We had little contact with people outside the region . . . We ate what we grew on the place or could glean from the hillsides. Dad worked in the timber woods and at a sawmill, when there was employment to be found. My family lived as far back in the hollers as it was possible to go in Bell County, Kentucky. ![]() This article originally appeared on The Gainesville Sun: The late Duane E.This remarkable memoir is “both one person’s extraordinary life story and a first-hand look at life in the mountains in a time that is fading from memory” ( Kentucky Monthly). In the video interview, Dewey said that when he puts the medal on, he thinks about the soldiers who deserve it that didn’t get it, and he said “I didn’t do anything that somebody else in my position wouldn’t have done.” He retired in 1973 and split his time between his hunting cabin in Irons, Michigan, and spending his winters in Alachua County. Upon being awarded the Medal of Honor on March 12, 1953, in a White House Ceremony, Eisenhower told him he had a “body of steel.” He said in a 2011 video interview that, before the explosion, he pulled the corpsman down to him and told him, “Hit the dirt, Doc, I’ve got it in my hip pocket.” Dewey spent 50 days recovering in military hospitals, according to the Congressional Medal of Honor Society. He was worried that he wouldn’t throw the grenade far enough away from his men because he was on the ground, so he put the deadly explosive underneath him to absorb the explosion to save his comrades. When he returned, a grenade detonated behind his left heel and a hospital corpsman was removing his pants to examine his wound when a grenade rolled near him. On April 16, 1952, his 80-man unit was far outnumbered by about 700 Chinese soldiers and he directed a continuous, sustained barrage of fire and eventually ran off to search for more ammunition. He gets along with everybody every time.”Īccording to the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, 147 Medals of Honor were distributed following the Korean War and only three of its Medal of Honor recipients are still alive.ĭewey was leading a machine gun squad in Panmunjom, a village just outside the de facto border between North and South Korea where the Korean Armistice Agreement was signed. “I think the first thing everybody notices about my dad is that everybody is his friend,” she said. Representatives from the governor’s office, Congresswoman Kat Cammack’s office and officials from local governments in Alachua County will also be present.īroome said her father never talked about the Medal of Honor or the war, so much so that she grew up and didn’t know much about what it was or meant until her 10th-grade history class when she learned about the Korean War and her teacher explained it to the class. 16 at 10 a.m., there will be a formal chapel service at William Thomas Funeral Homes in their Newberry location, located at 823 NW 143rd St., followed by a motorcycle escort to Bushnell National Cemetery at 2:15 p.m. ![]() ![]() ![]() “It was a great honor to know him and to be his friend.” “There’s a quiet humbleness about him,” Wait said. Wait said Dewey always had a smile on his face and that he was always at veteran’s events whenever he was in the Alachua County area. It was an incredible experience that could probably never be experienced the rest of my life.” “I can’t believe I was standing next to a Medal of Honor recipient. “We never really talked about the war, we just talked about positive things and the community,” Lynch said. At the event, aside from having a few speakers, they will toast a few beers to him and tell stories about their memories with him. Lynch said Dewey, to anyone who knew him, was just a nice guy who enjoyed sitting around having a cold beer.
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