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Episode 46 — Medal of Honor: Hendrix
Hi, I'm Secretary of State Mark Martin, and welcome to
This Week in Arkansas History.
Growing up as a sharecropper in Lepanto,
James Richard Hendrix may have thought he would never see the world.
But in 1944, when he was 18, he was drafted into
the Army to fight in World War Two.
In December that year, he was in Belgium,
trying to break through a siege to Bastogne.
The soldiers were halted by hostile artillery fire and small arms fire.
Private Hendrix jumped from his half-track and attacked two 88 millimeter guns.
Later he silenced two more hostile machine guns with
his own fire to cover the evacuation of two wounded soldiers.
Hendrix then raced through sniper fire
to rescue another wounded soldier who was trapped
in a burning half-track full of exploding ammunition.
Nine months later he was awarded the Medal of Honor.
Hendrix eventually became a master sergeant and served
in the Korean War before leaving the Army in 1965.
He died in 2002 and is buried in Florida.
Join me next time for more Arkansas history, and check out
at www.sos.arkansas.gov for educational resources.