Original subtitles

(warzone shooting)

(dramatic instrumental music)

- [Voiceover] When I was growing up, I looked for heroes.

And no other story inspired me and captured my imagination

more than that of Private Desmond T. Doss, the first

conscientious objector to ever receive the Medal of Honor.

The more I tried to comprehend his amazing actions, the

larger than life he became.

I never thought that 25 years later as a filmmaker, I'd find

myself atop historic Lookout Mountain, just outside of

Chattanooga, Tennessee, in a

little place called Rising Fawn, Georgia.

I was here to meet the man who had been my boyhood hero.

What I found was a simple man living a simple life who

could only hear me through the aid of his cochlear implant.

And though at times his words were hard to understand, the

character of the man spoke loud and clear.

- Okay.

- [Voiceover] I hear you.

- Okay, I'm hearing you now.

- [Voiceover] Okay.

Born in Lynchburg, Virginia on February 7th,

1919 to Tom and Bertha Doss, Desmond grew up as the middle

child in a typical Depression-era family.

Filled with curiosity, little Desmond

found fascination with simple things.

- My mother had a picture in the living room, a real large

picture of the Ten Commandments.

He, he was too small to get up he wanted to touch it.

He would get up in a chair and he was reading them

and he couldn't understand why did Cain kill Abel?

The Bible says, "Thou shalt not kill."

- And as a result, I didn't want to ever take life.

- [Voiceover] These simple images would stay with Desmond

for the rest of his life and help define his character.

On a typical day, Desmond could be found playing under the

train trestle or flattening pennies on the railroad tracks

that ran behind his backyard.

His best friend was his brother, Harold.

- I went to give him a hip toss, and the grass was wet and

I slipped and I landed right on his head.

And I, it hurt my hip, as a matter of fact.

And I turned to him and I said, "Now do you give up?"

And all he says, "uh-uh."

He couldn't even speak, he just said, "Uh-huh."

And I said, that's it.

That was the last time we ever wrestled,

because he was not one that would give up.

He didn't know how.

- [Voiceover] The Great Depression

took its toll on Desmond's father.

He was often drunk and despondent.

Fortunately, it was his mother's love

and compassionate ways that had

the greatest impact on Desmond's life.

- She let us be ourselves.

She was very spiritual, and she brought

us all up being spiritual.

- [Voiceover] Bertha Doss took her children

to a small Seventh-day Adventist church, a church that

believed in keeping all of the Ten Commandments.

She lived her life by these principles,

and young Desmond followed her example.

- He was always helpful to people.

- Anyone sick, he had to be there.

It was announced on the radio-we didn't have TVs in them

days-it was announced that there was an accident on Route

29, and they needed some blood

right away, to save this woman's life.

He walked three miles to the hospital and walked

three more miles back home after giving blood.

Two days later, a call came back over the radio

that they need more blood.

There he goes again, walks the three miles,

then walks three miles back.

- [Voiceover] A defining moment came to young

Desmond one hot summer evening

near his home in Lynchburg, Virginia.

- It was an experience I'll never forget.

What happened, my uncle and my dad

were both drinking;

in fact, I'm afraid more

than that, they were drunk.

And they got into a fight.

- [Voiceover] Insults were thrown

and challenges made until, in the heat of the moment,

Desmond's father pulled out a gun.

- They were fighting, and Daddy

had the gun, and Mother got in between.

Neither one of them wanted to hit Mother

and so Mother told Dad, "You give me that gun."

She said, "The police are on the way",

and you're going to be in real trouble,

"they catch you with that gun."

He took the bullets out and gave her the gun.

Mother gave me that gun, she said, "Go hide that gun!"

I ran home, it was about a block or two away.

- [Voiceover] With the .45 pistol hidden

in a safe place, Desmond ran back

just in time to see the police arresting his father.

- I watched them shove my daddy into the back of that old

black wagon with the drunks, and then they drove off.

And I'll never forget that experience because if it hadn't

been for Mother, my daddy would most likely have killed him.

- [Voiceover] Though Desmond can smile about it now, the

incident of his father almost killing his own brother-in-law

brought the Cain and Abel story too close to home, and he

vowed that that would be the last time

he ever touched a gun.

- I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked

and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7th, 1941

a state of war has existed between

the United States and the Japanese Empire.

We will gain the inevitable triumph, so help us God.

(Congress cheers)

- [Voiceover] At the time, Desmond worked at the Newport

News naval shipyard, which made him eligible for a

deferment, but when his boss offered

him one, he wouldn't hear of it.

Instead, when Uncle Sam called he was ready.

- I felt like it was an honor to serve God and country.

We were fighting for our religious liberty and freedom.

- He knew he was going to have difficulty,

because he doesn't uh use a gun.

- In World War Two, it was a total commitment among

Americans to serve, go to the draft, volunteer for the

draft, to do your duty.

And one gentleman said that three men in his hometown

committed suicide because

they were not physically able to serve.

Now, think about that for a moment here.

Because they were physically inadequate,

they were 4-F or whatever the code was, they couldn't serve?

So they committed suicide?

I mean, so here you have a person who steps up and says, I'm

a conscientious objector, I won't carry

a weapon because of my religious beliefs.

Can you imagine?

- He was not going to use a gun.

I, I'm going in as a medic.

I'll do that.

- And when I told the sergeant

I was supposed to be in the medics, ha!

We tell you where you belong, you don't tell us nothin'.

And I found out he meant it.

- [Voiceover] The army told Desmond that since he would not

carry a gun, they would

send him to a conscientious objector's camp.

There, he would work with men who refused to wear the

uniform or salute the flag.

- I tried to explain that I was

not that type of conscientious objector.

I tried to explain that I was a conscientious co-operator.

- I would say anyone is wrong

to try to compromise somebody's conviction;

I don't care whether it's army or what it is.

When you're under conviction that is not a joke.

That's what you are.

- I did believe in saluting my country's flag, wearing my

country's uniform and serving my

country the same as anyone else.

- [Voiceover] At Desmond's insistence,

the military decided that he could serve

in the regular army, but with a classification

he did not want;

1A-0 Conscientious Objector.

So Desmond headed off to South Carolina to join the 77th

Division and begin his basic training at Fort Jackson.

I asked Desmond to go with me, back to where it all began.

- I'm looking forward to getting back to the base and see

some of the old barracks and things

that I understand are still standing.

I didn't like my classification and I objected at the draft

board, and then it was explained to me this way,

it meant that I was going into the service

under conditions that I would not be forced to bear arms.

- [Voiceover] Here at Fort Jackson, Desmond looked forward

to becoming a combat medic, but the army had other plans.

A postcard from Desmond to his fiancee,

Dorothy Schutte, dated April 16, 1942.

- [Voiceover] Dear Dorothy, they've taken me out of the

medical attachment, so the next letter, let it be

Private Doss, Company C, Three-O-Seventh Infantry,

77th Division, U.S. Army.

Please pray for me, love, Desmond.

- [Voiceover] The army knew that peer pressure was powerful

medicine, so they assigned Desmond to a rifle company, the

perfect scenario where a conscientious

objector was least likely to be accepted.

It was in these very barracks filled with future G. I. Joes

that Desmond discovered that his

beliefs would be severely tested.

- He was regarded very frankly as a pest.

As true as I can say, a pest.

And, uh, I said, well, what do we need him for?

Let him get out of the army.

Throw him out.

- You know, he's soft-spoken, and very, you know,

easy-going, you know.

But a lot of people thought this

guy was putting on an act, you know.

