They Mocked This “Useless Dentist” — Until He Killed 98 Japanese With a Machine Gun​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

 

At 5:00 in the morning on July 7th, 1944, Captain Benjamin Solomon crouched inside a medical tent on Saipan as 3,000 Japanese soldiers charged toward his position from the darkness. The 29-year-old dentist had volunteered to replace the battalion surgeon 10 days earlier. He’d never treated combat wounds before that week.

 Now, he had 30 wounded men bleeding in his tent and 50 yards of open beach between him and 4,000 screaming attackers. The Japanese 43rd Division had lost 25,000 men in 3 weeks. The survivors were starving, wounded, running out of ammunition. But their commander had given them a final order. Attack at dawn.

 Kill 10 Americans each. Die with honor. Most carried rifles. Some had only bayonets tied to sticks. A few clutched rocks. They were told this was their last morning alive. Solomon had set up his aid station behind the forward foxholes near Tanipag Village. Two machine gunners protected the tent. At 4:45, the first screams echoed across the beach.

 Japanese infantry poured through American lines like water through a cracked dam. The first and second battalions of the 105th Infantry tried to hold. They had 1100 men at the start. Within an hour, 300 were already dead or bleeding out in the sand. The wounded came fast.

 They crawled through the tent flaps, walked in holding their intestines, got carried in by buddies who then ran back to fight. Solomon worked on gut wounds, sucking chest wounds, men with legs blown off. His hands moved fast. Clamp, suture, morphine. Next patient. The tent filled with the smell of blood and gunpowder and fear. Blood soaked through the dirt floor.

 Turned the ground into mud. Solomon’s boots stuck with every step. He moved between patients, checked pulses, made quick decisions about who could be saved, who needed to go to the rear hospital immediately, who wouldn’t make it past the next 10 minutes. The sound outside grew louder. Rifle fire, machine gun bursts, grenade explosions, men screaming in English and Japanese.

The canvas walls of the tent shook from nearby mortar impacts. Dust fell from the tent poles, but Solomon kept working. His hands stayed steady even when the ground shook. Then a Japanese soldier appeared at the tent entrance. He stepped over a wounded American and bayonetted the man lying nearest the canvas wall.

 Solomon looked up from the soldier he was treating, saw the enemy, dropped into a squat, grabbed an M1 rifle, fired once. The Japanese soldier fell dead. Solomon turned back to his patient, kept working. Two more Japanese soldiers pushed through the tent entrance. American troops near the flaps shot them both. Four more crawled under the tent walls. They came in fast with knives and bayonets. Solomon was alone.

His medics were loading wounded onto stretchers. The able-bodied soldiers were already outside fighting. The first Japanese soldier had a knife. Solomon kicked it out of his hand, shot the second soldier in the chest, bayonetted the third through the ribs. The fourth came at him with a bayonet. Solomon had no bullets left.

 He headbutted the man in the face, drove his skull into the soldier’s nose and teeth. The Japanese soldier staggered backward. A wounded American lying on a stretcher pulled his 45 caliber pistol, shot the man dead. Solomon looked around his tent. Blood everywhere. Wounded men trying to crawl toward the exit.

 Enemy soldiers dead on the dirt floor. The canvas walls shaking from explosions outside. More Japanese voices getting closer. He made a decision. He ordered everyone out. The walking wounded helped carry the ones who couldn’t move. Medics grabbed stretchers, lifted men as gently as they could while bullets cracked overhead.

 The last orderly looked back as he ducked through the tent flap, saw Solomon grab a rifle from one of the wounded men, saw him check the magazine, saw him turn toward the entrance and run outside. Four Americans had been manning a Browning M1917 machine gun in a sandbag position 30 ft from the tent. All four were dead. Japanese soldiers were swarming past their position. Solomon ran to the gun, dropped behind it, started firing.

 The Browning was a water cooled 30 caliber machine gun, weighed 41 lbs without water, could fire 450 rounds per minute. Solomon had trained on this weapon 2 years earlier when he was an infantry sergeant before the army forced him to become a dentist before they told him his hands were too valuable to waste on a machine gun.

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At 5:00 in the morning on July 7th, 1944, Captain Benjamin Solomon crouched inside a medical tent on Saipan as 3,000 Japanese soldiers charged toward his position from the darkness. The 29-year-old dentist had volunteered to replace the battalion surgeon 10 days earlier. He’d never treated combat wounds before that week.

