July 7th, 19440500. Captain Ben Solomon was stitching a shrapnel wound inside a medical tent on Saipan when 4,000 Japanese soldiers came screaming out of the darkness toward his position. He was 29. He had been a combat surgeon for exactly 14 days. The largest bonsai charge in Pacific theater history had just torn into the first and second battalions of the 105th Infantry Regiment.
between 3,000 and 5,000 enemy troops, and his tent stood 50 yards behind the forward foxholes. Solomon had graduated from the University of Southern California dental school in 1937. He wanted to join the army. Both the Canadian and American militaries rejected him. He built a dental practice in Beverly Hills instead. Then in October 1940, the draft notice arrived.
Private Benjamin Solomon reported to the 102nd Infantry Regiment as an infantry soldier. He qualified expert with both rifle and pistol. Within a year, the army promoted him to sergeant and put him in charge of a machine gun section. On August 14th, 1942, his commanding officer declared him the best all-around soldier in the regiment.
Then the war department sent a letter report for commissioning as a dental officer. Solomon refused. [music] He wanted to stay infantry. The army made it an order. Lieutenant Benjamin Solomon became a dentist again. He hated it. Even as the regimental dental officer of the 105th Infantry Regiment, 27th Infantry Division, he joined every training run.
He competed in every physical fitness competition. He won most of them. He was 30 years old, competing against frontline infantry men half his age and beating them. His men called him the best infantry tactics instructor they ever had. June 1944, the 105th Infantry landed on Saipan. Combat was immediate and brutal. Solomon had almost nothing to do.
Nobody needed dental work when artillery shells were landing. On June 27th, a mortar round wounded the second battalion surgeon. Salomon volunteered to replace him immediately. For 2 weeks, he saved lives. Shrapnel wounds, gunshot wounds, burns. He worked 18-hour days in a tent 50 yard behind the forward foxholes. He was good at it, better than he expected.
He told a friend he wanted to become a medical doctor after the war. He wanted to be the best surgeon that ever lived. By early July, the Japanese were trapped in the northern corner of Saipan. American land, sea, and air power had them surrounded. Lieutenant General Yoshitsugu Saito knew he could not win. The Imperial fleet had been destroyed in the Battle of the Philippine Sea two weeks earlier.
No reinforcements were coming. On July 6th, Saito apologized to Tokyo for failing to defend Saipan. Then he ordered every remaining soldier to launch a final attack. Kill 10 Americans before you die. That was the order. The second battalion positioned themselves near Tanipag on the western coast. Intelligence reports warned that the Japanese were planning something.
The battalion established a defensive perimeter. Artillery protected the foxholes. Salomon set up his aid station in a small tent 50 yards behind the forward line, 30 yards from the shoreline, close enough to reach wounded men quickly, far enough back to work safely. At 4:45 in the morning on July 7th, the Japanese attacked.
Some carried rifles, some carried swords, some carried bamboo spears. Walking wounded limped forward in the rear ranks. Officers led from the front, screaming and waving swords overhead. The Americans heard them coming through the darkness. Then they saw them. A human wave that would not stop. Salomon was about to face 5,000 enemy soldiers with nothing but a tent full of wounded men.
If you want to know what he did next, please like this video. Every like pushes this story to someone who has never heard of Ben Solomon, and he deserves to be heard. Please subscribe. Back to Solomon. The Japanese found a gap between the first and second battalions. They poured through it. Within minutes, they were inside the American perimeter.
The forward foxholes collapsed. Soldiers fell back. The wounded stumbled toward Solomon’s tent. Some walked. Some crawled. Some were carried by friends. 30 wounded men filled the small tent in the first 15 minutes. Blood soaked through the canvas floor. Solomon worked as fast as he could. Bandages, morphine, tourniquets. He could hear gunfire getting closer.
Then he saw movement at the tent entrance. A Japanese soldier stepped inside. The soldier walked past Solomon toward a wounded American lying near the wall. The soldier raised his bayonet. Solomon grabbed a rifle leaning against the tent pole. He fired from a squatting position. The Japanese soldier dropped.
Solomon turned back to his patient. Two more Japanese soldiers appeared in the tent entrance. Solomon shot them both. Before he could breathe, four more soldiers crawled under the tent walls. Solomon had no time to think. The first Japanese soldier came at him with a knife. Solomon kicked it out of his hand.