What kind of religion you can't

do this, you can't do that, ya know.

- [Voiceover] His tenacious practice of the principles that

he held true not only alienated Desmond from his fellow

soldiers, it made him a target for their ridicule.

- You didn't want to associate with him, you didn't

want to go to the latrine with him,

you didn't want to eat with him,

you didn't want him in your unit,

you didn't want to have anything to do with him.

And he was immediately branded

with a scarlet letter, so to speak.

- They don't like the idea of always a guy with a Bible.

He always carried his Bible.

And he had a small one and always carried it in his pocket.

And they were always seeing him reading his Bible.

That just made him fierce.

- Some people don't believe in religion,

so they figure, well, what the hell is he doing, you know?

- I was just something that, a joke.

And they made fun of me.

Who he think he is?

Holy Jesus? Uh, Holy Job?

- You know, he'd say his prayers at night and everything,

and some guys, some guys took their shoes

and threw shoes at him and threw things at him and made,

made fun of him, right out in the open.

And I don't think I could have taken what that guy did.

I don't think I could have taken it.

But he hung in there.

He hung in there regardless

of what they said or what they did.

- [Voiceover] Why do you think he was able to take that?

- Because, because of his real strong beliefs.

That's the only way that I could understand it that, you

know, he was a hundred percent.

He was a hundred percent in his religion and his beliefs,

and he just disregarded what they said.

I, I don't think I could have,

I don't think I could have handled it.

But he did, and that's why I give him a lot of credit.

- One fellow, he told me, "I swear to God Doss",

you go into combat, I'm going to shoot you."

- It's your buddies that get you along in life, and

certainly in the military, they help you survive.

- I don't think he really have a friend, you know.

He didn't have friends.

Because he was too much out of the mainstream, see.

- I have to, I have to give him credit for having a lot of

intestinal fortitude to stand up

to that ridicule and to that criticism.

- Now, I don't blame the men for

doing some of the things they did.

It's just that I was just someone

to let steam off on, and they probably thought I was just

trying to get out of the service.

They didn't know I, I was offered a deferment.

- [Voiceover] The men of the 77th Division were required to

go through mountain training exercises.

Part of this training included

learning to tie a variety of knots.

One of the basic knots that everyone had to learn was the

bowline, a knot with a loop that wouldn't slip.

One day while practicing the bowline knot,

Desmond was surprised to find that by doubling

the rope it made two loops instead of just one.

He had no way of knowing just how

important that little discovery would become.

The one relationship Desmond

could count on was with Dorothy Schutte.

Their letters had become his lifeline,

and on August 17, 1942, they got married.

Desmond's troubles with the army would follow him when the

77th Division moved to Fort Pickett, Virginia.

Besides his conviction not to take life,

Desmond followed another principle

that he learned from the picture on the wall.

The 4th commandment told him to keep the Sabbath day holy.

For Desmond, that meant not working

from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday.

- The Lord says, "Remember the seventh day,"

to keep it holy.

Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work,

but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.

"In it thou shalt not do any work."

And I took that personal to mean me.

- He would come to the dispensary

for his pass Friday evening.

Major, I want my pass.

So he'd go off to some little village or town or someplace

or find a little church, and spend his time,

and then he'd come back the next day,

and on Sunday he was given all the rough details,

because they said, you were off yesterday,

you get the tough details today.

- [Voiceover] Desmond never complained about his tough

duties, and after a month of being in the infantry,

he got some welcome news. May 5, 1942:

- [Voiceover] Dear Dorothy, I am back

in the medical attachment,

so when you write, be sure you don't write to C,

for I am not there anymore.

- [Voiceover] Even though his new commanding officer was

Jewish and believed in the same Sabbath as Desmond,

Captain Statman found Desmond's weekly

request for Saturday off a source of constant annoyance.

- If you're Jewish and very religious,

you might not want to do certain things

on Friday night or all day Saturday.

Our religion permits us to

carry out our duties whatever they are as necessary.

- [Voiceover] Desmond held his ground

and kept his Sabbath faithfully every week.

But tensions continued until finally,

Captain Statman had had enough.

- He says, "Doss, I am not signing any more passes"

for you or let anyone else

"sign a pass for you, is it clear?"

- [Voiceover] A letter home, April 12, 1943:

- [Voiceover] Dear Dorothy, I talked

to Captain Statman about not

being there Sabbath, and he was still red hot.

He said that he would court-martial me if I gave him any

more trouble, that I wasn't any better than any of the

others and that I wasn't going to have Saturdays off.

He also said that I wasn't any good to him,

and he was going to get rid of me the first chance he got.

- [Voiceover] Desmond's conviction outweighed Captain

Statman's intimidation and even under the threat of

court-martial, Desmond continued to ask for his weekly pass.

In the summer of 1943, the 77th Division moved to Camp

Hyder, Arizona for desert training.

- Those things are still there.

- [Voiceover] Two of Desmond's fellow soldiers, Jim Boylan

and Jack Glover, joined us at the abandoned site.

- Well, well, well.

- I think that's the worst, the worst place that we ever

could be sent to on the face of this earth.

We was the first, first infantry outfit

I think, to take maneuvers out there.

And what the hell they tried to prove, I don't know.

- Uh, it was miserable during the day when, when it was a

hundred and twenty-eight in the shade and no shade.

- They thought we were going on hikes in the daytime in a

hundred-degree-plus, with one canteen of water.

- So here you are out on the desert where the temperature

is a hundred and ten, you're sweating out a gallon, how

could you possibly get along on one canteen of water?

We lost people-people died from dehydration.

- [Voiceover] Desmond wrote home

concerned about the wellbeing of his men. July 9, 1943:

- [Voiceover] This morning, I went

to the company commander and

told him that all the water cans were full, and the men

wanted water, and the kitchen wanted the cans back by

nine-thirty so they could have them refilled.

Did he get hot!

He asked me if I was trying to tell him how to run things.

He told me that he was running the company

and I could take care of the blisters.

If I had any complaints, to go to the battalion commander,

so I went to Captain Benz and told him what took place.

- [Voiceover] The men got their water,

but Desmond took the heat from the company commander.

The conditions at Camp Hyder

were so bad that desertions were common.

Some men ran off into the desert, never to be seen again.

But no matter how severe the conditions got,

Desmond always put his men first, sharing his ration of

water, treating their raw and blistered feet,

and caring for those with dehydration or sun stroke.

- They found out I put my heart in my work,

and I wanted to help all of them I could.

- [Voiceover] However, in spite of Desmond's willing

service, his officers still considered him their weakest

link, and they were determined

to find a way to do something about it.

Commander Jack Glover didn't just

want Desmond out of the company.

He wanted him out of the army.

- I said, well, we're going into a war, and it's kill or be

killed, and everyone has to have a damn gun,

because it's, it's that type of thing,

and that's the only way we're going

to win a war is to kill all of them so, before they kill us.

And, uh, he said, Lieutenant, don't ever doubt my courage,

because I will be right by your side

saving life while you take life.

And I told him,

"You're not going to be by my

damn side if you don't carry a gun."

- All the rest of the medics were armed with side arms,

45-automatics, and I felt that he should do likewise.

So I went to my battalion commander, Colonel Gerald Cooney,

and I suggested that, in my opinion,

Doss should be transferred.

- I don't question Glover's sincerity either at that time.

I think he was very sincere in his feeling that the whole

company would be better off if Desmond wasn't with us.

- I wanted to stay with my men.

- Colonel Cooney said that he felt that he had no reason

for transferring him out of the company,

that it would have to come from someone else.

