| Captain Lewis Millett, US Army the CO of Easy Company, 27th Infantry Regiment led his unit in its bayonet assault of Hill 180, Soam-Ni Korea, February 7, 1951.
Millett led his men up Hill 180 as part of Operation Punch. Throwing grenades, turning back to call for more firepower when he saw the ground ahead crawling with Chinese, he seemed constantly upright and exposed standing under fire, urging the others on. At the crest he took shrapnel from a grenade. The men saw him silhouetted on the skyline and heard him shouting, Use grenades and cold steel!"
That day the bayonet was used liberally. Some say it was the most complete bayonet charge by American troops since the Civil War. Of 47 enemy dead, 18 had been killed by the bayonet. For his courage and leadership in the action, Captain Millett was awarded the Medal of Honor. And atop Hill 180, like their own special medal to their commander, the men left a bayonet stuck in a crack in a rock holding a sign which read, "Compliments of Easy Company."
That is the last bayonet charge in US military history that I can find any record of, 13th Redneck. I'd be interested in any dates and names you can attach to the bayonet charge you say occurred in Vietnam. I can find no record or any mention of one save your own.
__________________
"Do not forget your dogs of war, your big guns, which are the most-to-be respected arguments of the rights of kings."
- Frederick the Great, King of Prussia  |