Carter, Edward A., Jr. 1916-1963

Staff Sergeant Edward A. Carter
Medal of Honor Recipient
By Chief Warrant Officer 4 Ernest McPherson
California Center for Military History, State Military Reserve

When the Civil War ended, 21 African American soldiers wore the Medal of Honor. Blacks have earned our nation's highest honor in every war since then, except strangely eighty years later, World War II.1.2 million blacks served in that conflict and many bravely died in it, yet not one received any of its 433 Medals of Honor.

Finally, on January 13, 1997, a wrong was addressed as seven black heroes joined those ranks. Our state proudly associates with one of them, a California native, the late Army Staff Sergeant Edward Allen Carter Jr. His is a story of a true military man with more than his share of tribulations. Today, the California State Military Museum celebrates his victory over all challenges except that of being physically here to receive our thanks.

A career Army noncommissioned officer, Edward Carter Jr. was born May 26, 1916 in Los Angeles, California. He was the son of missionary parents who went to the Far East and finally settled in Shanghai, China. Edward ran away from this home when he was a young teen to begin a military exodus. However, it was not to be an ordinary journey as his material and spiritual paths intertwined.

His first tour was short-lived, yet not too short to prevent the 15-year-old Carter from rising to the rank of lieutenant in the Chinese Army. When he was discovered to still be a child, Edward was promptly discharged and returned to his parents. It was also long enough for Carter to believe he was visited by a spirit in the Chinese Army and informed him would be a great warrior but would not die in war. Now having a spiritual military destiny, as soon as he was old enough, Edward enrolled in a Shanghai military school. There he received extensive combat training and learned at least four languages, including Mandarin Chinese, Hindi and German.

Next he fought in the Spanish Civil War as a corporal in the socialist Abraham Lincoln Brigade. It was an American volunteer unit opposing General Franco's fascist troops. In 1938, they were forced to flee into France. This led to his return to the United States.

Here he met and married his wife Mildred in Los Angeles in 1940. It wasn't long though before destiny called again. He enlisted in the U.S. Army September 6, 1941, shortly before World War II and quickly rose to staff sergeant. In 1942, just months after he enlisted, however, the Army opened a counterintelligence file with his name on it. On May 18, 1943, an unidentified intelligence officer at Fort Benning, Georgia "deemed it advisable" to put Sergeant Carter under surveillance and start an investigation. The officer did so because Carter had been a member of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade. Allegedly, "while not necessarily communist," he had been "exposed to communism."

The report further alleged, "Subject... capable of having connections with subversive. activities due to... early years (until 1938) in the Orient" and had a speaking knowledge of Chinese. Every commander Carter had thereafter secretly reported what he read, where he went and what clubs he joined.

In 1944 he was shipped to Europe and ended up assigned to supply duties. When General Eisenhower ran short of combat-arms replacements in December 1944, he instituted the volunteer Ground Force Replacement Command for rear-echelon soldiers of all races. By February 1945, a total of 4,562 black soldiers were serving in units up to company size attached to previously all-white infantry and armored divisions.

At the height of his career he was even close to General George S. Patton, serving as one of the general's guards. Patton had no room for prejudice in the ranks. They had a strong bond with the fact they both believed they had been visited by a spirit who foretold accomplishments on the battlefield.

After months of volunteering, Carter's platoon made it into combat, yet he had to accept demotion to private. This was because his superiors would not allow a black to command white troops. He eventually served in the "Mystery Division" of blacks in Patton's Third Army. (The Mystery Division performed missions requiring uniforms without identifying unit insignia.) On March 23, 1945, Private Carter earned his Medal of Honor, was recommended, but received the nation's second highest award, the Distinguished Service Cross because of his race.

After recovering from his wounds in less than a month, he was restored to his staff sergeant rank and finished the war training troops.

At this point, October 1945, he had been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, Bronze Star, Purple Heart, American Defense Service Medal, Combat Infantry Badge and numerous other citations and honors. Shortly thereafter in 1946, Secretary of War Robert Patterson noted an irregularity in the lack of black recognition and promised to investigate. At the conclusion of the war Carter found himself stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington, and politely known as a Negro or colored. A lot of the battlefield camaraderie had faded, however, black soldiers were becoming increasing common and were blending more into the ranks.

When Carter attempted to reenlist, the Army barred his enlistment and drummed him out of uniform without explanation on September 30, 1949. He received an Honorable Discharge dated October 1949, probably the darkest "honor" of his life.

It is unclear when it became known they had banished the decorated warrior as a suspected communist. It was very clear the Army denied him the life of soldiering he dearly loved.

He moved into a life as a family man and steadily worked in the vehicle tire business the rest of his life. In 1962, although he smoked, he and his doctors attributed the discovery of lung cancer to shrapnel still in his neck. He died peacefully of lung cancer in the UCLA Medical Center, a Los Angeles hospital, on January 30, 1963 at 47 years of age.

