WTOC EDITORIAL SALUTES
America is blessed to have legacy heroes. Francis Curry fought with the 30th Infantry Division in Europe as a Sergeant. An automatic rifleman, and part of a defensive line near Malmedy, Belgium, on December 21st, 1944, a massive German tank onslaught, forced Sergeant Curry's platoon to withdraw and seek cover. Once there, grabbing a bazooka, and braving enemy tank and infantry fire, he and a companion took a tank out of the fight with one shot. Dropping the bazooka, he then dispatched 3 German soldiers hiding in the doorway of a near-by house. Then, bazooka in hand, he raced toward the enemy-occupied house, stood up and knocked down one of its walls with rockets. Still dodging fire, he raced across the street, for anti-tank grenades, once launched, driving the enemy tankers into that house. Next, Sergeant Curry, in full-view, jumped onto a half-track, sending withering machine-gun fire toward that enemy house, enabling 5, long-trapped, U.S. soldiers to run to safety. With no tank and multiple casualties, the Germans, were then forced to retreat. One amazing American soldier, in one small skirmish, amidst the threatening mosaic of one very large Battle of the Bulge.
In August of 1945, the war in Europe now over, Army Sergeant Francis S. Curry was awarded the Medal of Honor. His citation concluded (quote): "….by his heroic and repeated braving of murderous enemy fire, Sergeant Curry was greatly responsible for inflicting heavy losses in men and material on the enemy, for rescuing 5 comrades, and stemming an attack threatening to flank his battalion's position." This June 29th, Mr. Curry turns 85th years old. Fitting that his birthday falls so close to the date of our independence, the very same independence that, a century and a half after our nation's birth, American hero Francis Curry so gallantly helped to preserve.
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