The citation of Doris Miller’s Navy Cross Medal, the story of his bravery unfolds:
“While at the side of his Captain on the bridge, Miller, despite enemy strafing and bombing and in the face of a serious fire, assisted in moving his Captain, who had been mortally wounded, to a place of greater safety, and later manned and operated a machine gun directed at enemy Japanese attacking aircraft until ordered to leave the bridge.”
Throughout the history of the United States military, many men and women have gone beyond their call of duty to serve their country. One of the most potent examples comes from a United States Navy messman, Doris “Dorie” Miller. A native of Waco, Texas, Doris Miller would go squirrel hunting, cook for his family, and work on the family farm to provide an income for his loved ones struggling during the economic turmoil of the Great Depression. When the chaos of World War II was inching closer to the American shores, Doris Miller went to a United States Navy Recruiting station in Dallas, Texas. Since the United States military was deeply ingrained with racism, Doris Miller, like all other African Americans at the time, was segregated from the white sailors and forced into the lower positions of the military hierarchy with no opportunity to go up the power structure.
Doris Miller served as a mess attendant third class on the USS West Virginia (BB-48), a dreadnought battleship tied to other dreadnaughts on the Battleship row in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. His duties on the ship were to clean tables, shine shoes, fold laundry, and cook meals for other sailors on board. To the ship crew, Cook Third Class Miller was known for being the USS West Virginia’s Heavyweight boxing champion. On Dec. 7th 1941 while folding laundry on the third deck of the ship, Doris Miller would experience the brutality of a Japanese surprise attack
The Japanese Navy had launched 353 fighters, dive bombers, and other aircraft toward Pearl Harbor to destroy the American Navy battleships. The port side of the USS Virginia was struck by two torpedoes at 7:55 am. Right before, the USS Arizona was pounded by dive bombers that spilled the ship’s oil all over the water. This oil soon found its way toward the USS West Virginia, setting itself ablaze and creating pits of fire all around the ship.
In the onslaught of the bombing campaign, Doris Miller ran up to the upper deck and reported himself ready for duty. He was quickly called upon to help carry the wounded. “Miller went topside, carried wounded on his shoulders, made several trips up and down, wading through waist-deep water, oil-slicked decks, struggling uphill on slick decks,” recalled Rear Admiral John Fuller in a 2016 Memorial speech on Miller’s legacy. While Dorris Miller was supporting other sailors, Mervyn Bannon, the USS West Virginia Captain was injured by shrapnel and needed assistance. Doris Miller was called upon to support the Captain and carry him to an area where he could shield himself from Japanese fighter pilots.
After completing this task successfully, Lieutenant Frederic H. White ordered Doris Miller to help him load a .50 Browning machine gun on the deck. When the opportunity arose, Doris Miller handled the anti-aircraft machine gun himself and started firing at Japanese planes above. Telling the story later, Doris Miller said,
“It wasn’t hard. I just pulled the trigger and she worked fine. I had watched the others with these guns. I guess I fired her for about fifteen minutes. I think I got one of those Japanese planes. They were diving pretty close to us.”
This act of bravery awarded Doris Miller with the Navy Cross Medal, which made him the first African American to receive this award.
For 4 months after the infamous attack on Pearl Harbor and Doris Miller’s heroic actions, he was unknown to the press, who kept referring to him as the unidentified sailor. The US Navy had quickly identified white sailors who had sacrificed their lives aboard the USS Utah and shared their story with the press, but Doris Miller kept being spoken of as unidentified. Dorris Miller was finally identified after Lawrence Reddick, leader of Harlem’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, sent the US Navy a letter asking them to release the name of the sailor. The Pittsburgh Courier Newspaper, working with Lawrence Reddick to discover the sailor, was the first to announce publicly that Doris Miller was the man behind the guns.
Even after his display of honoring his call to duty, he was only promoted to third-class cook. Doris Miller continued to serve his country until November 1943. While participating in the Gilbert Islands Campaign, Doris Miller was one of the many crewmembers to be lost at sea after the USS Liscome Bay was destroyed by a torpedo.
Doris Miller’s legacy has lived on in the United States Navy and American culture. In 2010, Doris Miller was memorialized with a United States Postal Stamp. In December 2017 A 9-foot-tall, 700-pound bronze statue of Doris Miller was erected to honor his heroism in his hometown, Waco Texas. In 2020, the United States Navy announced that the fourth Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier will be named the USS Doris Miller (CVN-81) and will be launched in 2032.
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