The Gift of Valor: A War Story

by Michael M. Phillips Narrated by Michael Prichard

Overview

The true story of US Marine Corporal Jason Dunham's brave act that saved fellow Marines and earned him the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Corporal Dunham was on patrol near the Syrian border, on April 14, 2004, when a black-clad Iraqi leaped out of a car and grabbed him around his neck. Fighting hand-to-hand in the dirt, Dunham saw his attacker drop a grenade and made the instantaneous decision to place his own helmet over the explosive in the hope of containing the blast and protecting his men. When the smoke cleared, Dunham's helmet was in shreds, and the corporal lay face down in his own blood. The Marines beside him were seriously wounded. Dunham was subsequently nominated for the Congressional Medal of Honor, the nation' s highest award for military valor.

Phillips's minute-by-minute chronicle of the chaotic fighting that raged throughout the area and culminated in Dunham's injury provides a grunt's-eye view of war as it's being fought today-fear, confusion, bravery, and suffering set against a brotherhood forged in combat. His account of Dunham's eight-day journey home and of his parents' heartrending reunion with their son powerfully illustrates the cold brutality of war and the fragile humanity of those who fight it. Dunham leaves an indelible mark upon all who know his story, from the doctors and nurses who treat him, to the readers of the original Wall Street Journal article that told of his singular act of valor.

Editorial Reviews

bn.com

Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers
In April 2004, 22-year-old Marine corporal Jason Dunham was leading a patrol in far western Iraq when he encountered a convoy of cars. Jason rushed to the third car to check for weapons, and a struggle with the driver ensued. Suddenly, as Jason's comrades hurried over to assist him, the insurgent dropped a grenade. In that moment, Corporal Dunham made a decision that would change his life and the lives of his men forever; he clamped his Kevlar helmet over the grenade.

The Gift of Valor chronicles the events that brought Jason to that fateful patrol, and the second half of this engrossing book is a minute account of that awful day, Jason's journey through the military medical system, and his struggle to survive. Phillips, an embedded reporter for The Wall Street Journal, immerses readers in the everyday lives of the brave young Marines serving in Iraq with the chaos of combat around them. A remarkable tale of heroism, selfless sacrifice, and leadership, The Gift of Valor is a sobering story of a small-town boy who became the first American nominated for the Congressional Medal of Honor in over a decade. This brave young solider had a profound affect on all who met him, and his story, so ably told by Phillips, cannot help but affect readers, too. (Fall 2005 Selection)

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

"Thanks to Phillips' clear, dispassionate prose, Dunham ... is becoming a symbol of the Marines."

Proceedings Magazine

"Stands head and shoulders above previous Iraq books and will quickly [become] a 'must-read.'"
—U.S. Naval Institute

Armchair General Magazine

"If you have any desire to learn about the Marines, this book is well worth your time."

New York Times Book Review

Affecting.Moving.

Library Journal

In April 2004, Marine corporal Jason Dunham gave his life to save his comrades in Iraq. Now there's talk of a Congressional Medal of Honor-the first awarded in over a decade. A Wall Street Journal reporter tells the story. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

School Library Journal

Adult/High School-This expanded retelling of a front-page story that originally appeared in the Wall Street Journal serves as a memorable narrative tribute to the life and death of U.S. Marine Corporal Jason Dunham. At age 22, serving in Iraq near the Syrian border with the Third Battalion, Seventh Marine Regiment, Dunham suffereda grievous head injury when he clampedhis bullet-resistant Kevlar helmet over a live grenade thrust at him by an insurgent during hand-to-hand combat, in an apparent effort to contain the blast and protect his squadmates. Phillips, an embedded journalist with the Marines, subsequently interviewed the corporal's parents, his childhood friends in Scio, NY, members of his infantry unit, and medical personnel who tended him both in Iraq and during the medevac flights to Germany and Bethesda Naval Hospital. These interviews reconstruct the emotional, significant ways in which the young man's life and plight affected relatives, neighbors, and comrades in arms. The context of his upbringing serves as a backdrop to his developing military leadership style, and the scant number of years that separate his teenage experiences from grimly serious battlefield conditions will undoubtedly catch the attention of readers. He has been nominated for the Congressional Medal of Honor. This realistic, gritty portrayal of loss and its aftermath personalizes events behind daily headlines, but remains descriptive rather than political in its point of view.-LynnNutwell, Fairfax City Regional Library, VA Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

