True story of pacifist World War Two hero who saved 75 men despite refusing orders to carry gun will be depicted in brutal new Hollywood movie Hacksaw Ridge
Brutal new action film Hacksaw Ridge starring Andrew Garfield tells story of Desmond Doss, the first conscientious objector to receive US Medal of Honour
HE is the most unlikely war hero.
Desmond Doss was a skinny vegetarian and pacifist whose Christian faith did not allow him to serve on the Sabbath.
Yet the US army medic, a conscientious objector who refused to even carry a weapon, let alone kill enemy soldiers, single-handedly rescued 75 wounded comrades under vicious enemy fire in World War Two.
Returning time and again to the Japanese battlefield, Desmond dragged the men — some with their legs blown off — to safety before lowering them one by one down a 400ft jagged cliff edge, nicknamed Hacksaw Ridge.
His actions at the Battle of Okinawa led to him becoming the first conscientious objector to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor, America’s highest award for bravery.
Now his story is being told in Oscar-tipped movie Hacksaw Ridge, directed by Mel Gibson.
Brit star and former Spider-Man Andrew Garfield stars as the softly spoken Desmond in a film critics agree is the bloodiest war movie ever to be nominated for major awards.
Audiences see Desmond crawling over bodies and faced with missing limbs, spilled intestines and rats gnawing on mangled corpses.
Mel Gibson said: “Desmond abhorred violence. It was against his principles and his religious beliefs, but he wanted to serve his country.
“How does somebody go into the worst place on earth without a weapon?”
Desmond grew up in a family of Seventh-day Adventists in Lynchburg, Virginia. The Protestant denomination strictly believe in the Ten Commandments, including Thou Shalt Not Kill.
Assault by machine guns and flamethrowers
Desmond swore he would never strike out in anger after witnessing his father, an alcoholic, almost murder his uncle.
After the Japanese attacked the US naval base of Pearl Harbor, in Hawaii, in 1941, the 23-year-old Desmond joined the army, refusing a deferment for being a shipyard worker.
He explained in a documentary: “I felt like it was an honour to serve God and country. I didn’t want to be known as a draft dodger, but I sure didn’t know what I was getting into.
“We were fighting for our religious liberty and freedom. I tried to explain I was a conscientious co-operator. I was seen as a joke.”
While training, Desmond, who died at 87 in 2006, became an outcast among fellow recruits after refusing to handle a rifle or train on a Saturday, his Sabbath.
But he would not be intimidated into leaving and even won a tribunal to return after his captain, Jack Glover, had him kicked out on mental health grounds.
Captain Glover had tried to insist Desmond must carry a gun. He said: “We were going into a war and it was kill or be killed.”
After two years he was sent with the 307th Infantry Regiment, 77th Infantry Division, to Guam and the Philippines, where he won a Bronze Star Medal for courage under fire.
His division was sent to take Hacksaw Ridge, key to reaching the island of Okinawa, in April 1945.
It was to be a perilous mission. By day the Japanese let the US soldiers up to the ridge. Then at night they emerged from tunnels to launch blistering assaults with machine guns and flamethrowers.
Nine times the Americans were driven from the top, suffering hideous injuries and fatalities.
Out of the 155 men in the unit to go up in one wave only 55 managed to escape by themselves. Ignoring orders to retreat, Desmond stayed behind to save those still breathing.
He said: “The bullets were flying, I grabbed them by the collar and got as close to the ground as possible.
I was praying, ‘Please Lord help me get one more’. And once I had got him, I said it again.”
After dragging them from the battlefield, he tied a rope around himself to lower each injured comrade down the cliff.
He continued for hours — until everyone was rescued. Only then did he climb down himself, miraculously free of serious injury.
One of those he saved was Captain Glover, who admitted: “My thoughts changed about trying to have him kicked out.”
Amazingly, Desmond also treated the Japanese soldiers who had been trying to kill him.
Movie star Andrew said: “Desmond treated the enemy with as much care as he would his fellow Americans.
“That’s hard to wrap your mind around. The fact that this man, who is built as skinnily as I am, dragged men across the most rugged terrain under gunfire . . . that’s like when you hear about mothers who lift trucks off babies.”
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Inspired by his bravery, the men in his division did not want to launch the next assault without him.
But there was one problem. It was planned for the Sabbath.
Desmond agreed to accompany them but only if he could pray first — and the whole operation was held up while he did so.
There was more trauma to come for Desmond. Just 16 days later, on May 21, a hand grenade landed in a foxhole where he was treating others.
Desmond said: “There was nowhere I could get out.
“I just quickly threw it back. I was seeing stars and knew my legs had been blown up.”
According to his Medal of Honor citation, he cared for his own injuries rather than call another aid man from cover.
He waited five hours until two of his comrades could reach him.
Even then, as he was being carried to safety, the three of them were caught in an enemy tank attack.
He crawled off his stretcher and directed those carrying him to treat other injured men nearby.
Awaiting the stretcher’s return he was hit in the arm by a sniper’s bullet. But he managed to fashion a splint out of a rifle and crawl 300 yards to safety.
On October 12, 1945, President Truman presented Desmond with the Medal of Honor for his actions.
The citation read: “Through his outstanding bravery and unflinching determination in the face of desperately dangerous conditions, Private First Class Doss saved the lives of many soldiers.
"His name became a symbol throughout the 77th Infantry Division for outstanding gallantry far above and beyond the call of duty.”
After the war, Desmond spent five years in and out of hospitals being treated for his wounds. He lost five ribs, caught tuberculosis and then lost a lung.
Yet despite his injuries he managed to look after a farm in Georgia with his wife Dorothy, who he had married in the week before signing up. They had one son, Desmond Jr.
Before his death he was always too modest to agree to a movie being made about his life.
Mel said: “Desmond was asked permission for years to adapt his story into a film and repeatedly declined, insisting the ‘real heroes’ were the ones in the ground.
“In a cinematic landscape overrun with fictional ‘superheroes’, I thought it was time to celebrate a real one.”
- Hacksaw Ridge, which was nominated for three Golden Globes in tonight’s ceremony, is in cinemas on January 27.