The knife skidded across the bloody canvas floor. The second soldier raised his rifle. Solomon shot him in the chest. The third soldier lunged with a bayonet. Solomon grabbed his own rifle and drove the bayonet straight through him. The fourth soldier charged. Solomon dropped his rifle and headbutted him in the stomach. The soldier doubled over.
A wounded American lying on a cot raised his pistol and shot the Japanese soldier in the head. Solomon looked around the tent. Blood everywhere. 30 wounded men staring at him. The sound of gunfire outside was constant now, screaming, explosions. The tent walls shook. He could hear Japanese voices getting closer. The perimeter was gone.
The aid station would be overrun in minutes. Every wounded man in this tent would die. Solomon made a decision. He ordered the wounded to evacuate. Get back to the regimental aid station. Move now. The men who could walk grabbed the men who could not. They stumbled toward the rear.
Solomon grabbed an M1 Garand rifle from one of the wounded soldiers. He checked the magazine. Eight rounds. He turned toward the tent entrance and stepped outside. The scene was chaos. Japanese soldiers were everywhere, running, shooting, stabbing. American soldiers fought back from scattered positions, foxholes, shell craters, behind equipment.
The defensive line had completely collapsed. The Japanese had broken through and were pushing deeper into American positions. Solomon could see them moving toward the beach, toward the supply dumps, toward the command posts. If they reached the rear areas, hundreds more Americans would die. Solomon moved forward. He fired his rifle. One Japanese soldier dropped.
He fired again. Another fell. He kept moving. He passed wounded Americans crawling toward the rear. He passed dead bodies. American Japanese. He did not stop. Ahead of him, he saw an M1917A1 Browning machine gun, a heavy weapon, water cooled, beltfed, capable of sustained fire. Four American soldiers lay dead around it.
The gun was still operational. Solomon reached the machine gun position. He checked the weapon. The barrel was hot but not warped. The water jacket was intact. An ammunition belt fed into the receiver. He estimated 200 rounds remaining, maybe more. He grabbed the gun by its handles and pulled it toward a better position.
10 yards forward behind a small rise that would give him cover and a clear field of fire. He dragged the bodies of the four dead Americans with him. He positioned them as sandbags around the gun. It was not respect, it was necessity. He settled behind the weapon. The Japanese were still coming. Wave after wave.
Some wore uniforms. Some wore rags. Some were wounded and could barely walk. They came anyway. Officers with swords. Soldiers with rifles. Civilians with bamboo spears. They screamed as they charged. Solomon opened fire. The Browning roared. 30 caliber rounds tore through the advancing Japanese. Men fell. The gun kicked against his shoulder.
He held it steady. Short bursts. three to five rounds. Conserve ammunition. Pick targets. Leading soldiers first, officers next, anyone carrying a weapon. The belt fed smoothly through the mechanism. Brass casings ejected and piled up beside him. The barrel glowed orange in the pre-dawn darkness. The Japanese kept coming.
Solomon kept firing. His training as a machine gunner came back immediately. Traverse left. Traverse right. overlapping fields of fire. Deny them an approach route. Make them pay for every yard. Bodies piled up in front of his position. 10, 20, 30. The attack did not slow. More Japanese soldiers appeared from the darkness.
They climbed over their own dead to reach him. Solomon felt something hit his leg. He looked down. Blood. He had been shot. He did not know when. He kept firing. Another impact. His shoulder. He ignored it. The browning was everything now. Keep the belt feeding. Keep the barrel cool. Keep firing.
The wounded Americans were still evacuating behind him. They needed time. He would give them time. The ammunition belt ran out. Solomon reached for another. His hands were covered in blood. His blood or someone else’s. He could not tell. He loaded the new belt. The gun jammed. He cleared it. Started firing again. The Japanese were closer now. 20 yards. 15.
He could see their faces. Young men, old men, desperate men. He killed them all. Dawn broke over Saipan. The sky turned gray, then pink, then orange. Solomon had been firing for over an hour. His position was surrounded by Japanese dead. He estimated 60, maybe 70. He had lost count. More were coming.
He could see them forming up for another charge. His ammunition was running low. He had been shot multiple times. He could feel his strength fading. The machine gun was his only friend now. As long as it kept firing, he kept living. The sun rose higher. The temperature climbed. Saipan in July was brutally hot.
The machine gun barrel glowed white. Water in the cooling jacket boiled. Steam hissed from the vents. Salomon fired in shorter bursts now. The barrel could not handle sustained fire anymore. Three rounds. Pause. Three rounds. Pause. Each burst dropped another Japanese soldier around him.