From the Publisher

One of the first great books to be spawned by the war in Iraq . . . Phillips has captured the fear, bravery and confusion of the war.” —Tucson Citizen

“Affecting . . . moving.” —New York Times Book Review


“The story of extraordinary valor on the part of a brave marine.”
—H. Norman Schwarzkopf, General, U.S. Army, Retired


“Stands head and shoulders above previous Iraq books.”
—Proceedings, U.S. Naval Institute

APR/MAY 06 - AudioFile

This is a gritty report on life on the ground in the Iraq war. John Bedford Lloyd’s deep and serious voice communicates the observations of a calm observer. Lloyd’s reading is not overly dramatic, but this is not a firsthand account, such as JARHEAD. Lloyd captures the intent of the author, a journalist embedded with Marines during the opening phase of the Iraqi conflict. While Lloyd’s vocal characterizations are satisfactory but not memorable, his pace is excellent, and the work is engaging. The work describes daily life in Iraq, both the good and bad, in meticulous detail, following the activities of Jason Dunham, who leads his comrades and is injured in battle. M.L.C. © AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171908379
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	06/21/2005
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

PROLOGUE
Hand Grenades

Husaybah, Iraq

The Marines knew.

Somewhere in this desert city, in one or two or ten of those flat brown houses, someone was waking up, kneeling down for prayer, and planning to kill Americans today. Maybe he'd launch a rocket into the U.S. camp and spray hot metal fragments into the warehouses where the Marines lived packed tightly together. Perhaps he'd rig an artillery shell to explode along the street where an American patrol would pass in the evening. He might load explosives into the trunk of an old Toyota and press the gas pedal to the floor when the Marine sentries opened fire at the camp gate. Or would he just crouch behind a wall with a machine gun and wait?

From inside the fortified camp, each Marine looked out at the angry city of Husaybah and wondered when and where and how. And whether he'd measure up when the time came.

So it was that in the spring of 2004, Corporal Jason Dunham sat behind the razor wire and sandbags wondering what he'd do if today was the day someone in Husaybah woke up, grabbed a hand grenade, and set out to kill him.

----

Raised in the village of Scio, New York, the easygoing Corporal Dunham stood six-foot-one, with a bodybuilder's chest and an infectious, lopsided smile that disarmed wary young women and crusty old sergeants alike. His temples were shaved close, in the Marine style, and the top of his head was covered by a dirty-blond burr so short that it erased the cowlick above his forehead. Inked into his right arm was the tattoo he got during boot camp four years earlier: a skull wearing a military helmet emblazoned with the eagle-globe-and-anchor Marine emblem. On his left arm was a black skull with fangs, and on his chest a spade from a deck of cards overlaid with a skull gnawing on an eight ball, a souvenir of the years Dunham spent guarding a submarine base in Georgia before he was sent to Iraq.

The twenty-two-year-old Dunham was, in the eyes of his fellow Marines in Kilo Company's Fourth Platoon, the poster child for the Corps. Yet he had been in the combat zone just a few weeks and so far hadn't experienced that moment of fear and elation, resolve and doubt that came with taking another man's life. As the leader of an infantry squad, he had nine other Marines under his command, yet he had never had to decide which of his friends to send toward the sound of gunfire and which to keep safer in the rear. It was an interval of uncertainty when young men hoped their cocky war tattoos were more than just decoration.