I wanted to go further with it and have him transferred and

he gave me the, the go-ahead to

contact regiment, which I did.

They said that they could not do it,

they did not have the power to do it,

and I proceeded to go to division,

and my understanding was that they went to General Randall,

who was assistant division commander

and he gave them the word that not

only was he going to stay in the army,

but he was going to stay with me.

- [Voiceover] October 19, 1943:

- [Voiceover] Colonel Hamilton sent

for me to talk to me, and he

tried to shame me into taking a gun.

He talked about Stonewall Jackson, and Lee, and a few other

great warriors, and told what great men they were, and they

were great Christian men.

He put it that I was letting

others do my fighting for my religious rights.

I told him there were other important jobs to be done other

than having to take life,

and I was willing to go to

the front lines to save life, but not to take life.

- [Voiceover] Colonel Hamilton's failure to convince

Desmond to bear arms only heightened the army's frustration,

and Desmond's officers grew openly

less tolerant of his behavior.

His refusal to carry a gun or work on Saturday,

was a regular source of irritation.

And finally they had had enough.

So they convened a meeting to

discharge Desmond on a Section 8, for mental instability.

- Desmond was called to answer a charge that he would be of

no physical military use to the

1st Battalion because he was a conscientious objector.

- Sergeant Howell from the aid station came to my tent.

"Doss, turn in your aid kits.

You are no longer in the medics."

Man, you could have knocked me

to the floor, I couldn't believe it.

- But Cooney was pressured into at least holding this

hearing, or meeting, whatever they would call it.

And Cooney explained to him what was going on,

that somebody had complained, people had complained, they

didn't want him, this and that, this and that.

- I told them, for them to check the company records.

He says, "Oh, we have no comeback on your work."

You're just too strict on your religion,

"we want to just give you the rest of your Sabbaths off."

- So why somebody did this, I don't know, unless they of a

mind to say, well, I don't want to be in a foxhole with a

guy who doesn't have a grenade or a gun or something.

Because he had done nothing, that would cause them to

initiate a charge of this type.

- I told him, "Sir, I cannot accept"

no Section 8 off my religion.

To me I feel I would be a very poor Christian to accept a

"Section 8 off my religion."

- You know, if somebody brought you up on something like

that, you'd be inclined, the ordinary guy,

I think, would be inclined to be nasty.

Who said that?

Why do they say that?

So he wasn't like that.

I remember Desmond, and that's what

struck me so much with him at that time.

He said that he would be as

good a soldier as you are, Colonel, he said.

"I'll be just as good as you."

And of course, history shows that

he was not only good, but better.

- [Voiceover] Finally, Colonel Cooney and his officers

decided that Washington would never approve a Section 8

discharge purely on religious grounds.

Desmond had prevailed for now.

In October of 1943, the 77th Division moved

to Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania.

It was here that this man Captain William T. Cunningham,

took the controversy with Desmond's

refusal to bear arms one step further.

Jack Glover, Jim Boylan, and

Ken Lafond remember the incident.

- Wake up alive in the morning and you made your day.

When I met Jim at the reunion in 90 in D.C.,

he told me that Cunningham died,

and we had a big drink over him.

- I was always wishing, I was always hoping to see him in

the reunion, was I going to give it to him after he

humiliated Doss right in front of me when we were waiting

for a pass at Indiantown Gap.

An order came down that week that everybody, everybody,

including clerks, truck drivers, cooks, and everybody had to

qualify with a rifle on the rifle range before they could

get a pass to go into town overnight.

So I went over that night to get my

pass the C.Q., they call it, Charge of Quarters.

And, uh, Captain Cunningham was the

one that had all the passes there.

Desmond Doss just happened to be in

front of me, right in front of me.

So he got up there to get his pass, Cunningham looks over.

"You, you didn't qualify with a rifle.

You can't get a pass to go in town."

He says, "Captain," he said,

"I don't have to touch a rifle."

He said, "It's in, on my record."

I do not touch any weapons whatsoever."

He said, "You mean to tell me, if you're in the house and a"

guy came in with a gun and your mother was sitting there, he

says, 'I'm going to shoot your mother, '

and you had a gun nearby, you could have got and killed him,

you mean to tell me you wouldn't

have grabbed that gun and killed him?

- I said, "I wouldn't have no gun."

"You wouldn't have a gun?

You mean you wouldn't use it?"

I said, "I wouldn't have a gun."

"You mean you wouldn't do nothin'?"

I said, "Now, that's a horse of a different color."

I didn't mean I wouldn't do anything.

Only thing about it, when I got through with him he'd

probably wish he was dead.

"But as far as killing anybody, I won't kill nobody."

- "What, well what do you mean?" he says.

And he went into a tantrum about that.

- Man, he was strictly business.

He had that carbine rifle, and he gave me a direct order.

"You take this gun, or you'll be court-martialed."

I didn't take it.

He grabbed it.

- Everybody was getting restless, you know, guys standing

on one leg and then the other, looking around, rolling their

eyes and everything else ya know.

- He says, "Doss, I don't want to"

have to court-martial you.

"I'm going to give you one more chance."

He held it up again, he dropped it, and I, I didn't grab it.

He grabbed it.

He says, "Doss, I am now court-martialing"

you for refusing a direct order."

- Another officer in our company happened to come in, and

he stood there for a second and he saw what was going on.

He said, "It's right there on his record, Cunningham."

He said, "It's right there in black and white."

He doesn't touch a rifle."

He said, "You don't have to, give him his pass!"

He said, "He don't have anything"

to do about touching a rifle."

"Well, I can't understand that," he said.

But he lost that argument.

- [Voiceover] But Cunningham was not finished with him yet.

He placed Doss on permanent K-P duty, scrubbing pots and

pans until his hands were raw pieces of meat,

and he would not give him any passes to visit his new wife.

But Doss's greatest disappointment

came when he got a letter from home.

- My brother that I hadn't

seen for a year or two was going

into the navy, and if I wanted

to see him I better come home.

- [Voiceover] Desmond was long overdue for a two-week

furlough, so he went to

Captain Cunningham to get his papers.

They were all signed and ready.

Cunningham was the only thing standing

between Desmond and home.

- He looked at me, he says,

"Doss, you haven't qualified with your weapon."

And he just tore that paper right in the half.

But there was nothing I could do.

- [Voiceover] With his furlough papers torn up, Desmond's

hopes of seeing his brother were gone.

Of all the hardships and disappointments

he had been through the last

two years, this was the toughest.

- That's why I called home.

I couldn't hardly talk into the

telephone, I was so shook up and crying.

- That poor man.

I couldn't have taken it.

I couldn't have taken it if they'd court-martialed me.

I'd have told him to go to hell right there.

I mean it.

- [Voiceover] Heartbroken, Desmond had

a hard time sleeping that night.

All he wanted to be was a combat medic.

But the next morning, to Desmond's surprise,

he found Statman waiting to welcome

him back into the medical corps.

Desmond's father had made one call

to the War Service Commission.

His regimental commander, Colonel Steven S. Hamilton,

was reminded of the presidential order

signed by President Roosevelt affirming

that conscientious objectors would not have to bear arms.

Not even an army officer had

the right to go contrary to this act of Congress.

- There weren't many, I don't think,

that would have understood that he just had enough

inculcation of his religion to say,

I'm not going to do this.

I don't know what it costs me,

but I'm not going to have a grenade or a pistol or a rifle,

even though, as was pointed out, other medics did.

- I knew if I ever once compromised,

I was going to be in trouble.