The battle raged across the entire second battalion front. The Japanese bonsai charge had torn a hole through American lines. The first battalion was being overrun. The second battalion was fighting for survival. Scattered groups of American soldiers held isolated positions. Some foxholes still had defenders. Others were silent. The Japanese kept pushing south toward the beach, toward the supply dumps, toward the artillery positions.
Salomon could not see the bigger picture. He only knew his sector, the ground in front of his machine gun. Japanese soldiers kept appearing from the smoke and dust. He killed them. They fell. More appeared. He killed those two. The pile of bodies in front of his position grew larger. 80. 90. He stopped counting.
His job was simple. Keep firing until the gun stopped or he stopped. Another bullet hit him. His right arm. He switched to firing with his left hand on the trigger. His right hand worked the ammunition belt. Blood ran down both arms. His uniform was soaked. Red mixed with sweat. He could taste copper in his mouth. He had been shot in the face.
He did not remember when. His vision blurred. He blinked it clear. The machine gun kept firing. Behind him, the American line was reforming. Officers were gathering survivors, pulling men back from forward positions, establishing a new defensive perimeter. Artillery was firing now. Heavy shells screamed overhead and exploded in the Japanese rear.
The reinforcements were coming. The Second Marine Division was moving up from reserve. Help was on the way, but not yet. Not for another hour, maybe two. Solomon did not know any of this. He only knew the Japanese were still coming. His ammunition was running critically low. He had two belts left, maybe 300 rounds total.
At his current rate of fire, that gave him 10 minutes, maybe 15. Then the gun would be empty. Then he would be dead. He felt his position shifting. The ground beneath him was unstable. Too much blood, too many bodies. The machine gun was sinking into the mud. He tried to reposition it. His legs would not work properly.
He looked down. Both legs were bleeding. Multiple wounds, bullet holes, bayonet cuts. He could not remember taking those hits. The adrenaline had masked the pain. Solomon dragged himself in the machine gun to a new position. 5 yards to the right. Better elevation, clearer field of fire. He left a blood trail behind him.
He set up the gun again, loaded a fresh belt, started firing. The Japanese had not noticed him moving. They charged the old position. He cut them down from the flank. 20 more fell. The bonsai charge was losing momentum. The Japanese had been attacking for 3 hours now. Their numbers were thinning. The initial wave of 4,000 had been reduced to hundreds, then dozens.
American artillery was taking a toll. Machine gun fire from other positions was tearing them apart. The charge was collapsing, but it was not over yet. A group of Japanese soldiers spotted Solomon. They changed direction, came straight at him. 15 men, maybe 20. They were close. 25 yd. 20. Solomon traversed the gun and fired directly into them.
The range was point blank. The bullets went through multiple bodies. The group disintegrated. Three men were still standing. They kept coming. Solomon killed two. The third reached his position. The Japanese soldier jumped over the dead bodies. He landed in front of the machine gun. He raised his rifle with a bayonet. Solomon was out of time.
The gun was pointed the wrong direction. He could not traverse it fast enough. The soldier lunged. Solomon grabbed the barrel of the gun with both hands. It was scalding hot. His skin burned. He swung the entire weapon like a club. 47 lbs of steel and water smashed into the soldier’s head. The man dropped.
Solomon repositioned the gun, loaded his last ammunition belt. He estimated 150 rounds remaining. The Japanese charge was faltering now. Groups of soldiers were retreating back toward their lines. The American artillery had found their range. Shells were landing among the retreating Japanese. The bonsai charge was broken, but small groups were still probing American positions, looking for weak points, looking for ways through.
Solomon kept firing. He would hold this position until the gun ran dry or he died, whichever came first. He looked at the ammunition belt. 100 rounds left, maybe 90. He could feel himself getting weaker. The bleeding would not stop. He counted his wounds. Eight that he could see, probably more that he could not.
His right lung was making a strange whistling sound, punctured. His vision was narrowing. Tunnel vision, a sign of blood loss. He had maybe minutes left, maybe less, but the machine guns still had bullets, and Japanese soldiers were still out there. Solomon kept his finger on the trigger.
As long as one remained, so did the other. By 0800, the bonsai charge had spent itself. The Japanese had thrown everything they had at the American lines. 4,000 soldiers, walking, wounded, officers, civilians. They were broken now. Scattered groups retreated north toward the remaining Japanese positions. American artillery pursued them.
