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Posted on Nov 18, 2009 in War College

Requiem for Lewis L. Millett, Medal of Honor Recipient

Gerald D. Swick

Retired U.S. Army colonel Lewis L. Millett passed away at a veterans hospital in Loma Linda, California, on November 14. A veteran of both the U.S. and Canadian armies in World War II, he was awarded the Medal of Honor for personally leading a bayonet charge up Hill 180 near Soam-Ni during the Korean War.

An intelligence officer with the 101st Airborne at the time of the Vietnam War, he was sent to Southeast Asia as a military advisor to the controversial Phoenix program that reportedly killed thousands of suspected Viet Cong and their supporters.

He once said, "I must be the only Regular Army colonel who has ever been court-martialed and convicted of desertion!" in reference to official actions taken against him because he had left a U.S. Army Air Corps gunnery school in order to join the Canadian Army and fight fascism, after President Franklin D. Roosevelt said in 1941 that the United States was not going to war against Nazi Germany.

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An interview Military History magazine conducted with Col. Lewis Millett and another interview from Vietnam magazine are available on our partner site HistoryNet.

 

2 Comments

  1. Colonel Lewis Millett is perhaps one of the last practitioners of the art of the bayonet assault. During the Korean War, he led his Wolfhounds on a truly epic feat of arms. Certa Bonum Certamen!
    Requiescat in Pace!

    Frank Weiss

  2. I served with “The Wolfhounds” in Korea in 1952 to 1953 & Lewis Millet was a legend along with Dusty Desidro & Benito Martinez.This was one of the best RCT’S in Korea & i am very proud to have served in it.