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Rank and organization: Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company E, 359th Infantry,
90th Infantry Division. Place and date: Near Chambois, France, 20 August
1944. Entered service at: Bremerton, Wash. Birth: San Francisco, Calif.
G.O. No.: 55, 13 July 1945. Citation: He manned a light machinegun on 20
August 1944, near Chambois, France, a key point in the encirclement which
created the Falaise Pocket. During an enemy counterattack, his position
was menaced by a strong force of tanks and infantry. His fire forced the
infantry to withdraw, but an artillery shell knocked out his gun and wounded
him in the right thigh. Securing a bazooka, he and another man stalked
the tanks and forced them to retire to a wooded section. In the lull which
followed, Sgt. Hawk reorganized 2 machinegun squads and, in the face of
intense enemy fire, directed the assembly of 1 workable weapon from 2 damaged
guns. When another enemy assault developed, he was forced to pull back
from the pressure of spearheading armor. Two of our tank destroyers were
brought up. Their shots were ineffective because of the terrain until Sgt.
Hawk, despite his wound, boldly climbed to an exposed position on a knoll
where, unmoved by fusillades from the enemy, he became a human aiming stake
for the destroyers. Realizing that his shouted fire directions could not
be heard above the noise of battle, he ran back to the destroyers through
a concentration of bullets and shrapnel to correct the range. He returned
to his exposed position, repeating this performance until 2 of the tanks
were knocked out and a third driven off. Still at great risk, he continued
to direct the destroyers' fire into the Germans' wooded position until
the enemy came out and surrendered. Sgt. Hawk's fearless initiative and
heroic conduct, even while suffering from a painful wound, was in large
measure responsible for crushing 2 desperate attempts of the enemy to escape
from the Falaise Picket and for taking more than 500 prisoners.
This data was extracted from the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, U.S. Senate, Medal of Honor Recipients: 1863-1973 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1973)
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