Shells landed among the retreating men. Few made it back. The second battalion counted their losses. The first and second battalions of the 105th Infantry Regiment had been devastated. Over 400 men killed, over 500 wounded. Two entire battalions reduced to scattered survivors. Officers gathered whoever they could find. Sergeants counted heads.
The numbers were catastrophic. Companies that had entered the battle with 150 men could muster 20. Platoons were gone entirely. The battalion commander ordered a tactical withdrawal, pull back to defensible positions, reorganize, count ammunition, treat the wounded, establish a new perimeter. The survivors fell back toward the beach.
They moved slowly, exhausted. Many were wounded themselves. They helped each other, dragged the seriously wounded, left the dead where they fell. They would come back for the bodies later. Nobody knew what had happened to Captain Solomon. The last anyone saw him, he was heading toward a machine gun position near the forward line.
That position was now deep inside what had been Japanese- held ground. The area was still dangerous. Pockets of Japanese soldiers remained. Snipers, holdouts, wounded men with grenades. The Americans could not safely reach that section of the battlefield yet. The 30 wounded soldiers who had been in Salomon’s aid station made it back to the regimental medical station.
Most survived. They told the medical staff what they had seen. Captain Salomon fighting handto hand inside the tent. Four Japanese soldiers dead at his feet. Him ordering them to evacuate. Him grabbing a rifle and walking out of the tent alone. Nobody knew what happened after that. The American forces regrouped throughout the morning.
The second marine division moved up from reserve. Fresh troops, full ammunition. They began pushing north, slowly, reclaiming the ground lost during the bonsai charge. Artillery pounded Japanese positions. Aircraft strafed anything that moved. The Americans advanced carefully, checking every foxhole, every crater, every body.
By noon, the temperature on Saipan reached 95°. The sun beat down on the battlefield. The smell was overwhelming. Thousands of bodies, American, Japanese, baking in the tropical heat. Medics moved through the battlefield, checking for survivors. They found few. Most of the wounded from both sides had died hours ago.
The Japanese had lost over 4,000 men in the bonsai charge. It was the largest single attack of its kind in the Pacific theater, and it had failed. The American lines had bent. They had not broken. The reinforcements had arrived. The perimeter had held. By 1800 hours on July 7th, the Americans had reclaimed all the ground lost during the attack.
The Japanese were pushed back to their starting positions and then beyond, but the cost had been enormous. The 105th Infantry Regiment was combat ineffective. They would need weeks to rebuild. Replacements would need to be brought in. Officers would need to be promoted. Equipment would need to be replaced. The regiment had been gutted.
As the Americans advanced through the battlefield, they found machine gun positions. Most had been overrun, gun crews killed, weapons destroyed, Japanese bodies piled around defensive positions. Evidence of desperate last stands. Americans who had held their ground and died doing it. One position caught the attention of a patrol from the 27th Division, a Browning machine gun, still set up, still pointing north.
The gun was surrounded by bodies. Japanese bodies, dozens of them piled three and four deep. The patrol approached carefully. They checked for survivors. They found none. Slumped over the machine gun was an American, a captain. His uniform was soaked with blood. The patrol leader checked for identification. Captain Benjamin L.
Solomon, dental corps, second battalion surgeon. The patrol leader was confused. What was a dentist doing behind a machine gun? They examined the position more carefully. The bodies of four American soldiers had been arranged around the gun as cover. A blood trail led from another position 15 yards away. Captain Solomon had moved the gun during the battle while wounded.
The patrol counted the Japanese bodies in front of the position. 40, 50, 60. They kept counting. The number climbed. One of the soldiers noticed something. Captain Solomon’s body was riddled with wounds. The soldier started counting. bullet holes, bayonet cuts, the chest, the arms, the legs, the face. The wounds were everywhere.
This man had been hit dozens of times. How had he kept fighting? The patrol leader radioed back to battalion headquarters. They had found Captain Solomon. He was dead. The battalion wanted details. The patrol leader looked at the scene around him. The machine gun, the bodies, the blood. He did not know where to begin. The patrol leader called for Captain Edund G. Love.
Love was the 27th Division historian. His job was to document significant events, record heroic actions, gather evidence for awards and commendations. When Love arrived at the position, he understood immediately why he had been summoned. Love had seen combat. He had seen brave men die. He had documented Medal of Honor actions before, but he had never seen anything like this.
