Medal of Honor

John Ortega in 1864. In 1861, early in the American Civil War, a proposal for a battlefield decoration for valor was submitted to Lieutenant General Winfield Scott, the Commanding General of the United States Army, by Lieutenant Colonel Edward D. Townsend, an assistant adjutant at the Department of War and Scott's chief of staff. Scott, however, was strongly against the American republic's awarding medals for valor, a European monarchical tradition. After Scott retired in October 1861, however, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles adopted the idea of a decoration to recognize and honor distinguished naval service. On December 9, 1861, Iowa Senator James W. Grimes, Chairman on the Committee on Naval Affairs, introduced bill S. 82. The bill included a provision authorizing 200 "medals of honor," "to be bestowed upon such petty officers, seamen, landsmen, and marines as shall most distinguish themselves by their gallantry in action and other seaman-like qualities during the present war...." On December 21, the bill was passed and signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln. On May 15, 1862, the United States Department of the Navy ordered 175 medals ($1.85 each) from the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia with "Personal Valor" inscribed on the back of each one. On February 15, 1862, Senator Henry Wilson, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Military Affairs and the Militia, introduced a resolution (equivalent to a bill) for a Medal of Honor for the Army. The resolution (equivalent to a modern Act of Congress) was approved by Congress and signed into law on July 12, 1862. The Army's version had "The Congress to" engraved on the back of the medal. Both versions were made of copper and coated with bronze, which "gave them a reddish tint." On March 3, 1863, Congress made the Army Medal of Honor a permanent decoration by passing legislation permitting the award to such soldiers "as have most distinguished or who may hereafter most distinguish themselves in action." The same legislation also authorized the medal for officers of the Army. On March 25, 1863 the Secretary of War presented the first Medals of Honor to six U.S. Army volunteers in his office. In 1896, the ribbon of the Army's version of the Medal of Honor was redesigned with all stripes being vertical. Again, in 1904 the planchet of the Army's version of the Medal of Honor was redesigned by General George Lewis Gillespie. particularly the membership insignia issued by the Grand Army of the Republic. In 1917, based on the report of the Medal of Honor Review Board, established by Congress in 1916, 911 recipients were stricken from the Army's Medal of Honor list because the medal had been awarded inappropriately. Among them were William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody and Mary Edwards Walker. In 1977, the Army's board for correction of military records unilaterally restored Walker's medal at the request of a relative. The board had no authority to overturn a statute, and the restoration violated not only the period law during the Civil War, but also the law requiring revocation in 1916, and modern law in 1977. As a reaction to Walker's restoration, a relative of Cody's requested the same action from the Army's board for correction, and it reinstated the medals for Cody and four other civilian scouts on June 12, 1989. Subsequent litigation over the Garlin Conner award, which was recommended by the Army's board for correction of military records in 2015, established that the correction boards lack the authority to unilaterally award Medals of Honor. In Conner's case, the board merely recommended the medal, which was then referred to the Senior Army Decorations Board, and ultimately to the Secretary of the Army, the Secretary of Defense, and the President, who requested a waiver be passed by Congress. A separate Coast Guard Medal of Honor was authorized in 1963 but was not designed or awarded. design completed on April 14, 1965, ==Appearance==

There are three versions of the Medal of Honor, one for each of the military departments of the Department of Defense (DoD): the Department of the Army, Department of the Navy (including the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard), and Department of the Air Force (Air and Space Forces). Members of the Coast Guard, part of the Department of Homeland Security, are eligible to receive the Naval version. The United States Congress considered a bill in 2004 which would require the Medal of Honor to be made with 90% gold, the same composition as the lesser-known Congressional Gold Medal, but the bill did not pass Congress. Army variant The Army's version is described by the Institute of Heraldry as "a gold five-pointed star, each point tipped with trefoils, wide, surrounded by a green laurel wreath and suspended from a gold bar inscribed VALOR, surmounted by an eagle. In the center of the star, Minerva's head surrounded by the words UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. The pendant and suspension bar are made of gilding metal, with the eye, jump rings, and suspension ring made of red brass. The finish on the pendant and suspension bar is hard enameled, gold plated, and rose gold plated, with polished highlights. In the center is Minerva, personifying the United States, standing with her left hand resting on fasces and her right hand holding a shield emblazoned with the shield from the coat of arms of the United States. Air and Space Forces variant The Air and Space Forces version is described as "within a wreath of green laurel, a gold five-pointed star, one point down, tipped with trefoils and each point containing a crown of laurel and oak on a green background. Centered on the star, an annulet of 34 stars is a representation of the head of the Statue of Liberty. The connecting