Violent But True Bed Time Stories: Episode 19

Our story this week truly is one of a kind. Coast Guard Signalman First Class Douglas Munro is the only Coast Guardsman to ever receive the Medal of Honor. It all takes place on the island of Guadalcanal.

Guadalcanal was a bloodbath. The Marines and the Japanese were trading fire on an almost constant basis. One such day, Marines had landed on what appeared to be an empty beach. The Higgins boats that had brought them offloaded the last of the Marines and headed back to their ships. Soon after the Higgins boats left, the Japanese opened fire on the exposed Marines. Normally this would be great news for the Marines as they love a target rich environment. Today though, they needed to regroup and attack from a different angle. They needed to get off that beach.

Douglas Munro saw the action taking place on the beach and knew he needed to do something. He organized all of the landing craft and set back towards the beach to help the Marines out. When he got to the beach and the Marines started loading the landing craft, Douglas noticed they were doing so under great enemy fire. Douglas Munro rammed his landing craft on shore between the enemy and the Marines boarding their landing craft. He then lept to his 50 caliber machine gun and started to annihilate everything he could with the beloved "Ma Deuce". The Japanese were understandably pissed off and so they shot him multiple times, but that didn't stop him. Once all of the Marines were loaded up and the boats pulled away from shore, Munro asked if all of the Marines had made it off the beach.

Once it had been confirmed that all of the Marines were on the boats, Douglas Munro closed his eyes and died right there.