 Now, he had 30 wounded men bleeding in his tent and 50 yards of open beach between him and 4,000 screaming attackers. The Japanese 43rd Division had lost 25,000 men in 3 weeks. The survivors were starving, wounded, running out of ammunition. But their commander had given them a final order. Attack at dawn.

 Kill 10 Americans each. Die with honor. Most carried rifles. Some had only bayonets tied to sticks. A few clutched rocks. They were told this was their last morning alive. Solomon had set up his aid station behind the forward foxholes near Tanipag Village. Two machine gunners protected the tent. At 4:45, the first screams echoed across the beach.

 Japanese infantry poured through American lines like water through a cracked dam. The first and second battalions of the 105th Infantry tried to hold. They had 1100 men at the start. Within an hour, 300 were already dead or bleeding out in the sand. The wounded came fast.

 They crawled through the tent flaps, walked in holding their intestines, got carried in by buddies who then ran back to fight. Solomon worked on gut wounds, sucking chest wounds, men with legs blown off. His hands moved fast. Clamp, suture, morphine. Next patient. The tent filled with the smell of blood and gunpowder and fear. Blood soaked through the dirt floor.

 Turned the ground into mud. Solomon’s boots stuck with every step. He moved between patients, checked pulses, made quick decisions about who could be saved, who needed to go to the rear hospital immediately, who wouldn’t make it past the next 10 minutes. The sound outside grew louder. Rifle fire, machine gun bursts, grenade explosions, men screaming in English and Japanese.

The canvas walls of the tent shook from nearby mortar impacts. Dust fell from the tent poles, but Solomon kept working. His hands stayed steady even when the ground shook. Then a Japanese soldier appeared at the tent entrance. He stepped over a wounded American and bayonetted the man lying nearest the canvas wall.

 Solomon looked up from the soldier he was treating, saw the enemy, dropped into a squat, grabbed an M1 rifle, fired once. The Japanese soldier fell dead. Solomon turned back to his patient, kept working. Two more Japanese soldiers pushed through the tent entrance. American troops near the flaps shot them both. Four more crawled under the tent walls. They came in fast with knives and bayonets. Solomon was alone.

His medics were loading wounded onto stretchers. The able-bodied soldiers were already outside fighting. The first Japanese soldier had a knife. Solomon kicked it out of his hand, shot the second soldier in the chest, bayonetted the third through the ribs. The fourth came at him with a bayonet. Solomon had no bullets left.

 He headbutted the man in the face, drove his skull into the soldier’s nose and teeth. The Japanese soldier staggered backward. A wounded American lying on a stretcher pulled his 45 caliber pistol, shot the man dead. Solomon looked around his tent. Blood everywhere. Wounded men trying to crawl toward the exit.

 Enemy soldiers dead on the dirt floor. The canvas walls shaking from explosions outside. More Japanese voices getting closer. He made a decision. He ordered everyone out. The walking wounded helped carry the ones who couldn’t move. Medics grabbed stretchers, lifted men as gently as they could while bullets cracked overhead.

 The last orderly looked back as he ducked through the tent flap, saw Solomon grab a rifle from one of the wounded men, saw him check the magazine, saw him turn toward the entrance and run outside. Four Americans had been manning a Browning M1917 machine gun in a sandbag position 30 ft from the tent. All four were dead. Japanese soldiers were swarming past their position. Solomon ran to the gun, dropped behind it, started firing.

 The Browning was a water cooled 30 caliber machine gun, weighed 41 lbs without water, could fire 450 rounds per minute. Solomon had trained on this weapon 2 years earlier when he was an infantry sergeant before the army forced him to become a dentist before they told him his hands were too valuable to waste on a machine gun.

 Spent brass casings piled up at his feet. Enemy soldiers fell in groups. 10, 20, 30. They kept coming. Climbed over their own dead to reach American lines. Solomon took a bullet in his left arm, kept firing, took another in his shoulder, adjusted his grip. The bodies were piling up in front of his position. 15 ft away, 10 ft, 5.

 He couldn’t see past the stack of corpses. Couldn’t get a clear feel of fire. The gun was still working. The water jacket was boiling hot, but the dead were blocking his view. He grabbed the 41-lb gun, dragged it backward. Blood from his wounds left a trail in the dirt. He repositioned, started firing again. More Japanese fell. The pile of bodies grew higher.

