by
Jake Rosen at MentalFloss.com
It was
after midnight on May 15, 1918, when William Henry Johnson began to
hear the rustling. Johnson was a long way from his home in Albany,
New York, guarding a bridge in the Argonne Forest in Champagne,
France. Sleeping next to him was Needham Roberts, a fellow soldier.
Both men had enlisted in the New York National Guard just a few
months earlier and were now part of the French Army, donated by U.S.
forces to their understaffed allies in the thick of World War I.
As
Johnson continued hearing the strange noises late into the night, he
urged his partner to get up. A tired Roberts waved him off, believing
Johnson was just nervous. Johnson decided to prepare himself just in
case, piling up his assortment of grenades and rifle cartridges
within arm's reach. If someone was coming, he would be ready.
The
rustling continued. At one point, Johnson heard a clipping noise—what
he suspected was the sound of the perimeter fence being cut. He again
told Roberts to wake up. "Man," he said, "You better
wake up pretty soon or you [might] never wake up."
The
two began lobbing grenades into the darkness, hoping to discourage
whoever might be lurking around the perimeter. Suddenly, in the
middle of the French forest, Johnson saw dozens of German soldiers
come charging, bayonets pointed toward him. They began to fire.
What
transpired over the next hour would become an act of heroism that
prompted former President Theodore Roosevelt to declare Johnson one
of the bravest Americans to take up arms in the war. Johnson would
even lead a procession back in New York City, with crowds lined up
along the street to greet him.
Johnson
may or may not have felt like a hero, though he certainly was. But he
must have also felt something else—a sense of confusion. A man of
color, he had been dispatched to a segregated regiment, where he
received paltry combat training and was assigned menial tasks like
unloading trucks. Even his homecoming parade was split up according
to race. Henry Johnson, decorated virtually head to toe in French
military honors, returned to a country that considered him both hero
and a second-class citizen.
Though
officers would later verify much of Johnson’s account of that night
in the woods, his early life is harder to pin down. It has been
reported that Johnson himself wasn’t quite sure when he was born.
No one appeared to have kept a close eye on his birth certificate,
which came out of Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The official U.S.
Army website honoring Johnson’s service lists an approximate birth
date of July 15, 1892. Other research indicates he could have been
born as early as 1887 or as late as 1897.
After
moving to New York as a teenager, Johnson took on an assortment of
odd jobs; he was a chauffeur and a soda mixer, among other
occupations. Depending on the account, he was living in Albany
working either in a coal yard or as a railway porter when he opened a
newspaper in the spring of 1917 and read that the 15th New York
Infantry Regiment of the New York National Guard was accepting
enlistees. The regiment was comprised entirely of black soldiers.
Johnson
showed up on June 5, 1917, weighing a slight 130 pounds and standing
5 feet, 4 inches tall. Assigned to Company C of the 15th—which
later became known as the 369th U.S. Infantry Regiment—he was
quickly dispatched to Camp Wadsworth in South Carolina, where he
trained along with the rest of the segregated unit. Though minorities
had served in the U.S. military since the Revolutionary War, they
often lacked support from officials and got inferior training
compared to their white counterparts. At Camp Wadsworth, Johnson was
said to have been used primarily as labor, unloading supplies and
digging latrines. If there was one bright spot during this time, it
was that he married his wife, Georgina Edna Jackson, that September.
Johnson
and the 369th were sent to France on January 1, 1918. There they
continued laboring, which frustrated their commander, Colonel William
Hayward. Hayward lobbied his superiors to give his men a chance in
combat. Since France was experiencing a shortage of men, the
369th—which later became known as the Harlem Hellfighters because
many of their members had come from Harlem in New York City—joined
the 161st Division of the French Army, even wearing the jackets and
helmets of the foreign military.
To the
French, Johnson and his fellow soldiers were a welcome solution to
their lack of manpower. Sent to the front lines in March 1918,
Johnson and the others learned enough French to understand commands
from superiors. They were armed with rifles and held on to the bolo
knives used by the U.S. Army. The imposing 14-inch blades weighed
more than a pound and had much of their weight running along the
back, giving them a cleaving action similar to a machete. Johnson
would soon be glad he had such a weapon on his waist.
Along
with Needham Roberts—a man from Trenton, New Jersey—Johnson was
assigned sentry duty on the western edge of the Argonne Forest.
Patrolling near a bridge, Johnson and Roberts were given the late
shift, on patrol until midnight on the evening of May 14. It would be
a night neither he nor Roberts would ever forget.
As
their shift wound down, Johnson saw two relief soldiers approaching.
