Valor Friday

This week a D-Day veteran of WWII was honored at his gravesite at Arlington National Cemetery. As part of the service, Staff Sergeant Waverly Woodson Jr, formerly of the US Army, was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star Medal and the Combat Medical Badge. Both awards were late in getting to him, as he died in 2005. His widow, Joann, two of his children and extended family attended the ceremony where Joann was presented with both honors. Family and men of his unit are pressing for further awards to honor Woodson’s heroism on D-Day, as race likely played a major role in his being overlooked until now.

Woodson was from Philadelphia. Born in 1922, after he graduated high school he went to Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. He had aspirations to become a doctor, and was a pre-med student in the undergraduate program.

When the World War came calling for America’s young men, Woodson dropped out of college in his second year. He enlisted into the Army on 15 December 1942, being sworn in alongside his younger brother Eugene.

The Army at this time was still race segregated, with black soldiers serving largely in non-combat support roles. There were some very notable exceptions in the coming years, such as the famed Tuskeegee Airmen and the 1103d Engineer Combat Group. Both groups of all-black units saw extensive combat action in the European Theater.

The 1103d Engineers had started as part of the 555th Parachute Infantry Regiment. Known as the “Triple Nickels”, the 555th PIR didn’t see combat, but were deployed to the Pacific Northwest. There they fought forest fires, many caused by Japanese firebombing from their Fu-Go balloon bombs. Parachuting into these remote fires, they were trailblazers in wildland firefighting tactics and techniques. They thus became the first smoke jumpers.

Despite the segregation, many young black men still enlisted to do their duty. As such, many of them sought out what combat roles would be available. Woodson was no different. Scoring high on an aptitude test, he went to Officer Candidate School for the Anti-Aircraft Artillery Corps. Before graduating, Woodson was told that, due to his race, he wouldn’t be able to be commissioned into the Coast Artillery Corps.

Next, he was sent to be trained as a combat medic. This aligned with his dream of becoming a doctor. After training Woodson was assigned to the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion. This was the only black unit to see action on 6 June 1944 at Normandy.

The men of the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion’s mission on that morning was to reach shore and deploy their balloons. Barrage balloons were low altitude hydrogen-filled balloons. These balloons trailed wires. The balloons would prevent low flying aircraft from strafing the troops as they were exposed on the beach.

Woodson was with his unit, steaming toward Utah Beach as part of the third wave on the morning of D-Day. As they approached Fortress Europe, the landing craft tank (LCT) hit a German naval mine.

The boat lost power and started drifting. This made them an easy target for the German defenders. They took at least one direct hit from a German “88.” The 88 was designed as an anti-aircraft cannon, but saw extensive use as an anti-tank weapon and even an anti-personnel gun.

When the German shell hit the boat, Woodson took shrapnel injuries in his groin, thigh, and back. Upon finally getting to the beach, Woodson met up with other medics. After getting his wounds dressed, they set about making an aid station for the hundreds of wounded.

Taking refuge under a rocky escarpment, then-Corporal Woodson went to work. As thousands of men arrived in wave after wave ashore, many of them were mowed down. Woodson’s work was not going to be over any time soon. He’s recorded having worked, after being wounded himself, for 30 hours. From 1000 hours on 6 June to 1600 on 7 June, he answered the call for “Medic!”

During this horrendous, superhuman ordeal, Woodson set broken limbs, amputated a foot, removed bullets from wounds, and delivered life-saving plasma to the injured. Finally, after more than a solid day of treating the dead and dying, he was relieved.

Woodson set about to collect some bedding so he could finally get some rest. While doing so, he heard some British soldiers calling for help. The rope they’d been rappelling out of an LCT on broke. The soldiers on the rope crashed into the water, leaving the three men submerged for an extended time. Not breathing, Woodson provided CPR and revived all three.

His work now finally done, Woodson was evacuated to a hospital ship. After three days, he requested to be returned to the front. Woodson is personally credited with saving as many as 200 men (black and white) on Utah Beach.

Woodson’s commanding officer recommended Woodson for the Distinguished Service Cross, the nation’s second highest award for combat bravery. The office of Lieutenant General John H.C. Lee disagreed.

Lee recommended Woodson for the Medal of Honor. The discussion made it all the way to the office of President Roosevelt. He was advised by Philleo Nash, a desegregationist advocate working as special assistant to the director of the War Department, to give Woodson the proper recognition and hang the Medal of Honor on the valiant young man.

Ultimately, for whatever reason such decisions are made, Woodson would only be authorized the Bronze Star Medal and the Purple Heart. As he was not assigned directly to an infantry unit, he didn’t receive the Combat Medical Badge. The Philadelphia Tribune wrote, “the feeling is prevalent among Negroes that had Woodson been of another race the highest honor [a Medal of Honor] would have been granted him.”

Despite no official high honor given at the time, on 28 August 1944, the Army issued a news release, singling out the “modest Negro” who treated more than 200 men for “extraordinary bravery.” The news release continues that “The Philadelphia soldier’s story of heroism was left to his buddies to tell.”

Woodson’s bravery however was noted, among that of other black soldiers, in the Congressional record. The second session of the 78th Congress in 1946 recounts the amazing feats of Woodson.

Woodson’s 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion was redeployed back to the States soon after D-Day. At the end of the war, Woodson moved to the Army Reserve. He attempted to go to medical school, but strict quotas on black candidates kept him from finding one that would take him. He did finish his studies at Lincoln, graduating in 1950.

Woodson was recalled to active duty during the Korean War. He initially trained medics in Georgia before being charged with running a morgue. He left the Army in 1952, having risen to the rank of staff sergeant.

Also in 1952, Woodson married Joann, who he would only part from upon his death more than 50 years later. Woodson worked in the medical field, at the National Naval Medical Center and then the National Institutes of Health until his retirement in 1980. In 1994 he was one of three American servicemen invited back to Normandy for the 50th anniversary ceremonies of D-Day.

In the early 1990s, Congress tasked the Department of Defense with reviewing awards dating back to World War II in which racial discrimination may have played a role in denial or downgrading of award recommendations. Woodson’s was among those flagged.

Woodson was interviewed as part of that review. The committee couldn’t locate Woodson’s original awards package, and all of his personnel files were lost in the NPRC fire in 1973. They therefore did not recommend him to be among those upgraded. No black men received the Medal of Honor for actions during WWII until this award review recommended seven such upgrades.

Recently, family and friends, with some Congressional backing and the recommendation of high ranking Army officers, have pushed to have Woodson receive the Medal of Honor. I think his bravery under fire, while wounded, that saved scores of men, should warrant the medal. At the very least, he’s more than well deserving of the Distinguished Service Cross that he was initially recommended for. The most recent Army review of the matter was started in 2022, and has yet to return any judgement or recommendations.

Woodson’s obituary says of the man, “He was well-known for his hobbies, electronics, building equipment, TV and stereo accessories, woodworking, growing beautiful roses, and his collection of tropical fish.”

In addition to his wife, he left behind two daughters, one son, six grandchildren, and 13 great-grandchildren.

Category: Army, Historical, Valor, We Remember