Darol “Lefty” Lee; phony Iwo Jima hero

We’ve discussed Medal of Honor recipient West Virginian Hershel Woodrow “Woody” Williams before and his amazing assault across the first airfield at Iwo Jima on February 23rd, 1945 where he nearly single-handedly took 7 pillboxes and killed a score of Japanese soldiers doing so.

Here is Woody’s MOH citation to refresh your memory;

Of, course no one does that kind of stuff alone. Williams was supported by fellow Marines who provided covering fire for him. According to early reports, PFC Wesley Strickland, CPL William Naro, CPL Alan Tripp, CPL Alex Schlager, PFC George Schwartz were covering Woody. Furthermore, two men died covering him and research is currently being done to ascertain their identities. Well, somehow, Darol “Lefty” Lee got his name on that list. Here is a paragraph in an original draft of a dispatch write-up of the incident from the National Archives;

Notice that Lefty isn’t mentioned. Well, his name got added to the dispatch somehow in a copy Lefty Lee has been giving to historians;

A page later in the phony document, it describes Lefty as having killed “10 Japs”, something he never did on Iwo Jima on 23 February because he wasn’t there. The problem is that “Lefty” was aboard the APA-33 USS Bayfield after being evacuated from the Iwo Jima beach for “combat fatigue/shell shock” the day before as seen in yet again another document from the National Archives.

Lefty was evacuated all the way back to the United States – here’s his unit status report for February;

Somehow Lefty convinced Woody, scholars and archivists for a long time that Lefty had been there, and, of course, Woody and others believed him. Woody had fought with Lefty on Guam and knew he was in his same company and had landed on Iwo Jima with him so he had no reason to doubt Lefty’s story, especially since he was a brother Marine. Here’s an article from the Winona Daily News;

Another clip from a USAToday article;

And yet another clip from the Minnesota Legionnaire from 2015 (.pdf);

For years, Lefty had claimed he had two Purple Hearts and a Bronze Star with V (see Al Zdon’s 2015 article in the Minnesota Legionnaire newsletter shown above). However, he always claimed he had never received his second Purple Heart for his actions on Iwo Jima and had “lost” his Bronze Star and its citation in a move.

Knowing this, a group of well-meaning veterans decided that Lefty should get some long overdue recognition for his participation in the battle and historians began researching Lefty’s participation in the assault on Iwo Jima. Instead of finding supporting documents to honor Lefty, they discovered that he had barely participated in the battle, let alone in the MOH incident involving the real hero Woody Williams.

He had indeed served his country honorably before Iwo Jima. The year before Iwo, Lefty had been wounded on Guam;

He had an impressive career and he fought across the Pacific with the Marine Corps;

But, for some reason, that wasn’t enough. Lefty felt a need to inject himself into the story of Woody Williams, and the fog of war allowed him to take advantage of Woody and many journalists and scholars for several years.

Lefty has finally admitted to the fake story.

Category: Phony soldiers, Valor Vultures