This year, AmeriForce celebrates the military’s depiction in films and television with a look at some of your favorites, and at some of the movie stars who also served in the reserve component. This is the third article in the series. You can find our previous articles on our website at www.AmeriForce.net. Audie Murphy 36th Infantry Division, Texas Army National Guard For the T-Patchers holding the road in theater today by Claire Henline, All photos are from the Audie Murphy Research Foundation unless otherwise indicated It has been called the intersection of happenstance and hell; that time and fate coordinate where Medals of Honor are earned. It is an intersection from which many never return alive. And it was where a 19-year old kid from Texas found himself on a cold winter day in France. He had undoubtedly lied about his age when he joined the United States Army. For many from his background of abject poverty, absent parents and decreasing opportunities though, a smudged year on a birth certificate meant the difference between a chance to thrive or to languish at home in a status quo that seemed worse than any world war. 28 www.AmeriForce.net Looking back upon his miasmic youth as the son of a sharecropper who walked out on the family and a mother who died too young, leaving her children alone in the world, the kid reflected, “I must have done some of my best fighting in a war I was in long before I joined the Army. You might say there never was a ‘peace time’ in my life, a time when things were good.... It was a full-time job just existing.” He had borne the responsibility of providing for younger siblings while he himself was still a boy. While most children today are still losing baby teeth, the young Texan was perfecting his hunting skills, picking cotton for $1 a day, and whatever jobs he could find to take care of his brothers and sisters. When a friend commented on how good the kid had become with a rifle, he simply replied he had to be: “If I miss, my family doesn’t eat.” He never questioned the inequity of his lot in life, the far too early intersection where his childhood turned on the road to adulthood. He just looked on it as a matter of fact and knew someone had to be the one to take care of things. In his mind, that someone might as well be him — Audie Murphy. It was the same resilient attitude the baby-faced Murphy took into that hellish intersection as a Second Lieutenant on January 26, 1945, with orders to hold the road at all costs. He had seen hell already — in Texas, North Africa, Italy, and France, and arrived at that intersection with a combat record that showed he was no common Soldier and would earn: three Purple Hearts, two Bronze Stars with Valor device, the Legion of Merit, two Silver Stars, and a Distinguished Service Cross. A fellow officer cautioned others of Murphy, “Don’t let that baby face fool you, that’s the toughest Soldier in the Third Division.” Now he stood on the battlefield again, surrounded by an onslaught of German infantry troops and advancing German tanks. In the ensuing assault, Murphy alone would remain of the seven officers on the field. The full strength of 129 men from the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division had been whittled down by the Germans to 40. To Murphy, the commander of Company B in 1st Battalion, there were but 18 enlisted now at his disposal — but he had his orders. Someone had to hold the road — at all costs — and in the inference that all costs meant continued loss of life, then it might as well be his life. He ordered his men to withdraw while he remained at his command post directing artillery fire. In between directing fire, Murphy climbed onto a burning tank — still heavily loaded with gasoline and ammunition — and commandeered its .50 caliber machine gun making effective use of it to mow down German troops. The enemy came within 10 yards of Murphy, according to eyewitness accounts and at least one German shell hit the tank on which Murphy stood. In the fog of war, the Germans — even as close as they got to Murphy’s position — were having trouble locating him as his machine gun rained down on them. After nearly an hour of fighting, the German tanks and remaining troops retreated due to heavy losses — an estimated 50 casualties mowed down by Murphy — in the protective infantry ranks. Murphy then at last dismounted the burning tank and rejoined his men. At that point, the tank that had been his bastion finally blew up. Even more amazing (with the exception of reopening the wound he had received the day before), Murphy was unharmed in this action that earned him the one medal he had not yet earned — the Medal of Honor. When asked years later why he had seized the Top row: Audie receiving MOH and LOM from LTG Patch AMResearch Foundation, Audie with fellow MOH recipient Charles Murray at military ceremony 1955, Audie Murphy and siblings welcome home parade AMResearch Foundation, Audie Murphy as a child Second row: Audie drilling with TXARNG, 1953 Camp Mabry in Texas, Audie filming To Hell and Back, Audie visting Wounded Warriors 1946 AMRF Bottom row: March 17 1952 - Terry Murphy, Universtal Studios To Hell and Back. machine gun and taken on an entire company of German infantry by himself, Murphy said simply, “They were killing my friends.” Audie Murphy returned home to Texas in June 1945, after more than 2-and-a-half years of combat service overseas. He was only now just 20 years old. Back home, he set about reclaiming custody of his younger siblings and reintegrating to life outside of the combat arms profession. He honorably discharged continued on page 30 www.AmeriForce.net 29 continued from page 29 from the Army in