bar, hinge, and pin are made of bronze. The medals featured a female allegory of the Union, with a shield in her right hand that she used to fend off a crouching attacker and serpents. In 1896, the Army version changed the ribbon's design and colors due to misuse and imitation by nonmilitary organizations. After World War I, the Department of the Navy decided to separate the Medal of Honor into two versions, one for combat and one for non-combat. Despite the "actual conflict" guidelines, the Tiffany Cross was awarded to Navy CDR (later RADM) Richard E. Byrd and Floyd Bennett for their flight to the North Pole in 1926. The decision was controversial within the Navy's Bureau of Navigation (which handled personnel administration), and officials considered asking the attorney general of the United States for an advisory opinion on the matter. Byrd himself apparently disliked the Tiffany Cross, and eventually requested the alternate version of the medal from President Herbert Hoover in 1930. The Tiffany Cross itself was not popular among recipients—one author reflected that it was "the most short-lived, legally contentious, and unpopular version of the Medal of Honor in American history." In 1942, in response to a lawsuit, the Department of the Navy requested an amendment to expressly allow noncombat awards of the Medal of Honor. When the amendment passed, the Department of the Navy returned to using only the original 1862 inverted 5-point star design and retired the Tiffany Cross. In 1944, the suspension ribbons for both versions were replaced with the now-familiar neck ribbon. The Air Force diverged from the traditional depiction of Minerva in part due to a desire to distinguish itself from the Army, including the Institute of Heraldry that traditionally designs awards, but which falls under the Army. File:US-MOH-1862.png|1862–1895 Army version File:US-MOH-1896.png|1896–1903 Army version File:US-MOH-1904.png|1904–1944 Army version File:Army Medal of Honor.jpg|Post 1944 Army version File:US Navy Medal of Honor (1862 original).png|1862–1912 Navy version File:US Navy Medal of Honor (1913 to 1942).png|1913–1942 Navy version File:Tiffany Cross Medal of Honor.jpg|1919–1942 Navy "Tiffany Cross" version File:NavyMedalofHonor.jpg|Post 1942 Navy version ==Neck ribbon, service ribbon and lapel button==

On May 2, 1896, Congress authorized a "ribbon to be worn with the medal and [a] rosette or knot to be worn in lieu of the medal." The service ribbon is light blue with five white stars in the form of an "M." The center of the ribbon displays thirteen white stars in the form of three chevron. Both the top and middle chevrons are made up of five stars, with the bottom chevron made of three stars. Department of the Navy The Navy Medal of Honor is a five-pointed bronze star, tipped with trefoils containing a crown of laurel and oak. The Medal of Honor is one of only two United States military awards suspended from a neck ribbon. The other is the Commander's Degree of the Legion of Merit, and is usually awarded to individuals serving foreign governments. ==Devices==

In 2011, Department of Defense (DOD) instructions in regard to the Medal of Honor were amended to read "for each succeeding act that would otherwise justify award of the [Medal of Honor], the individual receiving the subsequent award is authorized to wear an additional [Medal of Honor] ribbon or a "V" Device on the Medal of Honor suspension ribbon" (the "V" device is a bronze miniature letter "V" with serifs that denotes valor). The Medal of Honor was the only decoration authorized to use the "V" device (none were ever issued) to designate subsequent awards in such a fashion. Nineteen individuals, all now deceased, were double Medal of Honor recipients. Effective December 2016, the relevant DOD manual was updated to read: The update further explicitly removed authorization for any device(s) on the MOH: == Medal of Honor Flag ==

On October 23, 2002, was enacted, modifying , authorizing a Medal of Honor Flag to be presented to each person to whom a Medal of Honor is awarded. In the case of a posthumous award, the flag will be presented to whomever the Medal of Honor is presented to, which in most cases will be the primary next of kin of the deceased awardee. The flag was based on a concept by retired U.S. Army Special Forces First Sergeant Bill Kendall of Jefferson, Iowa, who in 2001, designed a flag to honor Medal of Honor recipient Army Air Forces Captain Darrell Lindsey, a Martin B-26 Marauder pilot from Jefferson who was killed in action during World War II. Kendall's design of a light blue field emblazoned with 13 white five-pointed stars was nearly identical to that of Sarah LeClerc's of the Institute of Heraldry. The first Medal of Honor Flag recipient was U.S. Army Sergeant First Class Paul R. Smith, whose flag was presented posthumously. President George W. Bush presented the Medal of Honor and Flag to the family of Smith during the award ceremony for him in the White House on April 4, 2005. ==Recommendation process and presentation==

bestowing the Medal of Honor upon Henry Breault, March 8, 1924 There are two distinct protocols for recommending and adjudicating the Medal of Honor. The first and most common is recommendation within three years and approval within five years through the chain of command of the service member. The second method, which normally applies outside of the statute of limitations, is when a recommendation is referred to a military service by a member of the U.S. Congress, generally at the request of a constituent under . In both cases, if the proposal is outside the time limits for the recommendation, approval to waive the time limit requires a special Act of Congress. The Medal of Honor is presented by the President on behalf of, and in the name of, the Congress. Since 1980, nearly all Medal of Honor recipients—or in the case of posthumous awards, the next of kin—have been personally decorated by the president. Since 1941, more than half of the Medals of Honor have been awarded posthumously. ==Evolution of criteria==

