued a number of other declarations that do specifically address conscience objection, although these aren't legally binding among member states, they spell out conscience objection as being part of the fundamental human right to freedom of thought. The first of these was Resolution nineteen eighty seven forty six, which was passed in nineteen eighty seven with twenty six votes in favor, two against, and fourteen abstentions. The following year, the Commission on Human Rights issued Resolution nineteen eighty eight seventy seven, specifying that everyone has the right to conscience objection and calling on states that don't have conscience objection policies to develop them in a non discriminatory way. A number of other resolutions upholding the right the conscience objection have followed since then. Not every United Nations member state has agreed with those resolutions or with the interpretation that conscience objection is a fundamental human right. For example, Singapore drafted a letter to the Commission in two thousand and two that was co signed by sixteen member states. Those include Bangladesh, Botswana, China, Egypt, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, me and mar Rwanda, Singapore, Sudan, Syria, Thailand, Tanzania, and Vietnam, stating that they quote do not recognize the universal applicability of conscientious objection to military service, and of course, not every nation on earth is a member state of the United Nations. There are so many nuances to all this, and from an ethical and moral standpoint, the decision to object or not to object is an incredibly personal line. And if conscience objection is a fundamental human right, then that means that people who do serve in the military are fighting to protect the right not to, whether they agree with the existence of that right or not. And there have also been lots of times in history when the idea of conscience objections has become just incredibly divisive, and the most obvious is probably during the Vietnam War. All of that is really outside the scope of our show today, but we would be remiss.
If we did not at least acknowledge it. So for Desmond T. Dos the decision not to fight was not actually even something he thought of as a conscience objection. He actually preferred to be called a conscientious cooperator. And we're going to talk about him after a brief word from one of our sponsors. Desmond T.
Doss was born in Lynchburg, Virginia, on February seventh, nineteen nineteen. His mother worked in a shoe factory, and his father was a carpenter, and their family were members of the Seventh day Adventist Church. In their home, they had a framed poster that displayed the illustrated ten Commandments in the Lord's Prayer, and the illustration of the sixth commandment of Thou shalt not kill was of Cain having just killed his brother Abel from the Book of Genesis. This image had an almost visceral impact on the young Desmond. He was appalled at the idea that one brother could murder another, and he also believed that bearing arms was a sin against God. In April of nineteen forty two, Dawson listed in the Army for World War Two. Although he was designated as a conscientious objector, he didn't actually have an objection to serving as long as he didn't have to kill anyone or carry a weapon and could observe the Sabbath each Saturday. To reconcile his service with his faith, Dos became a medic. Being a medic would let him help people rather than harm them, and he didn't have an objection to doing actual medical work on Saturday, since and his words quote Christ, healed on a Sabbath. Even so, Das faced harassment and derision from his peers while they were in training. In addition to his religious refusal to carry a weapon or do non medical work like participating in drills on Saturdays, he continued his practice of devotion in prayers. He was also a vegetarian for religious reasons. At one point, his commanding officer attempted to have him discharged from the army on the grounds that he was mentally ill. Doas's response quote, I'd be a very poor Christian if I accepted a discharge implying that I was mentally off because of my religion. In the end, though, Das completed his training and was deployed with the three hundred seventh Infantry seventy seventh Infantry Division. He left for Guam in the summer of nineteen forty four, and he served as a me both there and on the island of Leati and the Philippines, earning the Bronze Star for his heroism. In the spring of nineteen forty five, Dos was part of the Battle of Okinawa, which stretched from April first to June twenty second of nineteen forty five and pitted the US and its allies against Japanese troops that were deeply entrenched in caves, tunnels, and other cover DOS's unit was on the four hundred foot tall ridge at Maida Escarpment when a Japanese force staged a counter attack on Saturday, May fifth of nineteen forty five. Dos was the only medic with them on the escarpment, and while some of the American force was able to retreat back down, a lot of the men who were wounded were stranded on top of this ridge and pinned down under fire from the Japanese force.
