On this day, 81 years ago, January 26, 1945, 19-year-old Second Lieutenant Audie L. Murphy of the United States Army was in command of Company B, 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division, holding a thin defensive line near Holtzwihr in the Colmar Pocket of eastern France. His understrength company had been ordered to hold a line at the edge of the Bois de Riedwihr, covering open, snow-covered fields against a German force that had already mauled the regiment and was expected to counterattack with tanks and infantry at first light. On the morning of January 26 a German force of about six tanks and some 200 to 250 infantrymen moved out from Holtzwihr and advanced toward Company B’s exposed position, covering their attack with heavy artillery, mortar, and small-arms fire that pounded the American line. Murphy saw that his right flank was wide open and that his small company could not stand against the combined tank and infantry assault in the open, so he ordered all of his men except a small group of artillery observers to withdraw into the woods to more defensible ground. He stayed forward alone at the original line with a field telephone and his carbine, directing artillery fire onto the German tanks and infantry as they closed the distance across the fields. When the German armor knocked out an American M10 tank destroyer on the road and set it on fire, the vehicle’s .50 caliber machine gun remained intact on the burning hull, still loaded and pointed toward the advancing enemy. Murphy moved to the disabled tank destroyer under artillery and machine gun fire, climbed onto the burning vehicle, and manned the exposed .50 caliber machine gun. From that precarious perch, with flames licking around the tank destroyer and the possibility of an internal ammunition explosion, he opened fire on the advancing German infantry, cutting down attackers as they tried to move up alongside and between the tanks. Enemy troops closed to within about 10 yards of his position, firing at him from three sides, but Murphy stayed on the gun, delivering accurate bursts that broke up assault groups and forced the German infantry to hit the ground or fall back. At the same time he continued to call in and adjust artillery fire on the German armor and troop concentrations by phone, bringing shells in so close to his own position that fragments burst around the burning M10 while he remained on top of it. During this firefight he was wounded in the leg by enemy fire, but he kept firing the machine gun for about an hour, raking the fields and road with heavy fire and killing or wounding large numbers of German infantry who tried repeatedly to press the attack. His fire, combined with the artillery he was directing, finally forced the German tanks and surviving infantry to break off the assault and withdraw toward Holtzwihr, leaving the ground in front of his position littered with dead and disabled. Only after the German attack had been stopped and the enemy had started to pull back did Murphy climb down from the burned-out tank destroyer, despite his leg wound and exhaustion. He then refused evacuation, moved back to the woods, and organized his returning company in a counterattack, leading his men forward to reoccupy the original position and drive the remaining German forces from the area. For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty near Holtzwihr, France, on January 26, 1945, Second Lieutenant Audie Leon Murphy, Company B, 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division, was awarded the Medal of Honor. Audie Leon Murphy survived World War II, remained on active duty until 1945, and went on to a postwar career as an actor and public figure; on May 28, 1971, at age 45, he was killed when a private plane in which he was a passenger crashed into Brush Mountain near Catawba, Virginia, and he was later buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.