Awarding 19th century (Navy) Navy regulations published in 1865 specified that "The medal shall only be awarded to those petty officers, and others indicated, who shall have evinced in battle some signal act of valor or devotion to their country; and nothing save such conduct, coupled with good general qualities in the service, shall be held to establish a sufficient claim to it." The regulation also permitted awards to seamen for "extraordinary heroism in the line of their profession," which meant heroism outside of combat operations. 19th century (Army) Several months after President Abraham Lincoln signed Public Resolution 82 into law on December 21, 1861, for a Navy medal of honor, a similar resolution was passed in July 1862 for an Army version of the medal. Six U.S. Army soldiers who hijacked a Confederate locomotive named The General in 1862 were the first Medal of Honor recipients; James J. Andrews led the raid. He was caught and hanged as a U.S. spy, but as a civilian he was not eligible to receive the medal. Many Medals of Honor awarded in the 19th century were associated with "saving the flag" (and country), not just for patriotic reasons, but because the U.S. flag was a primary means of battlefield communication at the time. Because no other military decoration was authorized during the Civil War, some seemingly less exceptional and notable actions were recognized by a Medal of Honor during that conflict. 20th century Early in the twentieth century, the Department of the Navy awarded many Medals of Honor for peacetime bravery. For instance, in 1901, John Henry Helms aboard was awarded the medal for saving the ship's cook from drowning. Six sailors aboard were awarded the medal after the ship's boiler exploded on January 25, 1904. Richard Byrd and Floyd Bennett were awarded the medal—the combat ("Tiffany") version despite the existence then of a non-combat form of the Navy medal—for the 1926 flight they claim reached the North Pole. And Ensign Thomas J. Ryan was awarded the medal for saving a woman from the burning Grand Hotel in Yokohama, Japan, following the 1923 Great Kantō earthquake. Between 1919 and 1942, the Department of the Navy issued two separate versions of the Medal of Honor, one for acts related to combat and one for non-combat bravery. World War I The criteria for the award tightened during World War I for the Army version of the Medal of Honor, while the Navy version retained a non-combat provision until 1963. In an Act of Congress of July 9, 1918, the War Department version of the medal required that the recipient "distinguish himself conspicuously by gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty," and also required that the act of valor be performed "in action involving actual conflict with an enemy." This followed shortly after the results of the Army Medal of Honor Review Board, which struck 911 medals from the Medal of Honor list in February 1917 for lack of basic prerequisites. These included the members of the 27th Maine erroneously awarded the medal for reenlisting to guard the capital during the Civil War, 29 members of Abraham Lincoln's funeral detail, and six civilians, including Buffalo Bill Cody (restored along with four other scouts in 1989) and a doctor, Mary Edwards Walker, who had cared for the sick (this last was restored posthumously in 1977). World War II As a result of lawsuits, the Department of the Navy requested the Congress expressly authorize non-combat medals in the text of the authorizing statute, since the department had been awarding non-combat medals with questionable legal backing that had caused it much embarrassment. The last non-combat Navy Medal of Honor was awarded in 1945, although the Department of the Navy attempted to award a non-combat Medal of Honor as late as the Korean War. Official accounts vary, but generally, the Medal of Honor for combat was known as the "Tiffany Cross", after the company that designed the medal. The Tiffany Cross was first awarded in 1919, but was unpopular partly because of its design as well as a lower gratuity than the Navy's original medal. The Tiffany Cross Medal of Honor was awarded at least three times in non-combat circumstances. By a special Act of Congress, the medal was presented to Byrd and Bennett (see above). In 1942, the Department of the Navy reverted to a single Medal of Honor, although the statute still contained a loophole allowing the award for both "action involving actual conflict with the enemy" or "in the line of his profession." Arising from these criteria, approximately 60 percent of the medals earned during and after World War II have been awarded posthumously. Vietnam era With the passage of Public Law 88–77 on July 25, 1963, the requirements for the Medal of Honor were standardized among all the services, requiring that a recipient had "distinguished himself conspicuously by gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty." Thus, the act removed the loophole allowing non-combat awards to Navy personnel. The act also clarified that the act of valor must occur during one of three circumstances: • While engaged in action against an enemy of the United States • While engaged in military operations involving conflict with an opposing foreign force. • While serving with friendly foreign forces engaged in an armed conflict against an opposing armed force in which the United States is not a belligerent party. Congress drew these three circumstances of combat from President Kennedy's executive order of April 25, 1962, which previously added the same criteria to the Purple Heart. On August 24, Kennedy added similar criteria for the Bronze Star Medal. The amendment was necessary because Cold War armed