Inside Camp Husaybah, the men of Fourth Platoon slept side by side on narrow cots, their only privacy a thin mesh of mosquito netting or a draped poncho, their only reminders of life before war what they packed in their seabags. Dunham brought a blue Yankees cap, a dartboard, and a folding chair from which he held court. That day in March the corporal sat inside the warehouse barracks with his platoon commander, Second Lieutenant Brian Robinson, and guided the conversation to a favorite topic: how to deal with an incoming hand grenade. The Marine Corps published manuals that covered almost every eventuality in warfare, but had no formal advice for grunts -- the Marines' affectionate term for infantrymen -- who found themselves on the receiving end of a live grenade. Each man had his own pet theory, and Corporal Dunham unveiled his for the lieutenant. If the Marine managed to cover the grenade with his helmet, Dunham said, the helmet's bullet-resistant Kevlar material would blunt the blast.

"I'll bet a Kevlar would stop it," Dunham said.

Brian Robinson had taken command of Fourth Platoon just before it shipped out for its second tour of duty in Iraq in February 2004. At Camp Husaybah, the Marines were still getting to know their new lieutenant, and it was there that they gave him the nickname Bull because of his resemblance to the gawky courtroom bailiff in the long-canceled television sitcom Night Court. When the conversation turned to hand grenades, Robinson, assistant manager of the building materials department at a Wisconsin home improvement store before he joined the Marines, thought back to photos he had seen at the Marine Corps school for freshly minted lieutenants. They showed a 7.62 mm bullet -- the kind Iraqi insurgents fired from their AK-47 rifles -- passing easily through walls and Kevlar helmets.

"There's no way a Kevlar could absorb that blast," Robinson told Dunham. The Marines' bulletproof body armor fared much better, however. The lieutenant had seen pictures of a ceramic chest plate, called a SAPI plate, that absorbed seven AK rounds before it finally cracked open.

"You'd be better off using a SAPI plate and protecting your nuts and your neck," Robinson told Corporal Dunham.

The lieutenant showed Dunham what he meant. He held his right forearm across his upper chest horizontally, and his left arm across his abdomen, the way a football halfback takes a handoff. If the Marine lay on top of the grenade like that, Robinson said, the blast might shatter both arms, but he'd probably survive thanks to the body armor covering his vital organs.

Lance Corporal Bill Hampton, one of the senior men under Corporal Dunham's command, overheard Dunham and the lieutenant going back and forth about the virtues of their grenade theories. Hampton thought that if a grenade rolled his way the sensible thing would be to kick it or throw it away and hit the deck. He remembered an older Marine once advising him to drop face down on top of his rifle, tuck in his arms, and aim the soles of his boots toward the explosion to absorb the shrapnel. Hampton didn't bother stopping to join Dunham's debate. One of the Marines cracked a joke about a lieutenant losing his arms, which caught the attention of Staff Sergeant John Ferguson, the top enlisted man in the platoon and Lieutenant Robinson's steady right hand. Ferguson was a stocky, serious veteran of both the intervention in Somalia and the invasion of Kuwait. From boot camp on, Marines were taught that their worst possible failing would be to let down the men beside them, and Ferguson, a thirty-year-old from Colorado, had already experienced the nerve-wracking responsibility of leading men into places they might never leave. The idea that a helmet would contain an exploding grenade struck him as naive. "It'll still mess you up," he warned Dunham.

"What about the helmet and the SAPI plate?" the corporal countered.

"It would increase your chance of surviving, but I don't think it would work," Ferguson said.

Dunham persisted. "I think it would work."

----

For Marines at war it was a mundane conversation, the battlefield equivalent of the discussions that college students back home might have about last night's keg party or cubicle dwellers might have over where to go to lunch. Idle chatter about life and death, forgotten by the next time Corporal Dunham's squad ventured out on patrol or raided the house of a suspected insurgent fighter.

But memories of that day came rushing back to Staff Sergeant Ferguson a few weeks later as he stared at an Iraqi insurgent stretched out in an open lot, his body stiff, his head cracked open and his black tracksuit wet with blood. Nearby was the spot where Corporal Dunham had lain a few minutes earlier, a halo of red oozing out of his head into the hard Iraqi sand. Dunham's helmet was ripped into bits of flimsy fabric and scattered all over the unpaved lane.

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