The soldiers were young and inexperienced, and Johnson felt
uncomfortable leaving them alone. He stayed put and surveyed the area
while Roberts went to rest in a trench. Shortly thereafter, he began
to hear the rustling noises, which eventually became German soldiers
rushing through the darkness. Johnson realized they were surrounded,
and urged Roberts to run for help. But Roberts didn't get far before
he decided to come back and help, and was soon hit by the shrapnel of
a grenade in his arm and hip.
Still
conscious, Roberts handed Johnson grenades to toss. When those ran
out, Johnson began firing his rifle while being hit by bullets in his
side, hand, and head. Quickly, Johnson shoved an American cartridge
into his French rifle, but the ammunition and the weapon were
incompatible. The rifle jammed. As the Germans swarmed him, Johnson
began using the rifle like a club, smashing it over their heads and
into their faces.
After
the butt of the rifle finally fell apart, Johnson went down with a
blow to the head. But he climbed back up, drew his bolo knife, and
charged forward. The blade went deep into the first German he
encountered, killing the man. More gruesome work with the weapon
followed, with Johnson hacking and stabbing bodies even as bullets
continued to strike him.
At one
point, Johnson noticed the Germans had grabbed Roberts and were
attempting to haul him away. He intervened, stabbing more soldiers,
including one in the ribs.
The
melee went on for roughly an hour, he said. When reinforcements
finally arrived, the remaining Germans fled. Johnson was given
medical attention. So was Roberts. Both lived.
The
next day, military officials visited the scene of the battle. German
helmets rested on the ground, along with puddles of blood. Four
bodies were left behind. The officials estimated Johnson had wounded
up to 24 others. Some men who walked the site said the death toll was
six, with Johnson injuring 32 men. After all the fighting, Johnson
had prevented the Germans from breaking the French line.
The
nicknames came fast. The bridge was declared “the Battle of Henry
Johnson.” Johnson himself was given the unofficial label “the
Black Death” and the official rank of sergeant. He was headed back
home.
Before
they departed, the French honored Johnson and Roberts with the Croix
de Guerre, one of France’s highest awards for valor. They were the
first two Americans to receive it. Johnson’s was amended with the
addition of the Gold Palm, intended to signify extraordinary valor.
It was
an honor, though one that came with a heavy price. Johnson later
estimated he had been shot five times, the bullets striking both
feet, his thigh, his arm, and even his head. A scar stretched over
his lip. A bayonet had been plunged into his torso—twice. He had to
have a metal plate inserted into his left foot. In all, Johnson
endured 21 injuries as a result of his defiant stand against the
Germans.
Back
home, he convalesced as the country sang his praises. Often, such
reports of his bravery took pains to note he was a man of color.
"When proudly speaking of fighting races we must not overlook
the American Negro," read an editorial in the New York Evening
Telegram. Other times, Johnson found himself in the peculiar position
of being celebrated while simultaneously being reminded of his
purportedly inferior status. The parade that honored the Harlem
Hellfighters in February 1919 ran for seven miles, with Johnson
leading the procession in an open-topped cab. But the Hellfighters
could not march with their white counterparts.
Needham
Roberts (L) and William Henry Johnson (R) pose for a photo with their
Croix de Guerre medals in 1918
Unfortunately,
Johnson’s postwar life remains as murky as his earliest years. He
reportedly received disability payments from the government as well
as medical care, but it’s unknown to what extent that supported him
or how badly his injuries kept him from employment opportunities. (He
did ask for, and received, as much as $100 per minute during speaking
engagements in cities such as St. Louis—well over $1000 in today's
money.) An attempt was made by the Albany Afro-American Association
to raise money to build him a home as a way of expressing gratitude
for his service, but it’s unclear whether the effort was
successful. On July 1, 1929, Johnson died of myocarditis (an
inflammation of the heart muscle) while living in Washington, D.C. He
was awarded a posthumous Purple Heart in 1996.
For
years, it was unclear what became of Johnson's remains. In 2002, when
the historians at the New York Division of Military and Naval Affairs
researched his service at the behest of his descendants (though it
was later discovered they were mistaken and not actually related to
Johnson), the historians determined Johnson was buried at Arlington
National Cemetery with full military honors. With confirmation of the
grave site, Johnson also became eligible for and was awarded the
Distinguished Service Cross in 2002.
In
2015, President Barack Obama awarded him the Medal of Honor, which
was accepted on Johnson’s behalf by Sergeant Major Louis Wilson of
the New York National Guard. And every June 5, Albany celebrates
Henry Johnson Day in acknowledgement of the day he enlisted. The city
also gives out a Henry Johnson Award for Distinguished Community
Service for those making contributions in the area.
Those
honors joined the Croix de Guerre, which Johnson was said to have
worn with humility. He sometimes needed to be prodded into discussing
his act of bravery, as if it were of no major consequence. “There
wasn’t anything so fine about it,” he said. “[I] just fought
for my life. A rabbit would have done that."