conflicts did not qualify for consideration under previous statutes such as the 1918 Army Medal of Honor statute that required valor "in action involving actual conflict with an enemy," since the United States has not formally declared war since World War II as a result of the provisions of the United Nations Charter. According to congressional testimony by the Army's Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel, the services were seeking authority to award the Medal of Honor and other valor awards retroactive to July 1, 1958, in areas such as Berlin, Lebanon, Quemoy and Matsu Islands, Taiwan Straits, Congo, Laos, Vietnam, and Cuba. In cases of chain of command recommendation, each intermediate commander will recommend approval or disapproval, citing "specific reasons when disapproval is recommended." If outside of statutory time limitations, another pathway is for a member of Congress to submit a recommendation package for service review under 10 USC 1130, or for Congress to otherwise waive time limitations by statute. A third pathway is for award packages that are submitted timely but lost during processing and then later rediscovered, which permits a service secretary to waive time limitations without seeking a congressional waiver. Most services first screen submissions at their awards branches. For the Army, this entails a review at the Human Resources Command level to determine if the award package is complete according to law and regulation. Then the Senior Army Decorations Board (SADB) reviews the package—this body "draws its membership from lieutenant generals who serve in the office of the Secretary of the Army and on the Army Staff," and is "responsible for reviewing high level valor awards and making recommendations to the Secretary of the Army." Above the decorations boards a Medal of Honor recommendation goes to the assistant secretary for manpower and reserve affairs, the chief of staff of the service, the service secretary, the secretary of defense, and ultimately the president. This interpretation led Congress to authorize a review to revoke these medals in 1916, leading to the revocation of 911 medals. The Army regulation stated "[o]nce an award has been presented, it may be revoked if facts subsequently determined would have prevented original approval of the award, had they been known at the time of award." Eventually, all services' regulations permitted revocation on similar grounds: the Air Force adopted unilateral revocation of valor decorations in 1969, and Navy adopted regulations permitting revocation of valor decorations in 1976. 21st century Unilateral revocation of military decorations (including the Medal of Honor) were eventually standardized by the Office of the Secretary of Defense after controversy surrounding the revocation of the Distinguished Service Cross approved for Army Major Mathew L. Golsteyn, who was charged with murdering a detainee but then pardoned (a grant of forgiveness, which differs from a court's finding of innocence) by President Trump before trial. This incident led DoD to clarify the prerequisites for revoking military awards due to misconduct in the DoD Awards Manual in 2019: "[t]he revocation of [personal military decorations] under the 'honorable' service requirement should be used sparingly and should be limited to those cases where the Service member's actions are not compatible with continued military service, result in criminal convictions, result in determinations that the Service member did not serve satisfactorily in a specific grade or position, or result in a discharge from military service that is characterized as 'Other Than Honorable,' 'Bad Conduct,' or 'Dishonorable.'" DoD also requested that Congress expand the statutory requirement for honorable service after award qualification to include all military decorations, which passed in December 2019. In 2019, a bill titled "Remove the Stain Act" sought to revoke Medals of Honor awarded for conduct during the Wounded Knee Massacre of 1890. The bill directed revocation of 20 Medals of Honor, and also directed removal of the recipients from the Medal of Honor Roll. Directing revocation from the MoH Roll was also a mistake, as the Roll of that time was merely a pension listing for recipients who lived past the age of 65 and separated honorably from the military without retiring. Since many of the Wounded Knee recipients did not live to the age of 65, were discharged dishonorably, or were retired from the military, this meant they never would have been on the Roll. In that particular case, the Senate Committee on Armed Services reflected that "these Medals of Honor were awarded at the prerogative of the President of the United States, not the Congress," suggesting that it was not the role of the legislature to direct awarding or revocation of medals, but rather to control the authorizing criteria for the award. Notably, the DoD review cited the joint explanatory statement for the FY2022 National Defense Authorization Act (which removed the Remove the Stain Act from the bill) as the impetus for the medal review. Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe chairman Ryman LeBeau wrote an op-ed on the outcome, saying "the Pentagon board has recommended that America keep the Medals of Honor for the Wounded Knee Massacre" with all three DoD panelists voting against revocation and both Department of Interior (the department charged with Indian affairs) panelists voting in favor. ==Authority and privileges==

