Doris 'Dorie' Miller 'Hero of Pearl Harbor' Dec. 7, 1941 USS West Virginia 'Above & Beyond the Call of Duty' WW2

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Doris 'Dorie' Miller went from Navy Mess Attendant to 'Hero of Pearl Harbor,' Oahu, Hawaii, Smithsonian Channel (4:13 min.) The Greatest Generation. 🇺🇲
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⚓ Doris 'Dorie' Miller, Above and Beyond the Call of Duty, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. (Part of our series celebrating America’s 250th anniversary).

- Born Oct. 12, 1919, in Waco, Texas, Miller joined the Navy in 1939 as a mess attendant one of the only occupational specialties then open to a Black man. In January 1940, he was assigned to the battleship USS West Virginia (BB 48), stationed at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
Severe damage to the ship during the early phases of the December 7th attack prevented Miller from manning his assigned battle station. Seeking to help where he could, he was ordered to the ship’s bridge to help move his captain, Mervyn Bennion, mortally wounded with shrapnel in his abdomen.

Doris Miller was then ordered to the port side anti-aircraft guns to load ammunition for an officer. After performing this task, Miller, on his own initiative, loaded and manned an unattended gun and fired at incoming Japanese planes. Although untrained, he laid down effective fire and stopped firing when he ran out of ammunition and the ship began to sink. Even then, he persisted in helping his fellow sailors to safety until he finally made his way to shore. Miller, himself, escaped injury and was reassigned to the cruiser Indianapolis (CA 35).

Initially commended only as an unnamed Black man, pressure from the NAACP led to Doris Miller’s identification and the presentation of an award. On April 2, 1942, Miller’s efforts on the West Virginia were dramatized on the CBS radio series, They Live Forever. Although Congressional bills and other calls to grant Miller the Medal of Honor failed, President Franklin D. Roosevelt approved awarding Miller the Navy Cross. Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Fleet, presented the Navy Cross to Miller on board the USS Enterprise (CV-6) on May 27, 1942.

The Navy detached Miller to participate in a War Bond tour with White war heroes from Dec. 1942 to Jan. 1943, making him the first African American allowed on the speaking tour. Furthermore, his portrait appeared in a 1943 Navy recruiting poster under the words “above and beyond the call of duty.” More...
https://department.va.gov/history/doris-miller/
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- Cuba Gooding Jr. as Dorie Miller in the movie, Pearl Harbor (2001). Ben Affleck film.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearl_Harbor_(film

- Wiki. - Doris 'Dorie' Miller (Oct. 12, 1919 – Nov. 24, 1943) was a U.S. Navy sailor who was the first black recipient of the Navy Cross and a nominee for the Medal of Honor. As a mess attendant second class aboard the battleship USS West Virginia, Miller helped carry wounded sailors to safety during the attack on Pearl Harbor.
He then manned an anti-aircraft gun and, despite no prior training in gunnery, officially shot down one plane (according to Navy Department records), but Miller and other eyewitnesses claimed a range of four to six.

Miller received the Navy Cross from Admiral Chester Nimitz on May 27, 1942, but many sailors and naval officers believed that Miller's heroism deserved a Medal of Honor. Miller was nominated for a Medal of Honor by a congressman from Michigan and a senator from New York, and the black press enthusiastically campaigned for Miller to receive this decoration...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doris_Miller#cite_note-aiken-9

- Wiki, Attack on Pearl Harbor. On December 7, 1941, the Empire of Japan launched a surprise military strike on the United States Pacific Fleet at its naval base at Pearl Harbor on Oahu, Hawaii. At the time, the U.S. was a neutral country in World War II. The air raid on Pearl Harbor, which was launched from aircraft carriers, prompted the U.S. to declare war on Japan the next day.

The Japanese military leadership referred to the attack as the Hawaii Operation and Operation AI,[nb 3] and as Operation Z during its planning. The attack on Pearl Harbor was preceded by months of negotiations between the U.S. and Japan over the future of the Pacific. Japanese demands included that the U.S. end its sanctions against Japan, cease aiding China in the Second Sino-Japanese War, and allow Japan access to the resources of the Dutch East Indies...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Pearl_Harbor