Army veterans often carry stories that reach far beyond the battlefield. These 30 facts explore remarkable acts of courage, unexpected turns, historic injustices, and the lasting impact veterans have made in war and civilian life.
Bonus Protest Meets Army
1. In 1932, a group of World War I veterans assembled in Washington, DC to demand early payment of their service bonuses. President Hoover ordered the Army to break up the protestors. Using 500 infantrymen, 500 cavalry, and 6 tanks, the Army succeeded, and two veterans were killed.
2. At Six Flags Darien Lake in 2011, a double amputee war veteran died after being thrown from a rollercoaster. Investigators determined it was the ride attendant’s fault for failing to follow the rules requiring riders to have both legs.
3. US veterans may have Mjölnir, Hammer of Thor, engraved in their headstones as a religious symbol.
4. The United States Postal Service is the single largest employer of veterans, with 22% of the postal workforce made up of veterans, and nearly a third of the veterans it employs are disabled.
5. Kevin Briggs is a San Francisco Highway Patrol Officer and a veteran of US Army, who has talked approximately 200 people out of suicide on the Golden Gate Bridge since 1994.
6. Bill Stone, one of the last five surviving World War 1 veterans, made several separate trips to rescue 1,000 men at Dunkirk, although the first trip was “the worst experience of his life.” His motto in life was “keep going.” He died at the age of 108.
7. Dewey Beard was the final Native American veteran of the 1876 Battle of Little Bighorn. In 1892, the US Army killed his family at the Wounded Knee Massacre, and he was shot. In 1942, the Department of War took his land to create a firing range. He died in poverty in 1955.
8. John Stith Pemberton, the inventor of Coca-Cola, was a Civil War veteran who became addicted to morphine because of pain from a saber wound to the chest. Looking for an alternative to his morphine use, he created the original Coca-Cola formula using the coca plant for pain relief.
9. When Dakota Meyer was reached to set up a time to tell him that his Medal of Honor case had been approved, the caller was informed that Meyer was at his construction job and was asked to call back during his lunch break. Later, when a White House staffer contacted Meyer again to arrange the ceremony, Meyer asked whether he could have a beer with President Obama. He received an invitation to the White House for the afternoon before the ceremony.
10. A Canadian military veteran amputee named Paul Franklin had to file annual paperwork to prove his legs were still missing in order to keep his disability benefits.
Liver Eatin’ Johnson’s Feud
11. John “Liver Eatin’” Johnson was a veteran of the Mexican-American War who became a mountain man, and in 1847 he began a personal vendetta against the Crow Nation after they killed his Flathead wife. He is said to have killed and scalped more than 300 Crows and then eaten their livers as a sign of disrespect.
12. Adrian Carton de Wiart was a veteran of 4 wars. He was shot in the stomach, groin, head, hand, ankle, hip, and leg. He once chewed off a few of his own fingers, survived two plane crashes, and lost an eye all during the wars he fought.
13. Susan Travers, a veteran of World War 2 and the Indochina War, is the only woman to have been formally enrolled in the French Foreign Legion.
14. A Vietnam War veteran named Michael A. Smith stood in line at (American actress) Jane Fonda book signing just to spit tobacco juice in her face, calling her a traitor to the US for her actions in the 1970s.
15. A 29-year-old Marine veteran named Taylor Winston stole a truck to take victims of the 2017 Las Vegas shooting to the hospital. He and his girlfriend made 2 trips, needing to choose only the most critically injured 10-15 people each time after helping boost others over a fence away from the shooter.
16. In 1946, Isaac Woodard, a black World War 2 veteran, was riding a bus home in uniform and asked the driver to make a stop for a bathroom break. The driver summoned the police, and the local chief of police arrested him, beat him, and gouged out his eyes with a nightstick. The officer was acquitted by an all-white jury.
17. Filip Konowal, a Canadian World War 1 veteran and Victoria Cross recipient, learned that a bootlegger had violently beaten one of his friends, so he disarmed the man and stabbed him to death. Konowal later told police: “I’ve killed fifty-two of them, that makes the fifty-third.”
18. Daniel Freeman was a U.S. Civil War veteran and the first person to file a claim for land under the Homestead Act. Later in life, he brought and won a landmark separation of church and state case against a teacher who was evangelizing to her students with permission from the school board.
19. The tombstone of U.S. Air Force veteran and gay rights activist Leonard Matlovich says this: “When I was in the military, they gave me a medal for killing two men and a discharge for loving one.”
20. James Stewart is the highest-ranking actor in military history (Brigadier General). He was a World War 2 and Vietnam War Veteran and Licensed Commercial Pilot. In 1996, he was due to have the battery in his pacemaker changed but chose not to, preferring to let things happen naturally.
GI Bill Exclusion After War
21. After World War 2, more than 1 million Black Americans were denied the GI bill benefits of free education and low-rate home loans.
22. The most highly decorated American World War 1 veteran from Texas was Marcelino Serna, an undocumented Mexican immigrant. He was also the first Hispanic person to receive the Distinguished Service Cross.
23. US Army veteran Shawn Nelson fell into severe depression after his wife filed for divorce, both parents died of cancer, his plumbing equipment was stolen, his income ended, his utilities were shut off, and his house entered foreclosure. He stole a tank from the armory, rampaged through the streets destroying cars, and was ultimately shot and killed.
24. Harry Wilhelm was an unemployed World War 1 veteran who had memorized the entire US Constitution during the Great Depression. Representative Sol Bloom bet that Wilhelm could not recite it perfectly. When Wilhelm proved him wrong, Bloom immediately gave him a job.
25. “Band of Brothers” aimed for such a high level of historical accuracy that multiple World War 2 veterans were flown in from all over the world to advise on the weaponry, battle tactics, and combat situations. As a final check, the veterans screened previews of each episode before they were released.
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