in Chattanooga, Tennessee at the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial at the Memphis National Cemetery The four specific statutory sections authorizing the medal, as last amended on January 1, 2021, are as follows: • Each Medal of Honor recipient may have his or her name entered on the Medal of Honor Roll ( and ) so long as they qualified for the medal under modern statutory authority. • Each person whose name is placed on the Medal of Honor Roll is certified to the United States Department of Veterans Affairs as being entitled to receive a monthly pension above and beyond any military pensions or other benefits for which they may be eligible. The pension is subject to cost-of-living increases; , it is $1,671.16 a month. • Enlisted recipients of the Medal of Honor are entitled to a supplemental uniform allowance. • Recipients receive special entitlements to air transportation under the provisions of DOD Regulation 4515.13-R. This benefit allows the recipient to travel as deemed fit, as well as allows the recipient's dependents to travel either overseas–overseas, overseas–continental U.S., or continental U.S.–overseas when accompanied by the recipient. • Special identification cards and commissary and exchange privileges are provided for Medal of Honor recipients and their eligible dependents. • Recipients are granted eligibility for interment at Arlington National Cemetery, if not otherwise eligible. • Fully qualified children of recipients are automatically nominated to any of the United States service academies. • Recipients receive a ten percent increase in retired pay. • Those awarded the medal after October 23, 2002, receive a Medal of Honor Flag. The law specified that all 103 living prior recipients as of that date would receive a flag. • Recipients receive an invitation to all future presidential inaugurations and inaugural balls. • As with all medals, retired personnel may wear the Medal of Honor on "appropriate" civilian clothing. Regulations specify that recipients of the Medal of Honor are allowed to wear the uniform "at their pleasure" with standard restrictions on political, commercial, or extremist purposes (other former members of the armed forces may do so only at certain ceremonial occasions). • Forty states offer a special license plate for certain types of vehicles to recipients at little or no cost to the recipient. The states that do not offer Medal of Honor specific license plate offer special license plates for veterans for which recipients may be eligible. • In 1969, the Nebraska State Legislature amended the Nebraska Hall of Fame statutes "to provide that Nebraskans awarded the Medal of Honor shall be named to the Hall of Fame" and required that the Hall of Fame Commission procure a plaque with the names of the Medal of Honor recipients. Saluting Eric T. Olson salutes Sergeant First Class Leroy Petry at a ceremony at The Pentagon (July 2011) Although not required by law or military regulation of all military services, members of the uniformed services are encouraged to render salutes to recipients of the Medal of Honor as a matter of respect and courtesy regardless of rank or status, whether or not they are in uniform. This is one of the few instances where a living member of the military will receive salutes from members of a higher rank. According to paragraph 1.8.1.1 of Air Force Instruction 1-1, the United States Air Force requires that salutes be rendered to Medal of Honor recipients. ==Legal protection==

1904 The Army redesigned its Medal of Honor, largely a reaction to the copying of the Medal of Honor by various veterans organizations, such as the Grand Army of the Republic. To prevent the making of copies of the medal, Brigadier General George Gillespie, Jr., a Medal of Honor recipient from the Civil War, applied for and obtained a patent for the new design. General Gillespie received the patent on November 22, 1904, and he transferred it the following month to the Secretary of War at the time, William Howard Taft. In 1994, Congress amended the statute to permit an enhanced penalty if the offense involved the Medal of Honor. 2006 The Stolen Valor Act of 2005 was enacted. The law amended 18 U.S.C. § 704 to make it a federal criminal offense for a person to deliberately state falsely that he or she had been awarded a military decoration, service medal, or badge. The law also permitted an enhanced penalty for someone who falsely claimed to have been awarded the Medal of Honor. The case involved an elected official in California, Xavier Alvarez, who had falsely stated at a public meeting that he had been awarded the Medal of Honor, even though he had never served in any branch of the armed forces. The Supreme Court's decision did not specifically address the constitutionality of the older portion of the statute which prohibits the unauthorized wearing, manufacturing, or sale of military medals or decorations, since the Alvarez prosecution only involved First Amendment protected speech. Under the law, the unauthorized wearing, manufacturing, or sale of the Medal of Honor is punishable by a fine of up to $100,000 and imprisonment of up to one year. 2013 Given the Supreme Court's ruling, President Barack Obama signed into law the Stolen Valor Act of 2013, making it a federal offense for someone to falsely represent themselves as awardees of medals for valor in order to receive "money, property, or other tangible benefit" (including grants, educational benefits, housing, etc.). False representations about the Medal of Honor or other valor decorations still result in a fine or imprisonment up to one year, or both, but are now narrowly tailored to financial gain rather than protected speech. As of 2017, there were only two reported arrests and prosecutions under the law, leading at least 22 states to enact their own legislation to criminalize stolen valor amid claims that the federal law was virtually unenforced. Despite claims that violations of the act are rarely prosecuted, there is evidence that convictions are still taking place, although not all are for Medal of Honor claims, nor are all in federal court. In some cases charges are not explicitly under the Stolen Valor Act, since the same conduct criminalized under the statute is often