Again, the corpses blocked his line of sight. Again, he moved the gun. Four times he would drag that heavy weapon to a new position. Four times he would leave a blood trail. Each time the enemy kept coming through the darkness. The sun was rising over Saipan. Solomon’s war had just begun. Benjamin Solomon hadn’t planned to become a soldier.

 He’d graduated from USC dental school in 1937, opened a practice in Los Angeles, treated movie stars and businessmen, made good money, had a comfortable life ahead of him. Then came September 1940. The Selective Service Act passed. His draft notice arrived 2 weeks later. He reported as an infantry private.

 The army looked at his records, saw he was a dentist, told him he’d be transferred to the dental corps within months. Solomon asked to stay in infantry. The army said no. He ignored them, kept training with his rifle company. He was 5’9″, weighed 160 lb. Not big, but he moved fast, learned fast. At the rifle range, he qualified as expert marksman with both the M1 rifle and the 45 caliber pistol.

 hit targets other men missed. His company commander noticed started using him as an instructor for the new recruits. Within a year, Solomon made sergeant, got put in charge of a machine gun section. The Browning M1917 became his weapon.

 He stripped it blindfolded, cleared jams in seconds, taught his gunners how to traverse and fire in coordinated bursts. His section had the lowest malfunction rate in the battalion. His commanding officer called him the best all-around soldier in the regiment. Then in August 1942, the orders came. The army was transferring him to the dental corps, making him a first lieutenant. Solomon tried to refuse, said he wanted to stay with his gun team. The army didn’t care what he wanted.

 A month later, he was wearing dental core insignia and working on soldiers teeth in Hawaii. He hated it. spent his mornings pulling wisdom teeth and filling cavities. Spent his afternoons running with the infantry companies. Did every training march, every physical fitness test, competed against frontline soldiers half his age, usually won. His fellow dental officers thought he was crazy. The infantry officers loved him.

 They knew what they had. A dentist who could outshoot most riflemen. A medical officer who understood tactics better than some company commanders. In May 1943, he got assigned to the 105th Infantry Regiment as regimental dental officer. Made captain in January 1944. Still ran with the troops. Still competed in rifle competitions.

 Still taught infantry tactics to anyone who would listen. When the regiment shipped out to Saipan in June, Solomon went with them. The 27th Infantry Division hit the beaches on June 15th. The fighting was worse than anyone expected. Japanese defenders had fortified Mount Tapochow, dug caves into the cliffs, built bunkers with interlocking fields of fire. Every hundred yards cost American lives.

 The second battalion took the worst of it. The battalion advanced through cane fields and jungle, took casualties from snipers, from mortars, from machine gun nests hidden in the rocks, lost 30 men in the first week, 50 in the second. On June 22nd, a Japanese mortar round hit the battalion command post, killed two men, wounded the battalion surgeon. Shrapnel tore through his leg.

 He couldn’t walk, couldn’t operate, needed evacuation. The battalion commander needed a replacement. Asked who could handle combat surgery. Someone mentioned Solomon. The captain was a dentist, but he had steady hands, knew basic anatomy, could handle pressure, had taken extra medical training in Hawaii. Solomon volunteered immediately.

 Finally got his chance to be at the front. He set up aid stations behind the advancing infantry, treated sucking chest wounds, amputated mangled limbs, worked under fire, stayed calm when mortars landed close enough to spray his tent with dirt. The wounded men trusted him, called him Doc, didn’t care that he was trained to fix teeth instead of bullet wounds.

 The officers respected him, saw he worked faster under pressure than most surgeons. After 10 days, he’d saved dozens of lives. Lost some, too. The ones who came in with half their chest blown away. The ones who’d bled too much before they reached him. He did what he could. Moved on to the next patient. Didn’t have time to think about the ones he couldn’t save. Then came July 6th.

 Intelligence reports warned of a major Japanese attack. The entire 43rd division was cornered in the northern part of the island. 30,000 men 3 weeks ago. Now maybe 5,000 left. Starving, desperate, no way off the island. American commanders expected a bonsai charge, the biggest one yet. Every battalion reinforced their positions, fixed bayonets, stacked extra ammunition in the foxholes, dug their fighting positions deeper, set up interlocking fields of fire.

