Medal of Honor Monday: William Maud Bryant

“The epitome of a Green Beret who endlessly pursued excellence.”

On this day in 1969, a hero engages in an action that would earn him a Medal of Honor. William Maud Bryant has been called “the epitome of a Green Beret who endlessly pursued excellence.”

“He led from the front,” Maj. Gen. Patrick Roberson, commander of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School concluded. “He displayed a tremendous level of courage.”

Bryant joined the Army in 1953, when he was just 20 years old. He initially trained with the Airborne, but the Green Berets had caught his eye. What he really wanted, he decided, was to be a member of the Special Forces.

At least reportedly, he felt he’d found his calling when he finally became a Green Beret, valuing the Special Forces as a place where “race, color or creed did not matter.”

His Medal action on March 24, 1969, proved exactly that.

Sfc. Bryant was then commanding a combined force of Vietnamese soldiers and American Special Forces in Long Khanh Province, Vietnam. Suddenly, he and his men came under attack. Worse, the enemy assault was coming from three directions.

Bryant couldn’t then know it, but the fighting would ultimately last for 34 hours.

It must have seemed that Bryant was everywhere during those hours!? He established a defense perimeter. He directed fire. He tended to the wounded. At one point, a supply drop from a helicopter went awry, scattering much-needed ammunition just out of reach.

Naturally, Bryant ran through enemy fire to secure the ammunition that his men needed.

When a lull in the fighting occurred, Bryant took advantage, leading a patrol outside the defense perimeter. Could he get more information about the enemy? Unfortunately, the small patrol came under intense fire and became pinned down. Perhaps you won’t be surprised to hear that Bryant launched a single-handed attack, fighting off that enemy assault.

At about this time, Bryant saw a wounded enemy soldier lying “some distance” from his patrol. He ran through intense fire, working his way toward the fallen man. He hoped to get him back inside American lines for intelligence purposes.

It was a brave thing to do, but unfortunately it didn’t work. “Finding that the enemy soldier had expired,” Bryant’s Medal citation explains, “Sfc. Bryant crawled back to his patrol and led his men back to the company position where he again took command of the defense.”

The enemy attack was ongoing, and Bryant wasn’t done.

He again led a patrol outside the defense perimeter, trying to break past the enemy. That effort left him badly wounded, but he refused to stop, instead calling for helicopter gunship support. He again charged an enemy position, singlehandedly destroying it. He was regrouping for another assault when he fell, mortally wounded by an enemy rocket.

He left behind men who continued on, “[i]nspired by his heroic example.”

Bryant was awarded a Medal of Honor posthumously, but he’s been honored in other ways as well. Perhaps most notably, Bryant Hall at Fort Bragg’s JFK Special Warfare Center and School is named for this brave Green Beret.

That school is home to Bryant’s Medal because his oldest son, Gregory, donated it several years ago. “[T]he medal needs to be in a place where people can really appreciate it,” Gregory concluded, “and back on a wall in my mancave is probably not the place.”

Both Bryant’s family and the JFK school hope the Medal display will inspire others. Such hope echoes a sentiment expressed by a World War II veteran during a 1986 ceremony in which Bryant was honored.

“It is appropriate for us to use words on this occasion,” that veteran concluded, “but it is more fitting to rededicate ourselves to our country like those who fought and died.”

Yes. Perhaps today is a good day to do exactly that.

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