equally capable of prosecution under regular criminal statutes not involving Stolen Valor. • In 2016, a federal court in IA sentenced a defendant for multiple violations of the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2016, federal prosecutors in OH charged a defendant with violations related to the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2017, a federal court in MO sentenced a defendant for violating the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2017, a federal court in TX sentenced a defendant for violating the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2017, a federal court in IL sentenced a defendant for violations related to stolen valor claims. • In 2018, a PA court sentenced a defendant for violations of the PA state statute on stolen valor. • In 2020, a federal court in GA sentenced a defendant for multiple violations of the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2021, a federal court in PA sentenced a defendant for violating the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2023, a federal court in TX sentenced a defendant for multiple violations of the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2023, a federal court in RI sentenced a defendant for multiple violations of the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2023, a WI man was convicted of several crimes at the state level in connection with stolen valor claims. • In 2024, a federal court in NY sentenced a Canadian man for multiple violations of the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2024, federal prosecutors in NY charged a woman with violating the Stolen Valor Act. • In 2024, federal prosecutors in MN charged a man with violating the Stolen Valor Act. ==Duplicate medals==

Medal of Honor recipients may apply in writing to the headquarters of the service branch of the medal awarded for a replacement or display Medal of Honor, ribbon, and appurtenance (Medal of Honor flag) without charge. Primary next of kin may also do the same and have any questions answered in regard to the Medal of Honor that was awarded. This service applies to all military decorations, which can be "issued on a one-time basis and without charge to the recipient." ==Recipients==

• The first Medals of Honor were awarded and presented to six U.S. Army soldiers ("Andrews Raiders") on March 25, 1863, by Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, in his office of the War Department. Private Jacob Parrott, a U.S. Army volunteer from Ohio, became the first Medal of Honor recipient, awarded for his volunteering for and participation in a raid on a Confederate train in Big Shanty, Georgia, on April 12, 1862, during the American Civil War. After the medal presentations, the six decorated soldiers met with President Lincoln in the White House. • Bernard John Dowling Irwin was the first (chronologically by action) Medal of Honor recipient during the Apache Wars. His actions on February 13, 1861, are the earliest for which the Medal of Honor was awarded. • The first U.S. Navy sailors were awarded the Medal of Honor on April 3, 1863. 41 sailors received the award, with 17 awards for action during the Battle of Forts Jackson and St. Philip. • The first marines awarded the Medal of Honor were John F. Mackie and Pinkerton R. Vaughn on July 10, 1863; Mackie for on May 15, 1862, and Vaughn for on March 14, 1863. • The first, and so far only, Coast Guardsman to be awarded the Medal of Honor was Signalman First Class Douglas Munro. He was posthumously awarded it on May 27, 1943, for evacuating 500 marines under fire on September 27, 1942, during the Battle of Guadalcanal. • The only woman awarded the Medal of Honor is Mary Edwards Walker, who was a civilian Army acting assistant surgeon during the American Civil War. She received the award in 1865 after the Judge Advocate General of the Army determined that she could be given a retroactive commission or brevet, but Secretary of War Stanton ruled against her in spite of this legal advice. Instead of a commission, President Andrew Johnson directed that "the usual medal of honor for meritorious services be given her." Evidently, Johnson did not know that the award was restricted by law to soldiers, which made the award to a contract surgeon (a civilian) unlawful. This defect later led to the award's revocation in 1917, and then questionable reinstatement by the Army's Board for Correction of Military Records in 1977. The reinstatement is often attributed to President Jimmy Carter, in error. • The first black recipients of the Medal of Honor were sixteen Army soldiers and sixteen Navy sailors that fought during the Civil War. The first black recipient was Robert Blake, who received the medal on April 16, 1864 for serving as a powder boy on the USS Marblehead. The first Army award was announced on April 6, 1865, to twelve black soldiers from the five regiments of U.S. Colored Troops who fought at New Market Heights outside of Richmond on September 29, 1864. He earned the Medal during the Battle of Fort Wagner, but was not presented with it until 1900. • congratulates SSG Miyamura after having awarded him the Medal of Honor on October 27, 1953.The only Medal of Honor to be classified as "top secret" was awarded to Hiroshi "Hershey" Miyamura for his actions on April 24, 1951, during the Korean War when he was presumed dead. The Medal of Honor, which had not been publicly announced, was classified as top secret for his protection until his release in August 1953. The 1917 Medal of Honor Board revoked 911 awards, but only 910 names from the Army's Medal of Honor list, including awards to Mary Edwards Walker, William F. "Buffalo Bill" Cody and the first of two awards issued February 10, 1887, to George W. Mindil, who retained his award issued October 25, 1893. None of the 911 impacted recipients were ordered to return their medals, although on