He walked the perimeter of the position slowly, making notes, taking measurements. The Japanese bodies formed a semicircle in front of the machine gun. The killing zone extended 30 yards forward. Nothing had survived in that arc of fire. Love ordered his team to count the bodies carefully, accurately. They started at the closest and worked outward. 10, 20, 30.
The count continued. 40 50. The bodies were stacked in some places. Men had climbed over their own dead to reach the gun. 60 70 80. The team kept counting. When they finished, they recounted to verify. 98 Japanese soldiers lay dead in front of Captain Solomon’s position. Love then turned his attention to Salomon’s body.
He needed to document everything. The position of the body, the condition of the weapon, the nature of the wounds. This was evidence. It would be needed for the official report. Love began his examination. Captain Salomon was slumped over the Browning machine gun. His hands were still on the weapon.
His finger was near the trigger. He had died fighting. Love carefully documented the body’s position. Then he began counting the wounds. He started with the most obvious. Bullet holes. He found them in the chest, the abdomen, the arms, the legs. Multiple entry wounds. Some had exit wounds. Others did not. The bullets were still inside.
Love counted methodically. 10 wounds. 15. 20. He moved to the back of the body. More wounds. The shoulders. The spine. Captain Salomon had been shot from multiple directions, front, side, back. He had continued fighting while surrounded. 30 wounds, 40. Love’s count climbed higher. 50, 60, 70. When he finished counting bullet wounds, he had documented 76 separate gunshot injuries.
Then Love noticed the bayonet wounds. These were different from gunshots, puncture marks, slash marks, evidence of close combat. After Salomon had been shot multiple times after he was likely dying or dead. The Japanese had continued to attack his body. Love counted these wounds separately. He stopped counting after documenting two dozen bayonet marks.
There were likely more. Love consulted with the battalion medical officer. They examined the wounds together. Their conclusion was disturbing. Based on blood flow patterns and tissue damage, approximately 24 of the wounds had been inflicted while Captain Solomon was still alive, still conscious, still fighting. The man had been shot and stabbed two dozen times, and he had kept firing the machine gun.
Love interviewed the survivors from Salomon’s aid station, the 30 wounded soldiers who had escaped. They described what they saw. Salomon fighting handto hand, killing four Japanese soldiers with his bare hands and bayonet, ordering them to evacuate, walking out of the tent with a rifle. Every witness statement corroborated the others.
The story was consistent. Love gathered eyewitness accounts from other soldiers who had seen Salomon during the battle. A sergeant reported seeing him firing the machine gun at 0600. The position was already surrounded by Japanese dead. A corporal saw him repositioning the gun at 0700.
The man was clearly wounded, blood visible on his uniform, but he kept firing. Love documented the blood trail. It showed that Salomon had moved the machine gun at least twice during the battle, dragging the 47-lb weapon while wounded, setting it up in new positions, maintaining his field of fire. The blood trail was substantial, evidence of severe hemorrhaging.
Most men would have collapsed. Solomon had kept fighting. Love compiled his findings into a detailed report. He included witness statements, photographs of the position, a sketch map showing the location of bodies, technical analysis of the wounds, estimation of ammunition expended, timeline of events, everything needed for an official recommendation.
On July 10th, 1944, Brigadier General Ogden J. Ross reviewed Love’s report. Ross was the assistant commander of the 27th Division. He had authority to recommend awards. He read the report carefully. Then he read it again. The evidence was overwhelming. Captain Benjamin L. Salomon had performed an action worthy of the Medal of Honor, the highest military decoration in the United States.
Ross signed the recommendation. He forwarded it to Major General George W. Grryer. Grryer was the commanding general of the 27th Division, Final Approval Authority. The recommendation reached Griner’s desk on July 12th. Grryer read it. He studied the evidence, the witness statements, the photographs, the body count.
Everything pointed to extraordinary heroism. Then Grryer noticed something in Captain Salomon’s service record. Dental corps, medical officer, non-combatant status. Grryer consulted the Geneva Convention. Article 24. Medical personnel are protected persons. They may not bear arms against the enemy. Salomon had not only borne arms.
He had used a machine gun, a crew served weapon, an offensive weapon system. Grryer made his decision. He denied the recommendation. His official statement was clear. Captain Salomon wore a Red Cross brasard on his arm. Under the rules of the Geneva Convention, no medical officer can bear arms against the enemy.