 Machine gunners checked their weapons three times, made sure the water jackets were full, made sure the ammunition belts fed smoothly. That evening, Solomon’s aid station sat 50 yard behind the forward line, a small tent, two machine gunners for protection, 30 yard from the beach. He had bandages ready, plasma, morphine, surgical tools laid out on a field table. Expected maybe 20 casualties in the first hour.

 Had no idea what was actually coming. At 4:45, the screaming started. Thousands of voices in the darkness. The Japanese came in waves, crashed into American positions like a human suit. Then with enemy soldiers who wanted to kill them all. Now Salomon sat behind a machine gun, firing at shadows in the pre-dawn darkness, already wounded twice, the ammunition belt running low.

 And somewhere out there in the black, thousands more Japanese soldiers were charging straight toward him. The Browning M1917 had been designed in the First World War. Weighed 41 lbs with an empty water jacket. Add water and it hit 93 lb. Tripod added another 53 lb. Total weight 146 lb for a complete system. Took a fourman crew to move it efficiently. Solomon was dragging it alone while bleeding from multiple gunshot wounds.

The gun used 30 caliber ammunition. same as the M1 rifle. Each round was 3.3 in long, weighed half an ounce, left the barrel at 2800 feet per second, could punch through a man at 500 yd, could kill at 1,500 yd if the shooter knew what he was doing. Solomon knew what he was doing. He’d moved the gun twice already.

 Each time the bodies piled up, each time he lost his field of fire. Now he was repositioning again. Grabbed the barrel jacket, burned his hands on the superheated metal, didn’t let go, dragged the weapon backward 10 ft, left a blood trail in the dirt, dropped behind it, started firing again. The sun was coming up. He could see them now. Not just shadows and muzzle flashes, actual men.

 Japanese infantry in tattered uniforms, some in just loin cloths, many wounded already. Bandages on their heads, arms and slings. They came forward anyway, screaming, bayonets raised, eyes wide with desperation and rage. Solomon fired in three round bursts. Traverse left, traverse right. Each burst dropped one or two attackers.

They fell in heaps. The ones behind climbed over, used the corpses as cover, advanced through the growing wall of their own dead. Some got within 20 feet of his position before the bullets found them. His left arm wasn’t working right. The bullet had clipped something important. Muscle or nerve.

 He couldn’t lift it above his shoulder. Used his right hand to work the trigger. Used his left to steady the gun. Ignored the pain. Ignored the blood running down his sleeve. Focused on the targets. More bullets hit him. One through his right thigh, another in his lower abdomen, another in his chest.

 Each impact felt like getting hit with a sledgehammer. Knocked the wind out of him, made his vision blur. He blinked, shook his head, kept firing. The gun was still working. He still had ammunition. He still had targets behind him. The American lines were collapsing. The first battalion had been overrun in the first hour. The second battalion was fighting hand-to- hand in their foxholes.

 Men were dying in groups. Entire squads wiped out. The Japanese pushed deeper into American positions, reached the battalion command post, killed the staff officers, captured the radio equipment, but the wounded were getting away.

 The men Solomon had evacuated from his tent were crawling toward the rear, being carried by medics who’d followed his orders, making it to the regimental aid station a quarter mile back. 30 men who would have died in that tent if he hadn’t held this position. 30 men who might survive because a dentist remembered how to work a machine gun.

 The Japanese commander had ordered his men to break through at any cost. Didn’t matter how many died. Just had to push through the American lines, reach the artillery positions, destroy the guns, kill everyone they could find. Die with honor. His troops were following orders. 4,000 men charging into machine gunfire, dying in waves, but still advancing. Solomon’s ammunition belt was running low, maybe 200 rounds left.

 He could see at least 300 Japanese soldiers still coming toward his position, more behind them. The math didn’t work. He was going to run out of bullets before he ran out of targets. His chest wound was bad. He could feel it. Breathing was getting harder. Each breath rattled. Blood in his lungs, probably. He’d seen enough chest wounds to know what that meant.

 hours, maybe not days, maybe not even hours. But those 30 men needed more time. The medics needed to get them farther back. The regimental aid station needed to set up triage, prepare for the casualties still coming. Every minute he held this position bought them time, bought them lives. He fired another burst. Five rounds. Three Japanese soldiers dropped. Two kept coming. He adjusted his aim. Fired again.