Dos remained with the wounded men, and he rigged a sling to evacuate them one at a time down the face of a cliff, using knots and techniques that he had learned as a youth when working in a flood rescue. He used a tree stump to anchor his sling. He loaded each wounded man into it, and he lowered them thirty five feet to safety on a protected ledge below. He did this over and over while under fire, until every man was down, and then he lowered himself. His commanding officer wanted to credit him with saving one hundred men's lives that day. He said it was only more like fifty, and they eventually compromised at seventy five. His heroic efforts to save people's lives did not stop there, though. He basically continued to rescue men from under fire repeatedly, including carrying people to safety while being fired upon for pretty much the whole next week. On May twelfth, he was injured by a grenade and had multiple shrapnel injuries to his legs. Although another medic was nearby, Dos cared for his injuries himself for five hours rather than having any other medic risk his own safety and come to help. Then, when Dos was finally evacuated, he saw another soldier whose need he thought was greater, so he got off the litter he was being carried on and asked the medics to take care of that other man instead. Then, while he was waiting for them to come back for him, he was struck in the arm by enemy fire and sustained a compound fracture. Impossibly the only time in his life that he ever handled a weapon, he made a splint for himself out of a rifle stock and then crawled to an aid station three hundred yards away with one of his arms broken. And splinted. Just stand in awe of all of this. I can't even grasp the fortitude a person has to have, which is why he earned the nickname the wonder Man of Okinawa. DESMONDI.
Das was one of the men awarded the Medal of Honor by President Harry S. Truman on October twelfth, nineteen forty five. Doss had been a private when he took these actions that led to this recognition, and he was a corporal when it was actually a war to him. His injuries from the war, however, were extensive and he needed ongoing medical care, and he eventually lost along to tuberculosis. He spent about six years in hospitals trying to recover, and he had planned to go to a trade school and become a florist, but the extent of his injuries and illnesses made that impossible. He devoted most of his life instead to religious work, and in nineteen seventy six he suddenly lost his hearing. In nineteen ninety one, DOS's first wife, Dorothy he had married in nineteen forty two before leaving for the service, died in a car accident. He remarried about three years later, and his second wife, Francis, was still living when Dos died on March twenty third, two thousand and six, at the age of eighty seven. In nineteen eighty seven, he said in an interview quote, I wasn't trying to be a hero. 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 that mother couldn't give up the child. For all of his life, he credited God with his survival during the war. After another brief sponsor break, we will talk a little bit about two other conscientious objectors who have also been awarded the Medal of Honor. We spoke right before the break about two other conscientious objectors who have also been awarded the Medal of Honor, and both of them received that honor for work as medics in Vietnam. The first was Thomas W. Bennett of Morgantown, West Virginia. His military records didn't list a denominational preference, but sources suggest that he was raised either Methodist or Southern Baptist. Regardless, he attended the services of multiple denominations, and he came to a sincerely held belief that all life was sacred. He also vehemently objected to the United States involvement in the Vietnam War. Specifically, Bennett was drafted during that involvement in Vietnam, and after he'd lost his student deferment due to poor grades at West Virginia University, he wound up registering as a conscientious objector who was willing to serve in a non combat role. He became a medic and was eventually deployed to Vietnam. On February ninth of nineteen sixty nine, his platoon there was ambushed. In the words of his Medal of Honor citation quote, Corporal Bennett, with complete disregard for his safety, ran through the heavy fire to his fallen comrades, administered life saving first aid under fire, and then made repeated trips carrying the wounded men to positions of relative safety from which they would be medically evacuated from the battle position. Corporal Bennett repeatedly braved the intense enemy fire, moving across open areas to give aid and comfort to his wounded comrades. Valiantly exposed himself to the heavy fire in order to retrieve the bodies of several fallen personnel.
Then, as the whole platoon was awaiting for helicopters to rescue the injured men, he spent the night outside the safety of any kind of shelter, tending to wounded people who couldn't be moved.
On February eleventh, a similar event happened again when the platoon came under sniper fire, and once again Bennett put himself at risk repeatedly to try to aid the wounded, including an attempt to save a fellow soldier who had fallen ahead of the company's position. Even though he was warned that the fallen soldier would be impossible to reach given where he was in the amount of enemy fire, Bennett tried anyway, and he was mortally wounded in the process. He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor on April seventh of nineteen seventy, which would have been his twenty third birthday. The third conscientious objector to be awarded the Medal of Honor was Specialist for Joseph G. Lapointe Junior, and there's not as much biographical inform that's publicly available on him. Army records, though identified him as a Baptist. On June second of nineteen sixty nine, the patrol he was on fell under heavy enemy fire. He rendered aid while under fire to two injured soldiers, and to do so he had to crawl directly into the line of sight of an enemy bunker. He resorted to shielding the two fallen men with his own body, but all three were killed by an enemy grenade. In addition to his Medal of Honor, Lapointe was also posthumously awarded the Silver Star. He was survived by his wife, Cindy, and his son, also named Joseph, who was unfortunately born after his father's death. And that's a little bit about conscience objection and conscientious objectors. Thanks so much for joining us on this Saturday. If you'd like to send us a note, our email addresses History Podcast at iHeartRadio dot com, and you can subscribe to the show on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.