Medal of Honor Monday: Benjamin Salomon

The only dentist to receive the Medal of Honor.

On this day in 1944, a U.S. Army Dental Corps officer bravely defends his field hospital. Captain Benjamin “Ben” Salomon remains the only dentist to receive the Medal of Honor.

Maybe he would have been as surprised as anyone? He’d left dentistry behind when he first joined the Army. Instead, the young Jewish American initially served in the infantry. He was an expert shot, and he earned the respect of his fellow soldiers.

“Ben Salomon was the best instructor in infantry tactics we ever had,” his commanding officer reportedly said. “He gave everybody who ever met him a real lift. He had a way of inspiring people to do things that they might not have done otherwise.”

Salomon wanted to stay in the infantry, but the Army had other ideas. By June 1944, he was a Captain in the Dental Corps, and he’d been deployed to Saipan where an intense battle was being waged.

There wasn’t much need for a dentist in an active combat zone, of course, so Salomon soon took over for a wounded surgeon instead.

Trouble came late on July 6: Intelligence suggested that a massive Japanese attack was coming. A perimeter of foxholes was established, and Salomon established his field hospital about 50 yards behind them.

The anticipated attack came at 5:00 a.m. That Japanese charge would prove to be one of the largest banzai attacks of World War II.

Salomon was treating dozens of wounded when an enemy fighter suddenly entered the tent, bayoneting an injured American lying on a nearby stretcher. Salomon reflexively shot that enemy, but two more took his place—and four more crawled under the tent walls!

“Rushing them,” Salomon’s Medal citation describes, “Captain Salomon kicked the knife out of the hand of one, shot another, and bayoneted a third. Captain Salomon butted the fourth enemy soldier in the stomach and a wounded comrade then shot and killed the enemy soldier.”

Things were deteriorating fast, so Salomon ordered the wounded and other medical workers to retreat to another aid station as best they could. In the meantime, he grabbed a rifle and rushed out of the tent. “I’ll hold them off until you get them to safety,” he shouted. “See you later.”

Several soldiers had been manning a heavy machine gun nearby, but they’d been killed. Salomon took over the station, apparently killing almost 100 of the Japanese before he succumbed to his injuries.

Captain Edmund G. Love described the scene when Salomon’s body was found the next day:

“There were ninety-eight Japanese bodies piled up in front of [Salomon’s] gun position. Salomon had killed so many men that he had been forced to move the gun four different times in order to get a clear field of fire. . . . One could easily visualize Ben Salomon, wounded and bleeding, trying to drag that gun a few more feet so that he would have a new field of fire. The blood was on the ground, and the marks plainly indicated how hard it must have been for him, especially in that last move.”

The dentist turned one-man army had 76 bullets in his body, and it’s generally believed that he took about 24 of those while still alive.

Salomon was recommended for a Medal of Honor, but it would be nearly 60 years before he received one. The Geneva Convention does not allow medical personnel to take up arms against the enemy. Had he violated that provision or was he simply acting in a defensive manner, as anyone would be allowed to do?

Ultimately, it was determined that he was eligible for the Medal.

“[He was] one young man,” the President concluded at Salomon’s 2002 Medal ceremony, “who was the match for 100, a person of true valor who now receives the honor due him from a grateful country.”

Rest in peace, Sir.

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