Sergeant Carter was laid to rest at the National Cemetery within the Veterans Hospital grounds in West Los Angeles near where he died.

In 1992 Secretary of the Army John Shannon commissioned an independent study to identify unrecognized African American heroes from World War II. In May 1996 the study was completed under the title, The Exclusion of Black Soldiers from the Medal of Honor in World War II. Staff Sergeant Edward Allen Carter Jr. of Los Angeles, California was identified and recommended for honors. January 10, 1997, Sergeant Carter was exhumed from the national cemetery and honored the next day in Los Angeles. On January 13, President Clinton presented Carter's posthumous Medal of Honor to his son, Edward Allen Carter III in Washington, D.C.

A horse drawn caisson and full military honors on January 14, 1997 ended his physical destiny following his birth in 1916 and passing away in 1963. Edward Carter, the consummate soldier, was now finally at rest in the Arlington National Cemetery as befitted his material exodus. His spiritual exodus was also about to end. In 1998 Allene Carter, his daughter-in-law, received 57 pages of declassified Army documents in response to Freedom of Information Act requests. The documents showed the Army could not find a shred of disloyalty by Carter.

In an emotional ceremony in the Pentagon's Hall of Heroes, the day before Veterans Day 1999, the Carter family again met with President Clinton. Assisting the Commander-in-Chief was General John Keane, Army vice chief of staff. General Keane presented the Carter family with a set of corrected military records and belated posthumous awards for Staff Sergeant Edward A. Carter Jr. of the Army Good Conduct Medal, Army of Occupation Medal and American Campaign Medal. Below where Carter's picture now hangs with other Medal of Honor holders, the Army admitted declassified Army intelligence records showed that any suspicions against the hero had no basis in fact.

General Keane and the President extended a full apology to the family and the nation. Thus ended the complete military destiny of Medal of Honor holder Edward Allen Carter Jr. with the end of his spiritual exodus.

The Deed

Carter's unit was the Seventh Army Infantry Company Number 1 (Provisional) attached to the 56th Armored Infantry Battalion, 12th Armored Division. In concert with the Third U.S. Army it was advancing toward Speyer, Germany on March 23, 1945. Speyer, a city of about 50,000 was a target in a race to secure bridgeheads.

The tank on which Carter, then 28, and other infantrymen were riding came under heavy small arms and anti-armor fire. Unit members thought the fire had come from a large warehouse on the outskirts of town. This resulted in him volunteering to lead three other soldiers on a patrol against the German position. They advanced toward the structure and took cover where they located and assessed the approximate enemy strength. They left this cover to cross 150 yards or so of open fields to the warehouse.

One American soldier was soon killed and Carter sent the two survivors back to hold the position covering his advance. There, another comrade was killed and the other seriously wounded by the German defenders. Carter inched his way to a place of safety behind a ridge 30 yards away and endured an exchange of gunfire with the warehouse. Along the way, his deadly fire knocked out two enemy machine gun nests and a mortar crew.

He paid a price though, as a machine gun burst put three bullets through his left arm. Continuing, he was knocked to the ground by another wound to his left leg. Then, after taking "wound tablets" a drink from his canteen was interrupted with another wound through his left hand. Three shrapnel wounds followed and were credited for pain he endured the rest of his life.

After enduring Carter's close proximity and periodic fire, German officers in the warehouse finally sent eight soldiers to flush him out and finish him off. He lay still for two hours until the patrol approached him, thinking the blood-soaked American soldier was dead.

Suddenly, Carter, seriously wounded, opened fire with his .45-caliber submachine gun. He shot six of the enemy dead and took the other two prisoner. Using them as a human shield, the sergeant made his way back to the American tanks. As another act of courage. Carter refused to be evacuated until he could report all he had observed and extract needed information about the enemy's emplacement from his German speaking prisoners.

Edward Allen Carter, II (1916-1963) was born in Los Angeles to missionary parents, and raised in Shanghai, China. As a teenager he joined the Chinese Nationalist Army to fight the Japanese, winning rapid advancement. He later joined the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and served in Spain, beginning in June 1937. Carter enlisted in the U.S. Army in September 1941 and was shipped overseas in November 1944. In 1945, while stationed in Germany, Carter distinguished himself in battle, suffering multiple bullet wounds. His heroic actions went unheralded by the U.S. Army for many years, due largely to discrimination against African Americans. Suspicion of Carter’s political background led the Army to reject his effort to re-enlist in 1949. Carter died on January 30, 1963. More than three decades after his death, the Army and the U.S. government finally recognized Carter’s bravery with a Congress Medal of Honor. The U.S. also named a ship after Carter, and his body was re-interred at Arlington National Cemetery in 1997.

