thedrifter
04-05-07, 02:23 PM
Smith’s sacrifice remembered by comrades
By Gina Cavallaro - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Apr 5, 2007 13:44:24 EDT
Medal of Honor recipient Sgt. 1st Class Paul R. Smith was honored Wednesday by the soldiers who first went into combat with him.
The remembrance ceremony by soldiers with 3rd Infantry Division took place four years to the day in the same location where Smith was killed in action while fighting off an attack by insurgents, according to an Army press release.
On April 4, 2003, near Baghdad International Airport, Smith braved enemy fire to man a .50-caliber machine gun mounted on a damaged armored personnel carrier, allowing several soldiers who had been wounded in the fierce firefight to withdraw.
Smith, who was with 11th Engineer Battalion out of Fort Stewart, Ga., is credited with killing as many as 50 enemy fighters before he was killed.
His family accepted the Medal of Honor on his behalf in a White House ceremony two years later.
Division commanding general Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch described Smith as an outstanding combat engineer, noncommissioned officer and family man.
“We stand here on hallowed ground,” Lynch said in the release. “He did his duty. He reached down in his soul and he did the right thing. He did what he was supposed to do.”
Ellie
By Gina Cavallaro - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Apr 5, 2007 13:44:24 EDT
Medal of Honor recipient Sgt. 1st Class Paul R. Smith was honored Wednesday by the soldiers who first went into combat with him.
The remembrance ceremony by soldiers with 3rd Infantry Division took place four years to the day in the same location where Smith was killed in action while fighting off an attack by insurgents, according to an Army press release.
On April 4, 2003, near Baghdad International Airport, Smith braved enemy fire to man a .50-caliber machine gun mounted on a damaged armored personnel carrier, allowing several soldiers who had been wounded in the fierce firefight to withdraw.
Smith, who was with 11th Engineer Battalion out of Fort Stewart, Ga., is credited with killing as many as 50 enemy fighters before he was killed.
His family accepted the Medal of Honor on his behalf in a White House ceremony two years later.
Division commanding general Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch described Smith as an outstanding combat engineer, noncommissioned officer and family man.
“We stand here on hallowed ground,” Lynch said in the release. “He did his duty. He reached down in his soul and he did the right thing. He did what he was supposed to do.”
Ellie