the question of whether the recipients could continue to wear their medals, the Judge Advocate General advised the Medal of Honor Board that the Army was not obligated to police the matter. Walker continued to wear her medal until her death, although some authors mistakenly claim that the Army sought its return. Although some sources claim that President Jimmy Carter formally restored her medal posthumously in 1977, this action was actually taken unilaterally by the Army's Board for Correction of Military Records. The Army Board for Correction of Military Records also restored the Medals of Honor of Buffalo Bill and four other civilian scouts in 1989. • Sixty-one Canadians who served in the United States Armed Forces earned the Medal of Honor, most during the American Civil War. Since 1900, four Canadians have received the medal. The only Canadian-born, naturalized U.S. citizen to receive the medal for heroism during the Vietnam War was Peter C. Lemon. While the governing statute for the Army's Medal of Honor (), beginning in 1918, explicitly stated that a recipient must be "an officer or enlisted man of the Army", "distinguish himself conspicuously by gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty", and perform an act of valor "in action involving actual conflict with an enemy", Lindbergh's medal was authorized by a special act of Congress, which effectively waived his ineligibility on the grounds of not being on military duty, not performing an act of gallantry, and not being in action (combat) against an enemy. • Foreign unknown recipients include five WWI Unknowns: the Belgian Unknown Soldier, the British Unknown Warrior, the French Unknown Soldier, the Italian Unknown Soldier, and the Romanian Unknown Soldier. • U.S. unknown recipients include one each from four wars: World War I, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. The Vietnam Unknown was later identified as Air Force First Lieutenant Michael Blassie through the use of DNA identification. Blassie's family asked for his Medal of Honor, but the Department of Defense denied the request in 1998. The action also resulted in clarification of unknown medal awards in the FY2005 defense bill, which expressly stated such medals are "awarded to the member as a representative of the members of the armed forces who died in such war or other armed conflict and whose remains have not been identified, and not to the individual personally." Note that the number of Air Force recipients does not count recipients from its pre-September 19, 1947, Army-related predecessor organizations. Nevertheless, the Air Force's transfer agreement gave it retroactive jurisdiction over military awards to the date the Air Corps was authorized by statute: Jul. 2, 1926. Thus, were a decoration submitted retroactively for an aviator's actions on or after that date (including a Medal of Honor), it would be processed by the Air Force despite the fact that the Air Force did not yet exist as a separate service. Double recipients Nineteen service members have been awarded the Medal of Honor twice. The first double Medal of Honor recipient was Thomas Custer (brother of George Armstrong Custer) for two separate actions that took place several days apart during the American Civil War. Five "double recipients" were awarded both the Army's and Navy's Medal of Honor for the same action, with all five of these occurrences taking place during World War I. This was a consequence of the marine recipients serving under Army command, which had been reviewed by the Army's judge advocate general. According to the judge advocate general, the marines were "a party 'of the Army'" since they were detached for service under the Army by presidential directive, and thus were subject to the Army's decoration statutes for that time period. No modern recipients have more than one medal because of laws passed for the Army in 1918, and for the Navy in 1919, which stipulated that "no more than one medal of honor . . . shall be issued to any one person," although subsequent awards were still authorized by issuance of bars or other devices in lieu of the medal itself. The prohibition on wearing multiple medals did not technically apply to the double recipients of WWI because they received Medals of Honor from different services, which meant the same medals were not duplicated and had independent statutory authority. Later, in 1927, President Coolidge issued an executive order that forbade issuing more than one federal decoration for the same action, a policy that continues through the present time. The statutory bar on issuing multiple Medals of Honor was finally repealed in the FY2014 defense bill, at the request of the Office of the Secretary of Defense, meaning that recipients can now be issued more than one medal rather than simply receiving a device for subsequent awards. However, it is still true that no more than one medal may be issued for the same action. The most Medals of Honor earned by any service member is two. the last individual to receive two Medals of Honor for two different actions was Smedley Butler, in 1914 and 1915. None of the double awardees earned two distinct medals under modern Medal of Honor criteria, although the WWI awardees qualified under substantially modern statutes. Related recipients Arthur MacArthur, Jr. and Douglas MacArthur were the first father and son to be awarded the Medal of Honor. The only other such pairing is Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. (awarded in 2001) and Theodore Roosevelt III. • George N. Galloway and John Galloway, in the American Civil War for separate actions. George for actions on May 8, 1864 and John for actions on April 7, 1865. Guy W. S. Castle for actions during the U.S. occupation of Veracruz, and his nephew Frederick Walker Castle for actions during World War II. Late awards Since 1979, 86 late Medal of Honor