Edward A. Carter Jr. was a career non-commissioned officer for the United States Army and one of the few African American recipients of the Medal of Honor during World War II.

Carter was born May 26, 1916, in Los Angeles, California to missionary parents and was raised in Calcutta, India, and Shanghai, China. Fluent in Hindi, Mandarin, English, and German, Carter ran away from home and enlisted in the Chinese Nationalist Army at the age of fifteen to fight the Japanese after the Shanghai Incident of 1932. He rose to the rank of lieutenant before he was found to be underage and discharged.

After a stint in a Shanghai military school and a failed attempt at joining the U.S. Army, Carter wound up in Europe in the late 1930s, fighting for the Loyalists in the Spanish Civil War. He fought as a corporal in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, an integrated volunteer troop of mostly American socialists until they were forced to flee to Paris in 1938.

Upon his return to the United States, Carter joined the Army in 1941 and was quickly promoted to staff sergeant because of his extensive military experience. Having witnessed the violence and discrimination visited upon African American soldiers during training in segregated Georgia, many of whom were dishonorably discharged when they fought back, Carter was determined to remain in the Army. After he accepted a demotion to cook in an era when blacks were rarely allowed to be officers or even participate in combat, Carter was shipped to Europe in 1944. By 1945, replacements were desperately needed, and Carter once again gave up his staff sergeant stripes. He joined as a volunteer private in the Seventh Army Provisional Infantry Company No. 1 and was assigned to the 56th Armored Infantry Battalion of the 12th Armored Division. Company commander Captain Floyd Vanderhoff, noting Carter’s experience and leadership, restored his staff sergeant stripes and made him an infantry squad leader.

While fighting with the 12th Armored, Carter became a member of General George S. Patton’s “Mystery Division” in his push into Germany and served as Patton’s personal bodyguard. Carter’s actions in battle on March 23, 1945, earned him a recommendation for the Medal of Honor, but because of his race he was awarded instead the Distinguished Service Cross.

After the war, Carter was promoted to sergeant first class and stationed in Fort Lewis, Washington, following a brief break in Los Angeles with his wife Mildred, children Edward and William, and two stepchildren. However, when Carter’s enlistment was near expiration, he was stunned to find that his request for re-enlistment had been denied. Unbeknownst to him, his service with the Lincoln Brigade and experience in China had raised fears of communist ties and made him a target throughout his career. He received an honorable discharge in October 1949.

Carter lived out the remainder of his life as a family man, working in the vehicle tire business. He passed away from lung cancer in Los Angeles on January 30, 1963. He was forty-six.

In 1992 Secretary of the Army John Shannon commissioned an independent study to identify unrecognized African American heroes from World War II. In May 1996, the study was completed and Carter was identified and recommended for honors. On January 13, 1997, President Clinton presented Carter’s posthumous Medal of Honor to his son, Edward Allen Carter III. However, it was not until 1999, after Carter’s family pressed the Army for answers into his disbarment, that the army formally apologized and issued a new discharge certificate, backdated to 1949, indicating that Carter had been eligible for full re-enlistment.

Edward Allen Carter Jr. (May 26, 1916 – January 30, 1963) was a United States Army sergeant first class who was wounded in action during World War II. He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military decoration for valor, for his actions of March 23, 1945, near Speyer, Germany.[1][2]

Carter and six other black Americans who served in World War II were awarded the Medal of Honor on January 12, 1997. The seven recipients are the first and only black Americans to be awarded the Medal of Honor for World War II.[3][4]


Contents
1 Early years
2 Military career
2.1 China and Spain
2.2 World War II
3 Awards and decorations
3.1 Medal of Honor
3.1.1 Citation
4 See also
5 References
5.1 Footnotes
5.2 Sources
6 External links
Early years
Carter was born in Los Angeles, California, in 1916. He was the son of missionary parents; an African American father and an East Indian mother. Carter grew up in India and then moved to Shanghai, China.[1]

Military career
China and Spain
While in Shanghai in 1932, Carter ran away from home and joined the National Revolutionary Army fighting against the invading Japanese during the Shanghai Incident. After reaching the rank of Lieutenant, he had to leave when it was discovered that he was 15 years old. He eventually made his way to Spain and joined the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, an American volunteer unit supporting the Spanish Loyalists in their fight against the Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War.[1]

World War II
Carter had entered the U.S. Army on September 26, 1941. As a result of his previous combat experience, he stood out among the other recruits. In less than a year, he had achieved the rank of staff sergeant. Carter was part of the 56th Armored Infantry Battalion of the 12th Armored Division.[5]

Provisional platoons of African-American troops were established in the wake of the Battle of the Bulge, which took place during the winter of 1944–1945. Black support and combat-support soldiers were allowed to volunteer for combat duty and were given brief training in small-unit tactics. Formed into provisional units, they were used to augment depleted divisions. Soldiers volunteering for this combat duty had to surrender their current rank. When the provisional companies were set up Carter volunteered and went from staff sergeant to private.