The Medal of Honor recommendation was returned to Captain Love. Denied. No further action. The telegram arrived at the Salomon family home in Los Angeles on July 15th, 1944. The war department regretted to inform them that Captain Benjamin L. Solomon had been killed in action on Saipan on July 7th. The family was devastated. Ben’s father had already heard stories about his son from other soldiers.
The boy who wanted to be a soldier, the dentist who became a hero, but the War Department telegram contained no details about how he died. Captain Love did not forget about Benjamin Solomon. The denial from General Grryer troubled him. The evidence was overwhelming. The action was clearly worthy of the Medal of Honor.
But the Geneva Convention argument had stopped the process. Love filed his report in the division archives. He documented everything. He kept copies of all witness statements. He preserved the photographs. Someday, he thought, someone might reopen this case. The war ended in August 1945. Japan surrendered. American forces returned home.
The 27th Infantry Division was deactivated. Soldiers scattered across the country. They returned to civilian life. Many tried to forget what they had seen. Some could not. The veterans of Saipan carried those memories forever. In 1951, Captain Love tried again. He was no longer in the military. He was a civilian historian, but he still had all his documentation from Saipan.
He had kept everything. witness statements, photographs, maps. He submitted a new recommendation for Captain Solomon’s Medal of Honor through the Office of the Chief of Military History. This was the proper channel for delayed awards for cases that had been overlooked during wartime. The recommendation was reviewed. The evidence was examined.
The conclusion was the same. Captain Solomon’s actions were heroic. They met all criteria for the Medal of Honor. But there was a problem, a new problem. The time limit for submitting World War II awards had expired. Congress had established a deadline. All Medal of Honor recommendations had to be submitted within a certain period after the war ended. That deadline had passed.
The recommendation was returned to Captain Love. No action taken. Official reason, time limit expired. Love was told that nothing more could be done. The case was closed. He filed his documentation again, kept his copies, waited. Years passed. The Korean War came and went. The Vietnam War began. A new generation of soldiers fought.
New heroes emerged. New medals were awarded. Benjamin Solomon remained forgotten. His family knew he had died heroically, but they had no official recognition. No medal, no ceremony, just a telegram from 1944. In 1968, Dr. John I. Engel became dean of the University of Southern California School of Dentistry, the same school where Benjamin Solomon had graduated in 1937.
Engel was friends with Solomon’s father. The old man told him about his son, the dentist who wanted to be a soldier, the hero of Saipan, the Medal of Honor that was denied. Leel was outraged. He decided to do something about it. Leel contacted Major General Robert B. Shira. Shira was the chief of the Army Dental Corps in 1968.
Engel explained the situation, showed him the documentation he had obtained, asked him to reopen the case. Shira agreed. This was an injustice that needed to be corrected. He began the process of reconstructing the award recommendation. The problem was that most records had been lost. The original 1944 recommendation could not be located.
The 1951 submission had disappeared. None of the paperwork existed in official files anymore. Shira had to start from scratch. He contacted Captain Love. Love still had his copies. He had kept them for 24 years. Everything was still there. In 1969, Lieutenant General Hal B. Jennings took over as surgeon general of the United States Army.
He reviewed the Solomon case. He read all the evidence. He consulted with legal experts about the Geneva Convention issue. The interpretation had changed since 1944. Modern understanding of international law allowed medical personnel to use weapons in self-defense and in defense of their patients. Solomon had been protecting wounded soldiers.
That was defensive action, not offensive. Jennings submitted a new Medal of Honor recommendation in 1969. It went through proper channels up the chain of command. Each level reviewed and approved. The recommendation reached the Secretary of the Army in 1970. Stanley R. Resour was Secretary of the Army. He read the recommendation. He approved it.
He forwarded it to the Secretary of Defense with his endorsement. The recommendation sat on the desk of the Secretary of Defense. Weeks passed. Months passed. Then it came back. No action taken. No explanation given. Just returned without approval. The case was dead again. Reer tried to find out why. He made inquiries. He pushed for answers.
The response was vague. policy considerations, timing issues, nothing specific. The recommendation was filed away again. The Solomon family was told that the case had been reviewed, that it had been denied. Again, no medal would be awarded. The family accepted this. What else could they do? Benjamin Solomon had died 26 years earlier.