Because if you can compromise once,

you can compromise again.

- [Voiceover] The standoff with Captain Cunningham marked

the end of two years of

fighting with the U.S. Army.

Desmond's next battle would be with the Japanese army.

During the second week of March 1944,

the 77th, the Statue of

Liberty Division, headed west to ship out.

Desmond and Dorothy said their goodbyes.

- When the train pulled out, I waved goodbye to her,

and I tell you, it leaves you in a very low feeling knowing

you may have seen your wife for the last time.

I tell you, I could hardly keep from crying, both of us

trying not to cry, because we

wanted to be brave to encourage each other.

But the tears came nevertheless as the train pulled out.

- [Voiceover] On the train, Desmond was doing his usual K-P

duty when he realized that they were going to pass his own

backyard in Lynchburg, Virginia.

He knew his dad loved to watch the trains go by,

so he quickly scribbled a note.

- [Voiceover] Dear Mother and Dad, I think

we are coming by the

home so I will write you a few lines.

I'm holding up good so far, and the Lord answered our

prayers, for I know I could not stand it, giving up so much.

Dot and I left each other with a smile as we wanted to see

the smile last, and it didn't make it so hard on me.

The handkerchief that waved Dot

the last goodbye may wave to you the same.

I hope to tie it around this and wave it as I go by.

I'll need your prayers more than ever,

but don't worry about me as I will be okay.

- [Voiceover] Sure enough, Dad was watching

the train pass by.

Desmond quickly tied the note to a brick and tossed it for

all he was worth, yelling and waving

and hoping to get his father's attention.

But their eyes never met.

As they crossed the old train trestle,

Desmond watched his father disappear in the distance.

- I hit an all-time low.

I knew now that I had seen my loved ones for the last time,

and I just felt like I'd like to jump off the baggage car.

I had a feeling, it felt like I might never come back, so

why go, but I knew I had to get that stuff out of my mind.

So I got busy with K-P.

After that, well, things went

about as well as you could expect.

- [Voiceover] The island of Guam.

Desmond and the men

of the 77th Division get their first taste of war.

(war zone shooting)

- You dig that hole, you get in it, and you stay there.

You don't get out.

- A guy laying right beside of me,

a bullet came in right through his skull.

- If you had to go to the bathroom, you use your, use your

steel helmet and put it on the side of the hole 'til the

next mornin, and wash it out the best

you could, and put it back on again.

- Laying in your foxhole at night,

and listening to the artillery coming in.

All night long you hear the whistle, you know, and then the

mortars too dropped in on us.

- Your mind is, it's like a haze, because you're taking

orders, you don't know why you're taking them, you just do,

because that's your job, that's your duty.

- Them boys fired them machine guns and things 'til the

barrels was turnin red.

- And it was scary, really scary.

- At night, that's when Desmond

done a lot of his work was at night.

He'd go out, crawl around amongst our boys and see if they

wasn't dead, he's take care of em and drag em back.

- [Voiceover] He wasn't supposed to do that.

- He wasn't supposed to move at night.

He said, "Them guys that's wounded out there",

I got to go see about em.

"That's my job."

- One time there was a guy pinned down and he, he got to

the guy, they were shooting at him too.

But I saw him get in there, but I never

saw him comin out, you know.

- I don't know how he kept from getting shot by the enemy.

Cause someway he got, he'd creep around

on the ground and get by with it.

- The captain told him, he says, you know, there's a lot of

people, you might, your own men might shoot you, you know.

But he disregarded that, and he just went around, anybody

that needed help, he'd help 'em.

- [Voiceover] Desmond talks about one particular soldier he

would never forget.

- Blood had run down into the fellow's face and eyes.

He was laying there just groaning and calling for a medic.

I took water from my canteen, got some

bandages, and I washed his face.

And when that blood was washed from his eyes,

his eyes came open, and man, he just lit up.

He says "I thought I was blind."

And if I hadn't gotten anything more out the war than that

smile he gave me, I'd have been well repaid.

- [Voiceover] The next morning, arriving at the bivouac

area, Desmond discovered that

the friend he had just saved had died.

- So from then on, I took care of the men, but I didn't

want to know which one of my men I was taking care of,

because it was just too hard on me.

- [Voiceover] Stories began to circulate about Desmond's

willingness to help anyone who was wounded.

- They said that he had treated an enemy soldier while he

was out there looking for ours, you know,

creeping around out there.

I don't know how bad the man was hit,

but there was one found with a bandage on his arm, an

American bandage, so that's the reason I figured they was

right when they said he done it.

- [Voiceover] But as dedicated as he was to saving all

human life, Desmond and his fellow medics quickly learned

that they would get no special treatment from the enemy.

- Medics was supposed to wear a so-called brassard, a red

cross, on their arm, and one painted on their helmet.

Our men quickly got rid of those things, because it made

them an outstanding target.

I can remember sitting up on a ridge and watching these

medics trying to evacuate a wounded infantry person, and the

Japanese were after them, they were trying

to kill the litter bearers.

- They preferred to get us above anyone else.

They would let the infantry get by just to pick off the

medic, because if they killed the medics,

it broke down the morale of the men.

- [Voiceover] The Japanese army took their demoralizing

tactics to a level that the men never expected.

An old man from one of the villages told Desmond what the

Japanese had done to the Okinawan people to instill abject

fear of the Americans.

- They would call the village out, for all the women to

come, and then they would take the most beautiful woman and

raped them in front of everybody.

And said, "That's what the American dogs will do for you."

- [Voiceover] Motivated by fear, the villagers

learned how to kill.

- They had, they had a thing they called the Bonsai attack.

They wanted to kill us while

we were in our foxholes at night.

And they used these women

with sharpened bamboo poles to kill us.

And we were rolling the grenades down at the charging women,

and, we had to really kill them.

Babies, for God sake, women.

We did it.

I'm shakin.

- [Voiceover] The Japanese knew that breaking down the

morale of the Americans

would give them a tactical advantage.

Jack Glover told me about when three Japanese soldiers

approached, two on a bike and one running alongside.

They were waving a white flag.

- And they got about twenty yards or so away from us, and

the two on the bike jumped off and the one stopped,

and all of them had grenades in their

hands or nearby or in their pockets or whatever.

And they threw the grenades

at us and five of my men were wounded.

After that time my orders were, to my men, when you see a

white flag waved by a Japanese soldier,

he will be dead and there will never be another instance

where anyone with a white flag

gets that close to us enabling them to wound us.

- [Voiceover] Regardless of the Japanese brutality,

Desmond's desire to treat anyone in need never changed.

- This Japanese was wounded.

He needed medical help.

I was going to give, I was going to take care of him.

The fellows pulled a gun on me.

They used some strong language.

"Use any of that stuff on that blankety-blank, we'll kill

"you," and I knew they meant it.

So I knew better than to try to take care of any Japanese.

- [Voiceover] When it came to courage on the battlefield,

the men of the 77th Division developed

a hard-core reputation for never backing down.

Even the infamous Japanese radio broadcaster, Tokyo Rose,

called them the Butchers of Guam.

But there was one man who was the exception to the rule:

the man who had tried to force Desmond to carry a gun.

- This guy Cunningham, who turned around

and ran in the face of the enemy.

Turned around and ran!

And everybody watched him.

- We were fighting the Japs, and I looked around, and

Cunningham was running across the field, away from us,

hightailing it across the field.

And I actually drew a bead on him

and I was going to kill him.

- The truth of his behavior all the way through, on

maneuvers and every place else, showed up when he turned

around and ran in the face of the enemy.