September 1945. Though his baby face often met the world with a smile such as the one seen on the cover of LIFE Magazine in July 1945, he would for the next several decades face new battles with insomnia, bouts of depression, and nightmares. “After the war,” Murphy pointedly and bravely summarized decades later, “they took Army dogs and rehabilitated them for civilian life. But they turned Soldiers into civilians immediately, and let ‘em sink or swim.” For Murphy, as with all those other intersections he faced in life, there was no choice, he had to swim. In a large part due to Murphy’s own candid discussions regarding his personal struggle with “battle fatigue,” he helped bring the hidden subject of post-traumatic stress disorder into the spotlight. In calling on government to lift the veil on post traumatic stress disorder and study Photo by Claire Henline its impacts on combat veterans, part of Murphy’s legacy would become the way the Courage, The Cimarron Kid, Gunsmoke, Night Passage, military takes care of its personnel today and rotates its The Unforgiven, and Ride a Crooked Trail. Murphy also force pool for missions. performed in television series to include Whispering Smith and non-western genre films like The Quiet It was actor James Cagney who saw the LIFE cover American. His standout role, though, was the one he photo of Murphy and invited the young hero out was literally born to play as himself in To Hell and Back to Hollywood for the opportunity to try acting as a in which he acts out his own true war story based on profession in late 1945. “I came to Hollywood because the accounts documented in his autobiography of the I had no place else to go,”Murphy stated. He had same name. He also had success as a country song some bit roles to start, but he was not immediately writer, book author, poet, and rancher. successful in the industry. For the intermediate time, the kid who quickly became an American war hero only knew the struggle that plagued him before the war as he tried to navigate civilian life and employment (now with the effects of battle fatigue). Eventually the bit roles, led to small roles, which led to bigger roles and then the lead role as outlaw Billy the Kid in the 1950 film The Kid from Texas. The movie was a box office success which garnered Murphy a seven-year contract with Universal Studios. Soon, Audie Murphy was not just a war hero but a western movie star. Murphy surmised his success in this new craft was because, “Acting is daydreaming. And I had daydreamed all of my life. It was the only way I could escape my environment.” He filmed some 44 movies in his career, with memorable performances in classics such as: The Red Badge of 30 www.AmeriForce.net Still, first and always, he remained a Soldier who took an oath once and never forgot it. “Nobody likes for his life to be disrupted,” Murphy affirmed, “But when the country calls, they need you . . . I am in favor of no more war but as long as war clouds hover over the earth, as a citizen, I feel we should be prepared for the worst.” At the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950, Murphy returned to military service with the 36th Infantry Division of the Texas Army National Guard as a federally recognized Captain. The T-Patchers were never called up during the war, but Murphy continued his part-time duty with them over the next two decades, and allowed the historic division to use his affiliation for recruiting initiatives. Murphy fulfilled drill duties and annual training with the 36th, serving in Headquarters and Headquarters Company of both the 1st and 2nd Battalions, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Infantry Division. He culminated his career at the rank of Major and was eventually transferred to the Inactive Reserve in 1966. He was on the roles of the Retired Reserve when he died in a plane crash on May 28, 1971, at the age of 41. I walk by his name inscribed on a Medal of Honor wall every day on my way to the office. And now, I finish his story where he lies bivouacked forever at Arlington Cemetery near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. I look upon his name carved on the simple headstone of a Soldier. It is a name I heard referenced my whole life, in my upbringing as an Army brat; its spokenness inferred a valor untenable in ranks today. In just under three years of active duty combat service, Audie Leon Murphy, the baby faced sharecropper’s kid from Texas, became the most highly decorated Soldier of World War II — a feat that still has not been surpassed. He received every medal for valor this country can award — sometimes more than once — and the highest medals for honor the French and Belgians can bestow. He is credited with killing over 240 of the enemy. He arrived at the intersection of happenstance and hell and never questioned his placement there. “I’ll tell you what bravery really is,” Murphy once disclosed, “Bravery is just the determination to do a job that you know has to be done.” Claire Henline is a freelance writer and an employee of Arrowpoint, Inc. She has held strategic communications and strategic planning positions with both the G5 and G4 directorates of the ARNG. She enjoys writing about military history for Reserve & National Guard Magazine. The Army says there will never be another Audie Murphy. In a sense, the Army is right. The nature of warfare has changed to a level of hybrid, high-tech, highly public, visibility arena in which no single service member can ever play a protracted role like Murphy. But he is a reminder that the most effective weapon the military invests in will always be a well-resourced, resilient, ready Soldier. www.AmeriForce.net 31