The war was ancient history now. Vietnam was the current war. Nobody cared about Saipan anymore. But one person still cared. Dr. Robert West joined the University of Southern California School of Dentistry faculty in 1992. He learned about Benjamin Solomon, the school’s most famous graduate, the hero who was never recognized.
West read everything he could find. He studied the case. He became convinced that this was an injustice. In 1998, West decided to try one more time. Dr. Robert West was not a military historian. He was a dentist, a professor, but he understood bureaucracy. He understood how to build a case. He knew that previous attempts had failed because they went through military channels.
The military had rejected Salomon five times already. West needed a different approach. He needed political pressure. West contacted Congressman Brad Sherman. Sherman represented California’s 27th congressional district. His district included the University of Southern California. West explained the case to Sherman, showed him the documentation, the evidence, the witness statements, the photographs from 1944.
Sherman was convinced this was a legitimate injustice. He agreed to help. Sherman had power that previous advocates did not. He was a member of Congress. He could make inquiries that would be taken seriously. He could push departments that had ignored earlier requests. He began working the case through congressional channels, asking questions, demanding reviews, making it clear that this issue would not go away.
West also contacted Major General Patrick D. Scully. Scully had become the new chief of the Army Dental Corps. He was a strong advocate for dental officers. He believed that medical personnel who fought to save lives deserved recognition. Scully reviewed the Salomon case personally. He read all the documentation.
He consulted with legal experts about the Geneva Convention issues. The legal interpretation was now clear. Salomon’s actions were defensive. Protecting patience was within the rules. Scully threw his full support behind the recommendation. He used his position to push the case through army channels. He coordinated with Sherman’s congressional efforts.
Together, they created pressure from two directions, military and political. The combination was effective. The recommendation went to the Department of the Army, then to the Department of Defense, then to the White House. Each level required review, legal analysis, historical verification. The process took months. West and Sherman pushed at every delay.
They would not let the case die again. In 2001, the recommendation reached the desk of President George W. Bush. The president reviewed the case personally. He read Captain Solomon’s story. He examined the evidence. 98 enemy soldiers killed, 76 wounds died protecting his patients. The president made his decision.
The Medal of Honor would be awarded. On May 1st, 2002, a ceremony was held at the White House. Dr. Robert West attended. He would accept the medal on behalf of the University of Southern California School of Dentistry. Captain Solomon had no surviving immediate family. His parents had died years earlier.
The medal would go to his school to be displayed, to be remembered. President Bush spoke at the ceremony. He described Captain Solomon’s actions on Saipan, the bonsai charge, the hand-to-hand combat, the machine gun, the 98 enemy soldiers, the 76 wounds. He explained why the medal had been delayed, the Geneva Convention interpretation, the bureaucratic obstacles, the five previous denials.
The president was clear. This delay was wrong. Captain Solomon had earned this medal in 1944. He should have received it in 1944. The fact that it took 58 years to correct this injustice was shameful. But today, the injustice would be corrected. Today, Captain Benjamin L. Solomon would receive the recognition he deserved.
President Bush presented the Medal of Honor to Dr. West. The citation was read aloud. The official description of Captain Solomon’s actions. The medical tent under attack, the wounded soldiers evacuated, the machine gun position, the 98 enemy killed, the 76 wounds suffered, the ultimate sacrifice. West accepted the medal. He spoke briefly.
He described Benjamin Solomon as a man who wanted to serve his country, who was forced to be a dentist when he wanted to be a soldier, who became both in the end, a healer who killed to save lives, a dentist who died like a warrior. Wes said the medal would be displayed at the USC School of Dentistry, where students could see it, where they could learn about the man who graduated from their school, who gave everything for his patients.
The ceremony ended. The medal was placed in a case. It would be transported to Los Angeles to the University of Southern California to the dental school where it remains today, a small blue ribbon with white stars. The Medal of Honor, the highest military decoration, earned in 1944, awarded in 2002, 58 years late.
Captain Benjamin L. Solomon became one of only three dental officers to receive the Medal of Honor in American military history. He is the only one to receive it for direct combat action, the only dentist who earned it with a machine gun, the only medical officer whose Medal of Honor was delayed for more than half a century.
The story of his death became required reading at the Army Medical Department. His actions are studied in military ethics courses. The question is always the same. Did Solomon violate the Geneva Convention or did he uphold the highest traditions of military medicine? The debate continues, but the medal has been awarded. The question is answered.