Twelfth Armored soldier standing guard over a group of Germans
On March 23, 1945, Carter, then a 28-year-old infantry staff sergeant, was riding on a tank when it was hit by a Panzerschreck. Dismounted, Carter led three soldiers across an open field. In the process, two of the men were killed and the other seriously wounded. Carter continued on alone and was wounded five times before being forced to take cover.

Eight German soldiers tried to capture him, but he killed six and captured the remaining two. He used the two as human shields from enemy fire as he recrossed the field. His prisoners provided valuable information on enemy troop dispositions for his unit. For this, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross on October 4, 1945, and later promoted to sergeant first class.[5]

Carter was refused re-enlistment in Army in 1949, due to allegations that he had communist contacts and allegiances, related to his affiliation with the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and a "Welcome Home Joe" dinner.[2] He died of lung cancer—attributed to shrapnel remaining in his neck—on January 30, 1963.[1] Carter was buried at Los Angeles National Cemetery and re-interred at Arlington National Cemetery in 1997.[6]

Awards and decorations
Carter's awards and decorations include:




Bronze oak leaf clusterBronze oak leaf clusterBronze oak leaf cluster
Badge Combat Infantryman Badge
1st row Medal of Honor
2nd row Bronze Star Medal Purple Heart Army Good Conduct Medal
3rd row American Defense Service Medal EAME Campaign Medal
with oak leaf clusters World War II Victory Medal
MV SSG Edward A. Carter Jr. (T-AK 4544), a Navy container ship of the Military Sealift Command, was named after Carter.[7]

Medal of Honor

Carter's grave at Arlington National Cemetery
In the early 1990s, it was determined that black soldiers had been denied consideration for the Medal of Honor in World War II on ground of their race. In 1993, the Army contracted Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina, to research and determine if there was racial disparity in the review process for recipients of the Medal of Honor. A study commissioned by the Army described systematic racial discrimination in the criteria for awarding decorations during World War II.

In 1996, after an exhaustive review of files, the study recommended that ten black Americans who served in World War II be awarded the Medal of Honor. In October of that year, Congress passed legislation that would allow the Medal of Honor to be passed to seven out of the ten former soldiers. The Medal of Honor was given to Carter's son, the descendants of the other five black Americans, and the only still-living recipient, Vernon Baker, on January 12, 1997.[8][9][10][11][12] Out of the seven, six had their Distinguished Service Crosses revoked and upgraded.[13]

Citation
The president of the United States in the name of the Congress takes pride in presenting the Medal of Honor posthumously to:


Staff Sergeant Edward A. Carter Jr., United States Army


For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his own life above and beyond the call of duty in action on 23 March 1945. At approximately 0830 hours, 23 March 1945, near Speyer, Germany, the tank upon which Staff Sergeant Carter was riding received bazooka and small arms fire from the vicinity of a large warehouse to its left front. Staff Sergeant Carter and his squad took cover behind an intervening road bank. Staff Sergeant Carter volunteered to lead a three-man patrol to the warehouse where other unit members noticed the original bazooka fire. From here they were to ascertain the location and strength of the opposing position and advance approximately 150 yards across an open field. Enemy small arms fire covered this field. As the patrol left this covered position, they received intense enemy small arms fire killing one member of the patrol instantly. This caused Staff Sergeant Carter to order the other two members of the patrol to return to the covered position and cover him with rifle fire while he proceeded alone to carry out the mission. The enemy fire killed one of the two soldiers while they were returning to the covered position, and seriously wounded the remaining soldier before he reached the covered position. An enemy machine gun burst wounded Staff Sergeant Carter three times in the left arm as he continued the advance. He continued and received another wound in his left leg that knocked him from his feet. As Staff Sergeant Carter took wound tablets and drank from his canteen, the enemy shot it from his left hand, with the bullet going through his hand. Disregarding these wounds, Staff Sergeant Carter continued the advance by crawling until he was within thirty yards of his objective. The enemy fire became so heavy that Staff Sergeant Carter took cover behind a bank and remained there for approximately two hours. Eight enemy riflemen approached Staff Sergeant Carter, apparently to take him prisoner. Staff Sergeant Carter killed six of the enemy soldiers and captured the remaining two. These two enemy soldiers later gave valuable information concerning the number and disposition of enemy troops. Staff Sergeant Carter refused evacuation until he had given full information about what he had observed and learned from the captured enemy soldiers. This information greatly facilitated the advance on Speyer. Staff Sergeant Carter’s extraordinary heroism was an inspiration to the officers and men of the 7th Army, Infantry Company Number 1 (Provisional) and exemplify the highest traditions of the military service.[14]