awards have been presented for actions from the Civil War to the Vietnam War. In addition, five recipients whose names were included on the Army's medal revocations in 1917 had their awards restored. A 1993 study commissioned by the U.S. Army investigated "racial disparity" in the awarding of medals. At the time, no Medals of Honor had been awarded to U.S. soldiers of African descent who served in World War II. After an exhaustive review, the study recommended that ten Distinguished Service Cross recipients be awarded the Medal of Honor. On January 13, 1997, President Bill Clinton presented the Medal of Honor to seven of these World War II veterans, six of them posthumously and one to former Second Lieutenant Vernon Baker. This was following a historical review conducted by a team of historians headed by Jim McNaughton at the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center, located in the Presidio of Monterey, California. The review ultimately forwarded at least 47 cases of Distinguished Service Crosses for potential upgrade, as well as one Silver Star. Twenty of the resulting medals went to U.S. soldiers of Japanese descent of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team (442nd RCT) who served in the European Theater of Operations during World War II. One of these Medal of Honor recipients was Senator Daniel Inouye, a former U.S. Army officer in the 442nd RCT. In 2005, President George W. Bush presented the Medal of Honor to Tibor Rubin, a Hungarian-born American Jew who was a Holocaust survivor of World War II and enlisted U.S. infantryman and prisoner of war in the Korean War, whom many believed to have been overlooked because of his religion. On April 11, 2013, President Obama presented the Medal of Honor posthumously to Army chaplain Captain Emil Kapaun for his actions as a prisoner of war during the Korean War. This follows other awards to Army Sergeant Leslie H. Sabo, Jr. for conspicuous gallantry in action on May 10, 1970, near Se San, Cambodia, during the Vietnam War and to Army Private First Class Henry Svehla and Army Private First Class Anthony T. Kahoʻohanohano for their heroic actions during the Korean War. As a result of a congressionally mandated review to ensure brave acts were not overlooked due to prejudice or discrimination, on March 18, 2014, President Obama upgraded Distinguished Service Crosses to Medals of Honor for 24 Hispanic, Jewish and black individuals—the "Valor 24"—for their actions in World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. In 2010 and again in 2014, Congress directed the Department of Defense to "survey military leaders . . . to the lowest level of command to determine if there is a trend of downgrading awards . . . for medals related to acts of valor and gallantry," and also to "review the Medal of Honor process to ensure that the nomination process, valor requirements, and timeliness of the process do not unfairly penalize service members." This ultimately resulted in a review of all post 9/11 valor awards, several of which resulted in Medals of Honor. Another historical review for World War I medals that may have been tainted by discrimination was authorized in the FY2021 National Defense Authorization Act. Conducted under the George S. Rob Centre at Park University, the review is still ongoing but has already identified some 200 medals for potential upgrade. ==27th Maine and other revoked awards==

in Austin, Texas During the Civil War, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton promised a Medal of Honor to every man in the 27th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment who extended his enlistment beyond his separation date. The Battle of Gettysburg was imminent, and approximately 300 men of the regiment volunteered to serve until the battle was resolved. The remaining men returned to Maine, and with the Union victory at Gettysburg the volunteers with extended enlistments soon followed. They arrived back in Maine in time to be discharged with the men who had returned earlier. Since there seemed to be no official list of the extended volunteers, the War Department exacerbated the situation by forwarding 864 medals to the commanding officer of the regiment. The commanding officer only issued the medals to the volunteers who stayed behind and retained the others on the grounds that, if he returned the remainder to the War Department, the War Department would try to reissue the medals. In 1916, a board of five Army generals on the retired list convened under act of law to review every Army Medal of Honor awarded. The board was to report on any Medals of Honor awarded or issued "for any cause other than distinguished conduct by an officer or enlisted man in action involving actual conflict with an enemy." The board, led by Nelson A. Miles, identified 911 awards for causes other than distinguished conduct. This included the 864 medals awarded to members of the 27th Maine regiment; 29 servicemen who served as Abraham Lincoln's funeral guard; six civilians, including Mary Edwards Walker and Buffalo Bill Cody; and 12 others. Walker's medal was restored by the Army Board for Correction of Military Records in 1977, an action that is often erroneously attributed to President Jimmy Carter. Cody and four other civilian scouts who rendered distinguished service in action, and who were therefore considered by the board to have fully earned their medals, also had their medals restored by the Army Board for Correction of Military Records in 1989. The report issued by the Medal of Honor review board in 1917 was reviewed by the Judge Advocate General, who also advised that the War Department should not seek the return of the revoked medals from the recipients identified by the board. In the case of recipients who continued to wear the medal, the War Department was advised to take no action to enforce the statute. ==See also==