Benjamin Solomon died on July 7th, 1944. He was 29 years old. He saved 30 wounded soldiers that morning. He killed 98 enemy soldiers. He took 76 bullets and bayonet wounds. He never left his machine gun. 58 years later, his country finally said, “Thank you.” The medal sits in a display case at the University of Southern California School of Dentistry.
Students walk past it every day. Most stopped to read the plaque. Captain Benjamin L. Solomon, Medal of Honor, Battle of Saipan, July 7th, 1944. Some students do not understand at first. A dentist with a medal of honor. Then they read the details. 98 enemy killed, 76 wounds. They understand. The Army Medical Department uses Solomon’s story in training.
Medical officers study his case. The question is always presented. What would you do? Your aid station is being overrun. Your patients cannot evacuate on their own. Enemy soldiers are bayonetting wounded men. Do you run or do you fight? There is no correct answer, only the answer Solomon gave. Military ethicists debate his case.
Some argue he violated the Geneva Convention. Medical personnel are non-combatants. They must not bear arms. Others argue he upheld a higher duty, the duty to protect patients, the duty to save lives, even if it meant taking lives. The debate will never be resolved. Both sides have valid arguments, but the men who survived because of Solomon never debated.
They knew what he did. He gave them time to escape. He held the position so they could live. 30 wounded soldiers walked away from that aid station. Most survived the war. They went home. They had families, children, grandchildren. All because one dentist picked up a machine gun. The mathematics are simple. Solomon saved 30 lives. He took 98.
The arithmetic of war. The calculus of sacrifice. One man decided that his life was worth less than 30 others. He made that decision in seconds. He lived that decision for hours. He died for that decision. Benjamin Solomon wanted to be a soldier. The army made him a dentist. On Saipan, he became both.
He healed men with his hands in the morning. He killed the enemy with a machine gun by afternoon. He died doing what he always wanted to do, fighting for his country, protecting his men, being a soldier. His story asks uncomfortable questions. When does a healer become a warrior? When does medicine become warfare? When does saving American lives justify everything else? These questions have no easy answers.
But they are worth asking because men like Salomon force us to think about duty, about sacrifice, about the cost of protecting those who cannot protect themselves. The battle of Saipan lasted 25 days. Over 3,000 Americans gave their lives. The island became a launching point for the air campaign that would end the war. B-29 bombers flew from Saipan’s runways to strike the Japanese homeland.
Every mission that took off from that airfield was made possible by the men who bled for that ground. Benjamin Solomon was one of thousands who died taking Saipan. But his death was different. Not because he killed more enemy soldiers than anyone else that day. Not because he suffered more wounds, but because he chose to stay.
He could have retreated with his patience. He could have abandoned the position. He could have saved himself. He chose not to. That choice defines heroism. Not the killing, not the suffering, the choice, the decision to put others first. To value their lives above your own. To die so they can live. That is what the Medal of Honor recognizes.
Not courage, not skill, sacrifice. Saipan is quiet now. The battlefield is overgrown. Nature has reclaimed the ground where Americans fought and died. A marker stands near where Salomon’s aid station was located, near where he made his last stand. Name, rank, date, medal of honor. Nothing more is needed. The machine gun is gone, salvaged decades ago.
The ground has healed. The scars remain only in memory. But the story survives, passed down through generations, from veterans to children, from teachers to students, from historians to viewers like you. The dentist who became a soldier, the healer who became a warrior, the man who died so 30 Americans could live.
He got his wish. He died a soldier. Not a dentist, a soldier. He earned his medal. 58 years late, but earned. Captain Benjamin L. Salomon, 29 years old, the only dentist in American history to receive the Medal of Honor for direct combat. 98 enemy soldiers in front of his gun, 76 wounds in his body, and 30 Americans alive because he refused to leave.
That is the story, and now you know it. But most people do not. Most people have never heard the name Ben Solomon. That is where you come in. Hit that like button right now. Not for us, for him. Every like sends this video to someone new, someone who should know what this man did. Hit subscribe, turn on notifications.
We dig through archives, through official records, through Medal of Honor citations to find men like Solomon. Men who were forgotten, men who were denied, men whose stories sat in filing cabinets for decades while the world moved on. We pull them out. We tell their stories every week. Drop a comment. Tell us where you are watching from.
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And every name matters. Thank you for watching. Thank you for staying until the end. And thank you for making sure that Captain Ben Solomon finally gets what the United States Army denied him for 58 years.