But Doss didn't do that.

He didn't do that ever.

- Then several stories that came down as we gradually went

along, after combat after combat, action after action.

There was always some story in regard to Desmond T. Doss,

the medic, that, uh just absolutely refuses to allow

wounded soldiers to, to not be treated.

Refusing to withdraw under any circumstances.

- When we went into Guam, that's when they started

respecting him, because he'd get, he'd go right on in there

without no weapon, and any man that's willing to go in the

war without a weapon is, uh, he's

goin to have to have faith.

- Okinawa, the hellhole of the Pacific.

Okinawa to me was sleeping in rain, cold weather, with mud

up to here, mud in your ears and your nose and your mouth,

and your shoes, and other places.

- [Voiceover] With Guam and Layte behind them, Desmond and

his men would face their greatest

challenge as the 77th Division prepared to participate

in an invasion bigger than D-day.

They would be thrown head first into the bloodiest battle in

the Pacific theater, code-named Operation Iceberg.

- And we could, we could see the fleet out in the water,

all our ships, battleships and all, destroyers and flattops.

And we could see these kamikazes

coming right in on em and hittin em.

Boy, I'm telling you, that's a bad feeling.

- [Voiceover] Ordered to replace the decimated 96th

Division, the men of the 77th anxiously

anticipated getting ashore.

But no enemy waited to confront them.

Instead, they had to face their

own feelings of fear and foreboding.

- [Voiceover] April 28, 1945, Dear Dorothy,

it won't be long before I won't be

able to write you letters like this.

Not that I don't love you as much, but because I have to

keep my mind on my job so I can come back to you in good

health and do my work the best I know how with God's help.

- When I see these, uh, trucks coming out with the, uh,

dead people, dead American soldiers,

stacked on those trucks like cordwood.

Many trucks not just one or two, but all of these dead

comrades, friends, buddies, coming back

from where I'm going to?

I had many misgivings about this.

- We went up to pick up bodies

and stack them up alongside the road.

So we'd, we'd pick them up, and of course a lot of them were

bloated and missing parts.

And we had like one guy on one end of the litter and one guy

on the other, and the guy would drop

it because it was too heavy.

And the guy'd "Eh.. you stupid old so-and-so.. you know."

And it was, we were just oblivious

to the fact that these used to be people.

It was like stacking up cordwood.

We'd stack them up along the way,

and then put some more this way, as high as we could reach,

and so they could, uh, the trucks

could come by and they put them on a truck.

Take them back and I guess try to identify them.

They were, it was just like it was, I don't know,

they just weren't people.

- The mud was almost halfway up to our knees.

And I was carrying this litter.

I, I was carrying this litter.

I was in the front of it, and I noticed a guy in front of

me, he stepped in this mud puddle, and when he pulled, when

he pulled his foot out, I, I could see the coagulated blood

coming from his, coming from his

shoe into the water, you know?

And the water was all red, and I'm saying to myself, good

God, I, I don't believe this.

And so help me, it was about two hundred yards there that we

literally, literally, walked through blood.

It was that bad.

It was that bad.

I, I, uh, dream about that sometimes.

- [Voiceover] I had mixed emotions about taking Desmond and

his friends back to the escarpment.

I didn't want them to have to think about what it was like.

Yet, on the other hand, I hoped it would help them remember.

They had no trouble remembering.

- With my eyes open, I can visualize that escarpment and

every damn piece on it with all

the bad memories that I have about it.

- I want to go see it, anxious to see it.

I think maybe I can put a little more of it behind me.

- I couldn't sleep, I thought about it a little bit.

What will my reaction be?

- 4/28 to 5/9.

Can thank God that I am still alive.

On the 28th, went up to relieve the ninety-sixth division,

which had been unable to move for many days.

They were held up at a ridge about three hundred feet high.

It was called the escarpment.

- [Voiceover] The morale of Desmond's men would be tested

to the core as they faced this imposing monolith.

- The Maeda Escarpment uh ran almost across the island, the

southern part of the island.

It was a, a plateau that was.. uh.. fortified by.. uh

reinforced pill boxes, caves,

steel and concrete reinforced emplacements.

- They had a view of the entire island from that point.

It was a, a sheer wall of about,

at least three hundred and fifty feet.

They could not get past that.

There was nothing that could get past that

because it was so well defended.

It was not hit and advance, hit and advance.

It was a stagnant war.

It was a kill-or-be-killed

type of war, on the spot, right there.

You didn't make much of an advance.

- The Japanese had been there for many years,

and they had cut holes all in there.

- And this is where they had their, their headquarters

like, where they had their food, their ammunition, their

weapons and, uh, medications, stuff like that.

- They were down in there,

and they could get out of the way when we dropped our

grenades in there, and shoot in there

and one thing and another.

They could get out of the way and sit down

and just wait for us to leave.

- One time we had some Japs cornered in a cave, and we had

an interpreter with us who told

them to come out with their hands up, you know.

- And he hit it with this flamethrower.

And right inside, shot it right inside the cave.

And then we saw people coming out of the cave on fire with

that, with that, and there were women!

Not only the Jap soldiers, the women that were with them.

They were on fire, running out of the cave, rolling on the

ground, suffering, screaming, howling.

Well, what the hell could you do really you know?

That was pitiful.

- I don't like it.

I... I may joke about it, but I very seriously,

I don't like being here.

I don't like it being brought to my memory,

bringing it back to me.

Uh, I'd rather I hadn't come, but as I said

before, I felt I had to.

- Ah, it's so peaceful and quiet here.

You can't imagine.

You just can't imagine, the difference.

Just about this time of night, every night it started.

Cause they'd let us occupy the top of the ridge most of the

day, and just about at sundown,

that's when they'd drive us off.

(children's laughter)

- [Voiceover] Standing here, it is impossible for me to

imagine the carnage, the killing field

that existed on this plateau.

Directly under this very spot,

four hundred Japanese soldiers lie entombed in their cave

blown shut by Jack Glover and his men... just one of many.

Nine times in seven days

the men were driven off the escarpment.

The machine-gun fire was so thick at times

that men would be cut in half.

Every night there wasn't one inch of this parcel of rock

that hadn't been bombed, mortared or shelled.

Eight company commanders were lost

in less than thirty-six hours.

Platoons with thirty men would

come back with only five or six.

The whole invasion became focused on the 77th's vicious

fight to take Hacksaw Ridge and hold it.

- We were sent up in groups of one, of two, of a squad, and

we were thrown off.

And the next group came up, and they were thrown up.

And finally we worked our way around from the east side,

and we came across this little depression right here.

We had stones built up that we picked up, and we built a

rock to keep the machine guns from cross-firing,

because they had a cross-fire across the top of this thing.

Anybody popped his head up he was dead.

- This is a Japanese position.

And from here... they had a clear

shot of all the American movement.

- Not being able to get to the top,

we called for cargo nets.

- The captain had called back to the colonel, and he said,

"What you want, Frank?"

And he says, "I want a cargo net."

- The same cargo nets that we climbed down from the army

personnel carriers into the landing craft as we went ashore.

- "Now, Frank, what in the hell

do you want with a cargo net?"

He said, "I'm getting, I'm going to go over that ridge."

- [Voiceover] Someone had to go up and hang the cargo nets.

Three men from B Company volunteered.

Medic Desmond Doss was one of them.

- We got some of these two-by-fours,

spliced them together... made a long ladder.

And the sergeant and I climbed up and tied some cargo nets.

