Exciting news! Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland has taken the fight to win a Medal of Honor for Waverly Woodson to the next level. Van Hollen has teamed up with a coalition of bipartisan legislators to introduce a bill in the Senate and House calling on the President to award Woodson our nation’s highest honor.
Van Hollen announced the news Sept. 8 at a Zoom press conference attended by Joann Woodson, Woodson’s wife, and his legislative partners. This is looking good!
Theolus "B" Wells, one of the men featured in FORGOTTEN, passed away July 16. He was 96. Mr. Wells, 96, of Orangeburg, South Carolina, shared a foxhole on Utah Beach on D-Day. "I didn't have enough sense to be scared," he said, explaining that he was just a kid. During his time in Britain training for the invasion, he was often mistaken for the boxing champ Joe Louis. He didn't always correct the mistake, he said with a smile, especially if the person asking him happened to be a lady. You can read more about him here.
Photo courtesy of Janet Singleton Wooten/Facebook
I was so very touched to receive an email from Roger Moss, executive director of the Savannah (Ga.) Children's Choir, which performed a work at the June 6, D-Day ceremonies at the American Cemetery in Normandy paying tribute to the men of my book FORGOTTEN. Roger writes, "One of our children presented a report based on your book in order for the children to understand. Here are the lyrics. Thank you for your book." Thank you Roger, and the children in the choir!
A SOLDIER'S HEART
Music: Wycliffe Gordon; Lyrics: Roger Moss
Brave and strong
Filled with gratefulness and song
Our hearts are full
Without worry or fear
All thanks to what you showed us here
For on these banks
With the light of battle in your eyes
You flew balloons of freedom in the skies
From many cities and sometimes kept apart
One thing in common, a soldier’s heart
A Soldier’s heart, a soldier’s spirit, a soldier’s soul
A heart whose beats are freedom songs
A spirit calls to right the wrongs
A soul that seeks justice and peace
Your children’s thanks will never cease
As we leave this place we’ll hold you near
Remembering all that we learned here
Our lives changed
Each day we’ll start
Living our lives with a soldier’s heart
Good news! WWII Navy hero Carl Clark, 100, will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Mr. Clark helped saved his ship and many shipmates after a Japanese kamikaze attack but was denied proper recognition. Like Waverly Woodson, the Army Medal of Honor nominee I have written about extensively on this page, Mr. Clark was a victim of the US military's policy of denying top honors to African Americans. He finally got a Commendation Medal-- and a thank you -- in 2012. I'll always be thankful to Ricki Stevenson, Robin Bates and Constance Bryan for bringing us together last March for a talk at UC Berkeley. Dapper in his Navy uniform -- it still fit him perfectly -- he was still going strong and was a compelling speaker. He also wrote a memoir. Click here to read more about Mr. Clark.
Al Sharpton interviewed Linda Hervieux at MSNBC's studios in Rockefeller Center.
Should D'Day's hero medic, Waverly Woodson, receive the Medal of Honor? That was question Al Sharpton explored on his MSNBC show PoliticsNation. Woodson, dubbed the invasion's No. 1 hero by the black press, was nominated for the nation's highest honor, though he never received it. His widow, Joann Woodson, eloquently made the case to Sharpton about her husband's heroism. Linda's Hervieux's book FORGOTTEN: The Untold Story of D-Day's Black Heroes, At Home and At War, makes the case for Woodson to posthumously receive this important award. See the interview here.
Lowell Sun photographer Julie Malakie takes a selfie with Linda Hervieux on a frigid, windy day at the Centralville War Memorial in Lowell. Julia's photo and video with Linda appeared on page 1 of the Lowell Sun, along with Christopher Scott's page 1 story about the men of the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion, the only black combat unit to land on D-Day. Read the story here. FORGOTTEN also make page 1 of the Nashua Telegraph. Read the story here.
FORGOTTEN makes page 1 of the Lowell Sun on Dec. 4, 2015.
Historian Antony Beevor came to Miami to talk about his new book, "Ardennes 1944," and Linda took the opportunity to ask him about her book, "Forgotten." Beevor said he's love to read it. A book is on the way!