- I saw him up on this escarpment, he and this other man,

and they stood straight up on the escarpment

and they silhouetted themselves up there,

as you're not supposed to do.

And at that time the Japanese had been

firing at us with artillery and so on and so forth.

But while he was up there, there was

no Japanese fire that I saw or heard.

- [Voiceover] That's kind of odd.

- Yeah, it is.

- [Voiceover] This film shows the first rifleman climbing

the wall of the escarpment.

Desmond stands on top, having just secured the cargo nets.

This was the last photo taken at the escarpment.

The photographers refused to go any farther.

The fighting was too intense.

- Captain Vernon told some guy, one of the infantrymen, to

go up on the-and see what's going on up on top.

Well, he climbed up the ladder, and as soon as he got up the

top, and got over the top, you'd hear machine gun fire and

then it was quiet.

Didn't hear a thing.

So then he sent another guy up,

and he went up, same thing happened.

- [Voiceover] A third man was sent to the top,

and the results were the same.

Then Lee Willoughby and Desmond Doss,

were approached by Full Bird Colonel.

- When he came up past that platoon command post, I was

reading my Bible, and he asked me,

"How's things on top?"

I says, "I don't know, the company"

command post is sitting just below.

"You ought to check before you go up."

But he came on up anyway.

- It wasn't a matter of a few minutes and, uh, you could

hear machine gun fire, or rifle fire, I can't remember.

You'd hear fire.

And Desmond took a look over the top,

and there he was lying prone.

And Desmond went running up, and he told me to come up.

And we got up next to him, and he had

blood on his, on the front of him.

You know, I don't know the extent of his wounds to this day.

But he had blood on him, and Desmond said,

"I don't have any plasma.

Go down and get some plasma."

So I had to go down... that whole slope, down to where the aid

station was, was probably a couple hundred yards.

And, uh, there's mortar shells coming down all the time.

And all these guys are all dug in.

And I'm running down there to get this blood.

I wasn't too happy about it.

And when I got down there I wished I could have stayed.

But I got the plasma and ran back up again and gave it to

Desmond, and he administered the plasma.

- [Voiceover] Because of their great numbers,

defensive tactics, and unfailing spirits,

the Japanese seemed invincible.

- We'd call for the artillery fire to bomb them a while,

shoot them, and they would, and then

we'd go back and try it again.

And we, most every day we'd maybe get to the top of it, but

wouldn't stay long.

We'd come back.

That happened several days in a row.

- [Voiceover] Do you recognize

these rocks in this area here?

- No trees, just rock ground, like this.

- [Voiceover] Desmond told me how the Japanese would

purposely let the Americans

take this segment on top of the escarpment.

Then when there was a high concentration of U.S. soldiers,

the Japanese opened fire with everything

they had, killing and wounding dozens

of Gis and driving the best

back over the ridge, leaving behind the carnage.

On April 30, 1945, Companies A and B were ordered to mount

an assault on the escarpment.

Preparing to go up with B Company,

Desmond asked permission to pray for his men.

Lieutenant Gornto granted his request.

The attack was launched, and A Company was decimated.

B Company, the company Desmond prayed for, knocked out a

large pillbox and returned without a scratch.

- Headquarters said that they, they sent a note down, you

sure you got the right ridge?

Cause it was, like they say, it was like a miracle.

Nobody got wounded or anything... killed or wounded.

- [Voiceover] But on May 2, 1945, Desmond's request for

prayer could not be granted.

The assault was already in progress.

The Japanese waited until B Company reached the top,

and then started a brutal barrage

of artillery, mortar, grenade and rifle fire.

- Dat-dat-dat-dat, boom, boom, it just,

the air was full of flak and grenade fragments and bullets.

- When you hear this just, phhhht, phhhht, like that, go by

your head, you know that, uh,

that a bullet come pretty close to your head.

We used to make jokes about it,

don't worry, don't worry about it,

as long as you can still hear them go by your head

you don't have to worry about it.

- [Voiceover] Atop the escarpment,

cries for a medic were heard.

Ralph Baker found an unconscious

soldier with head and chest wounds and both legs blown off.

- But how much time would it take

to treat a guy with both legs blown off?

After you maybe put a tourniquet on his legs.

And uh then if his legs were blown off,

it was bleeding you know, terribly.

- [Voiceover] So Baker was faced

with the difficult decision:

try to save a man who would probably die anyway,

or move on to help someone else.

- The guy was dying and I just left him,

walked off and left him.

And, that's not callousness or nothing like that.

There's one principle you almost use, is,

treat the least seriously wounded first.

- [Voiceover] But Desmond Doss was guided

by a different principle.

- I had taken care of men that was left for dead because

they were unconscious, and so that's why I wanted to give

this man the benefit of the doubt.

My goal, as long as there is life, there's always hope.

- [Voiceover] Desmond treated the wounded soldier and

dragged him back to safety.

The man survived and lived to be seventy-two.

That night, Desmond and a buddy were trying to get some

sleep near the bottom of the escarpment,

when he heard Japanese voices coming

from a hole just a few feet below him.

Desmond grew concerned that they would be discovered.

- Between me and my buddy was these hand grenades.

All I had to do was just pull the pin

and I knew I had some Japanese.

- [Voiceover] This is a photo of the actual hole where the

Japanese were setting up a machine gun.

Just above, Desmond was facing the very crisis that his

commanding officers had warned him about.

When forced to choose between protecting

his men or standing by his convictions, what would he do?

- And I thought of what I'd heard before.

Thou shalt not kill.

God gave life, and I didn't want to take life.

- [Voiceover] Desmond told me that this was the greatest

temptation of his life.

In the end, he decided that he could not kill,

even at the risk of death to himself and his men.

Meanwhile, nearby in another cave, Carl Bentley and his

buddy, Charlie Eggett, faced their own moral dilemma.

- And we could see the Japanese feet going back and forth,

just ten feet, twenty feet from us.

And we were being real quiet.

And there was one guy in there that was already wounded.

And he was beggin us to take his boots off.

He said, "My feet hurt, please take my boots off."

And, uh, one, one foot didn't, he didn't have a foot.

It was gone.

It had blown off.

The other foot was hanging by a tendon.

And, uh, we said, okay, we'll take your boots off,

just be quiet, quit moaning, because

the Japanese will hear you.

I haven't told this a lot of places.

I don't know whether to tell it now or not.

But we, uh, we knew this guy couldn't make it.

He was so wounded up, shot up, just all through riddled his

body, leaking out

everywhere, blood leaking out.

And we thought about going ahead

and putting him out of his misery,

and putting us out of danger,

by killing him, uh bayonetting him.

And Charlie said, "You do it, I can't."

I said, "No, I can't, Charlie, you'll have to do it."

He says, "I can't either."

But it actually entered our minds,

and shouldn't we go ahead and put an end to his life

and put an end to his moaning and groaning

and putting us in danger.

We thought about it but we couldn't do it.

I'm ashamed that we thought about it.

- No, this ain't war, this is hell.

- Rifles broke right in two,

canteens torn right in two, and everything.

That's how bad it was.

- Mortars coming down like grapes.

I mean, clusters.

- People started shooting at each other.

We were shooting our own men.

- And the Japanese came in on us, and they just came in in

such hordes, and such, so many of them,

all so suddenly, that, uh, they just knocked our boys down

and out, and, uh, killing them

right and left, and they just swarmed over us.

- Our guys were getting shot left and right, they were

getting wounded, shrapnel, gunfire, grenades, mortars.

- An American guy up on the ridge, he got bayonetted by a

Jap, his stomach fell out.

He was holding it, and he, you know, he was so scared he

started backing up and he went right over the cliff.

And it, when he was yelling going down,

oh... never forgot that.

- [Voiceover] The routed Americans

were called to a hasty retreat.

Some were shot or bayonetted

as they tried to climb back down the cargo nets.

- For the third time, we once again,

we were kicked off of that escarpment.

And, uh, and we left, uh, many men up on top,

injured men, wounded men, up on top of the escarpment.

- [Voiceover] One of the wounded was Private John Centola.

- The first time I got wounded, you know, you don't know

what it's all about until you get whacked.

Desmond Doss, you know, he was working on me, and he says,

"Take it easy, you'll be all right."

He says, and I couldn't believe how calm he was.

And, uh, while he was working me,

I asked him, I says, "You don't have any weapons."

I says, "I'll give you a forty-five."

He says, "No," he says, "I can't kill anybody,"

you know, he says, "That's my religion."

And I says to myself, here's a warrior, you know?

- [Voiceover] Centola watched as

Desmond disappeared into the mayhem.

Out of 155 of Company B,

55 retreated under their own power.

The rest remained on top.

- The next thing I knew, to my recollection,

was that there was a man up on top,

aiding injured men and bringing them back to the ledge.

- And they says, "Yeah, there's some,"

some nut up there that's getting his butt

"shot off, saving the infantrymen."

- [Voiceover] That nut was about

to become their most loved medic.

What Private Desmond T. Doss did over the next

twelve hours was nothing short of a miracle.

- Every time I'd look, he was there.

He was letting these wounded down to the other people down

below, the medics and one thing and another,

and taking them on down, back below,

where they could be taken away.

- He kept on dragging people back to the ledge and, uh,

getting those people to the ledge so that he could,

uh... lower those people to the bottom

where they could be treated properly.

- And he was covered from head to

foot in blood, and he was just a mess.

- I happened to be in a position there where Doss was near

me, and someone told Doss that there was a man out there

that was wounded and needed help,

and he went out there and got him period!

And the mortar fire and the rifle fire was just heavy.

Real heavy.

And, uh, I looked out of my foxhole

and shooting and peeking over the edge and everything,

and Doss walked out there and got him and brought him back.

- The bullets were flying and shells going off.

You have to make yourself as small a target as possible.

And so in order to get the men over here, I just caught them

by the collar of the neck and I got down close to the ground

and dragged for all I was worth.

- Then I felt like the Lord impressed on my mind, that

bowline knot you tied in West Virginia.

Hey, that double loop!

You know, I took that rope and I had a double loop.

Then I put the leg through each loop.

- [Voiceover] Using that double-loop bowline knot he

discovered back in training, Desmond quickly secured each

man and lowered him over the seventy-foot cliff.

- They was hollering at him.

"Hey, Doss, get down from there.

You can't stay up there. Get down."

And he just, like he didn't hear them.

Like they weren't there.

One time he had one man on each arm.

They were partially equipped where they could partially help

themselves, and he was leading them, one man under each arm,

holding with each arm, and bringing them

over there to let them down.

I thought, this is amazing, how can this guy do this?

- He doesn't weigh over a hundred

and fifty pounds, I don't think, you know.

Maybe a little more when he was in the service.

But, not a very big man.

So it was just amazing.

- [Voiceover] The wounded men lay scattered across the

rocky plateau, some as far away as a hundred and twenty-five

yards from the cargo net.

Desmond dragged or carried each man back to the edge of the

escarpment by himself.

- Time after time I saw Doss go back into, into the enemy,

into the Japanese, and pick up wounded, our wounded, and

bring them there and let them down on these ropes and one

thing and another, off the escarpment.

And the bullets were flying like bees or something.

It's just, it was miraculous.

I couldn't understand how he could do this.

- I was praying the whole time.

I just kept praying, "Lord, please help me get one more."

When I got that, I said, "Lord",

please help me get one more."

- It's as if God had his hand on his shoulder, is the only

thing, the only explanation I can give.

- [Voiceover] Desmond worked alone as the battle raged on

around him, ignoring the constant danger.

Knowing that the Japanese would torture a wounded soldier at

night, Desmond refused to leave a single man on top.

- They, they were coming down every so often, and some of

them were dead and some of them were wounded.

You know, and sometimes you didn't know which is which,

and some were crying, and... but we tried to reassure them.

We'd say, "Hey, you're okay."

You know, "you'll be okay."

Maybe they weren't, but, uh, at least give them a little

assurance that they were, uh, they had a chance.

- [Voiceover] From this vantage point, the Japanese had a

clear shot of Desmond as he lowered the men to safety.

One Japanese soldier reported that he had had Desmond in his

sites, but his gun jammed every time he pulled the trigger.

In spite of all their attempts to kill him,

Desmond was never hit.

During this chaotic twelve-hour period,

Desmond let down seventy-five men,

averaging one man every ten minutes.

- Some of them were even still

in the litter while he was lowering them down.

They were tied onto the litter,

and he lowered the-he did it himself.

I mean, he could have been pulled over so easily himself,

and if he got pulled down, he would have been killed.

- I was fighting for freedom by trying to save life instead

of taking life, because I couldn't picture Christ out there

with a gun, killing people.

I'd like to think of him out there with an aid kit like me.

- He was an exceptional man.

To have the, to have the guts, as we call it, to just go

back up there all the time and go out and bring those guys

in when they were hit.

- Somebody can tell you something, you know, but when you

actually see what this guy did under combat conditions you

know this guy, he's all right.

That's the only way you can look at it.

Just see what he did.

- [Voiceover] After another four days of savage fighting,

the escarpment was still in the hands of the Japanese.

Operation Iceberg had been held up long enough, and the

other divisions needed to continue their assault.

So invasion headquarters passed down an order that Hacksaw

Ridge must be taken, no matter what the cost.

Colonel Hamilton's battle-worn 307th regiment would make

one final all-out attack the next morning, May 5th, 1945.

By now, the weary men of B Company

had come to explicitly trust Desmond.

He was their security blanket, and they felt safe knowing

that Desmond would take care of them no matter what.

But May 5 fell on a Saturday, Desmond's day of rest.

- So Captain Vernon asked me about going.

"Doss, you're now the only medic we have left.

Would you mind?"

I told him, "Well, I'd like to finish"

my private devotion first."

- Captain Vernon had his orders but headquarters,

but he said, "Yeah, I'll do it."

- [Voiceover] Hidden in a niche on top of the escarpment,

waiting to attack, Jack Glover wondered

why there was a delay.

- And I heard from Captain Vernon,

the captain of B Company, that uh he had to delay it for

some time because Doss wanted time to read his Bible.

And he wanted that time granted.

- [Voiceover] Captain Vernon knew that his request to delay

the assault would affect the entire division.

But he sent it up the chain of command anyway.

- The time actually was granted by Colonel Hamilton,

the commander of the regiment.

- [Voiceover] The same Colonel Hamilton who tried to shame

Desmond into carrying a gun back at Camp Hyder now put the

entire division on hold while Desmond read his Bible.

- Des went off to the side to

prayer, and he said, "Okay, I can go now."

It more or less said,

"I've got permission from God, I can go with you!"

- [Voiceover] As the only medic working with B Company,

Desmond had his hands full again.

In the midst of the fierce fighting, he not only took care

of his soldiers, he also treated

many of the men in Company A.

That day, the 307th regiment held the escarpment, A-K-A

Hacksaw Ridge, for good.

The sun went down, and Desmond's Sabbath ended.

- Being in the medical corp it was a type of work I could

do seven days a week, and so it didn't make any difference

if it was Sabbath or not.

It was doing good.

- If he had been without the belief and without the

religious commitment, I think he would have been much less

of a person doing his duty as he did it with his commitment.

- He'd be like the rest of us.

- [Voiceover] Now that the escarpment

had been secured, the invasion could advance.

The number of dead and wounded

continued to swell on both sides.

Near the base of the escarpment,

a Japanese artillery shell nearly killed Jack Glover.

Coming to his aid was the man that he had tried

so hard to kick out of the army.

- Right down there in some spot on that parking lot, I was

wounded when the shell hit.

And that's when you came over and treated my wounds.

My thought changed about how wrong I was to say, for trying

have him kicked out, because here he was doing a service,

and my mindset was in regard to physically fighting a war,

and his mindset was in treating wounded

and having nothing to do with the war see.

- [Voiceover] On a moonless night, May 21st, 1945,

Company B was on a covert mission just a half-mile past the

escarpment, when Desmond himself came close to being killed.

They inadvertently had walked

into a company of Japanese soldiers.

It was hand-to-hand combat, and in the chaos Desmond crawled

from soldier to soldier, treating the wounded.

- And they began to throw these hand grenades.

I saw it comin.

There was three other men in the hole with me.

They were on the lower side, but I was on the upper side

looking when they threw the thing.

I knew there was no way I could get out, so I just quickly

took my left foot and throwed it back,

to where I thought the grenade might be and throwed my head

and helmet to the ground.

And more than it happened it blowed up.

I felt like I was sailing through the air.

I was seeing stars I wasn't supposed to be seein.

And I knew my legs and buttocks were blown up.

- [Voiceover] Desmond waited five

long hours before Ralph Baker reached him.

As Baker and the other litter bearers carried Desmond

through an intense machine gun battle,

Desmond saw a soldier lying unconscious,

a bullet wound to his head.

- You know, Terry, Desmond was wounded, and while he was

laying in his litter wounded, some guy got hit, and he

rolled off his litter to go over and patch the guy up.

Now, who the hell would do something like that?

- [Voiceover] After giving up his litter, Desmond was hit

again, this time by a sniper's bullet, shattering his arm.

Using what little strength he had left, Desmond made a

splint out of a rifle stock and crawled

the remaining three hundred yards under fire until

he reached the safety of the aid station.

Eventually, Desmond was taken to the hospital ship Mercy.

It was here that he realized something had been left behind.

- [Voiceover] May 31st, 1945. Baby, did I tell you of my

misfortune of losing my little Bible when I was hit?

I sure hate that.

But I'm in hopes that someone

has found it and is holding it for me.

I'm planning on writing Company B and see if anyone has it.

I sure hope so.

- That was my main source of

strength all during the war and in the service.

And then when I lost it, I was lost.

- [Voiceover] When the men of Company B found out that

Desmond's Bible lay somewhere on the battlefield,

they acted without hesitation.

Retracing Desmond's steps back into the combat zone, they

searched the rough terrain for Desmond's Bible,

and kept searching until they found it.

- It really gives you a mixed feeling, to where you feel

like crying, you can't keep from crying, you feel so happy

to think they would even risk their

life under those conditions.

I didn't know just how bad the situation was at the time.

It wasn't until later I found out

what they went through to find it for me.

- [Voiceover] The war in Okinawa claimed the lives of

115,000 Japanese soldiers.

It killed one-third of the Okinawan population,

over 100,000 people.

And 15,000 American soldiers gave their lives

on this piece of coral rock.

But on May 23rd, 1945, with a fractured arm and seventeen

pieces of shrapnel embedded in his body,

Desmond Doss headed home.

- There's not too many people that would put

their life on the line like he did.

A lot of those fellows that

he saved were ones that rebuked him during training.

Then he turns around and saves their life.

Uh, it takes quite a man to do that.

- They called him a nut.

What a beautiful nut, uh, oh Geez.

You know, what Desmond did, you can't, I could talk to you

for a year and a half.

You'll never believe what he did.

- I wouldn't take back the time

that I had known him for nothin'.

- Boy, he deserves more than

a bronze star or a silver star.

Let's put him in for the Medal of Honor.

- [Voiceover] Fifteen heroes decorated by

President Truman with a Congressional Medal of Honor.

Then the conscientious objector hero,

Corporal Desmond Doss refused to fight, refused to kill.

A medical corpsman, he displayed

self-sacrificing valor in the care of the wounded.

Now he receives the nation's highest military decoration,

and explains his view as a conscientious objector.

- I thank God for letting me do my part in this war, and

saving the lives of my fellow men.

The reason why I do not bear arms...

He came up, I saluted him, he reached up and caught me by

my hand, and began shaking it like an old-time friend.

I thought I was going to be nervous.

He didn't even give me a chance to get nervous!

And then he was tellin me, "You really deserve this."

He said, "I consider this a greater honor than being the"

President of the United States."

- [Voiceover] Desmond, how do you feel

about receiving the Medal of Honor?

- I feel very highly honored, because I'd like to feel like

I am wearing it in honor of all the men who paid the supreme

price for their country.

And I thank God he abled me to do what I did to save life.

- [Voiceover] Desmond's life has been

far from easy since the war.

His wounds left him a hundred percent disabled,

including losing one lung due to

tuberculosis contracted in Okinawa.

The army's efforts to treat his TB ended

when they gave him an overdose of antibiotics

that left him totally deaf.

- The equipment's like myself, old and worn out.

Seems it's tryin to break down faster than I can fix it.

- [Voiceover] In November of 1991, Desmond's wife, Dorothy,

died from brain cancer.

He later married Frances, who has been

by his side for over a decade.

Together, they've created a home that for me was like going

to Grandpa and Grandma's house,

a place that you want to get there fast and leave slow.

The accolades bestowed on Desmond

from the war have not changed him.

Today he is still that same little boy who walked six miles

to give blood to a complete stranger,

and then turned around and did it again a few days later.

He is a man at peace with his life,

with his faith, and with his memories.

But what became clear to me was that his whole being was so

profound that it changed the world around him.

I know, because Desmond changed me.

- Even though I said those things to him in regard to

carrying a rifle, and he would never be by my damn side at

all unless he had a rifle, I think, well, I was immature in

what I was saying, because I wasn't uh, I didn't know him as

the man, I knew him only as a skinny little kid in front of

me that I felt couldn't carry the load.

But then in the long run, finding out that not only was he a

skinny little kid, but not only was he that, but he was one

of the bravest persons alive.

And then to have him end up saving my life

was the irony of the whole thing.

From the beginning of his first combat mission until the

last one, he absolutely was fearless in regard to what was

going to happen to him.

You can go back over Medal of Honor winners,

and it's because of one absolute instant of decision.

And Doss' was a constant doing of something that was so

outstanding, not only once, but time and time and time and

time, and every time again.

- He did the right thing about,

in carrying out his obligations.

Not only his obligations to God,

but his obligations to his fellow human beings,

and particularly to his fellow Americans.

- There is a mystique about him because he's a kind of a

loner, he's here and he's all by himself at different times,

but that is Desmond.

It's enhanced by his deep faith

and his care for his fellow man.

Courage and bravery and humility, he's got it.

You could run through the alphabet with descriptive

adjectives and go from A to Z or from alpha through omega in

the Greek, and you'd find some word that vividly describes

the basic Desmond Doss.

I'm proud to have known him.

(battle march music)