 They fell. More appeared behind them. Always more behind them. A bayonet thrust came from his left. He hadn’t seen the soldier crawling through the bodies. The blade caught him in the side, drove between his ribs. He twisted away. The soldier tried to stab him again. Solomon grabbed the rifle barrel with his left hand. His weak hand, the one that barely worked.

 Used it to shove the bayonet aside. Used his right hand to pull his 45 caliber pistol. fired three times into the soldier’s chest. The man fell across the sandbags. Solomon dropped the pistol, grabbed the machine gun again, started firing. His vision was fading, getting darker around the edges, shock, probably blood loss, the chest wound, all of it together.

 He blinked hard, tried to focus. The targets were right there, 20 ft away, 10 ft, still coming. The gun was almost empty. The water in the jacket was boiling. Steam hissed from the valve. The barrel was probably warped from sustained fire. Didn’t matter. It was still shooting. He was still shooting. And the Japanese were still dying in front of his position.

 Then the ammunition belt ran out. Solomon looked at the empty ammunition belt, looked at the Japanese soldier still advancing, looked at his pistol lying on the sandbags. Three rounds left, maybe four if he was lucky. He’d lost count after shooting the soldier with the bayonet. He grabbed the pistol, aimed at the nearest target 15 ft away. Fired. The soldier dropped.

 Aimed at another, fired. Another drop. Two rounds left, maybe one. He couldn’t remember. His mind was getting foggy. The blood loss was catching up to him. A Japanese soldier reached the sandbags, jumped over. Bay bayonet aimed at Solomon’s chest. Solomon fired his last round. Point blank range. The soldier’s head snapped back, fell on top of him. Solomon shoved the body aside.

 The pistol was empty now. The machine gun was empty. He had no ammunition left, but he still had the gun itself. 41 lb of steel and wood. He grabbed it by the barrel jacket, ignored the burns on his palms, swung it like a club, caught a Japanese soldier in the face. The man’s jaw shattered, teeth flew, he dropped.

Another soldier came at him. Solomon swung again, hit him in the ribs, heard bones crack. The soldier fell. Another one. Solomon couldn’t lift the gun anymore. His arms wouldn’t work. The wounds were too much. He dropped the browning, fell to his knees behind the sandbags. A bayonet thrust came at his chest. He caught the rifle barrel with both hands, held it. The Japanese soldier pushed. Solomon pushed back.

 His hands were slippery with blood. His own blood. He couldn’t hold on. The bayonet drove into his chest, 3 in deep, maybe four. He felt it scrape against his ribs. The soldier pulled the bayonet out. Thrust again. Solomon couldn’t stop at this time. The blade went in, came out, went in again.

 He counted the impacts, lost count after six. Everything was getting dark, cold. His legs weren’t working. He slumped forward over the machine gun. His face pressed against the water jacket, still warm from all that firing. Comfortable almost. He could hear fighting, screaming, explosions. But it all seemed far away now, like listening to a radio in another room. The sounds faded.

Everything faded. The Japanese kept coming, poured through the gap in the American lines, reached the artillery positions. The gunners fought them with pistols and rifle butts, handto hand in the gun pits. The attack lasted 15 hours total from 4:45 in the morning until nearly 8 at night.

 The American second battalion took 83% casualties. 919 men dead or seriously wounded out of 118 total. The first battalion lost almost as many, but they held. The Japanese attack failed. By nightfall, the survivors were retreating north. Fewer than 500 left out of 4,000 who charged that morning. American troops retook the lost positions on July 8th.

 Found Salomon’s body slumped over his machine gun. His shirt had been pulled up to his waist, probably by Japanese soldiers checking if he was dead, making sure, bayonetting him a few more times to be certain. Around his position, they counted the bodies. 98 Japanese soldiers laid dead in front of his gun, piled three and four deep in some places.

 The counting party followed the blood trail, found where he’d moved the gun once, twice, three times, four times total. each time dragging that 93-lb weapon while bleeding from fatal wounds. Each time setting up and firing again. Captain Edmund Love was the 27th Division historian. He walked through the scene with the counting party, saw the blood, saw the bodies, saw the empty ammunition belts and spent brass casings scattered everywhere. He started taking notes immediately. This was a Medal of Honor action. No question.

 They examined Salomon’s body, counted the wounds, 76 bullet holes, multiple bayonet wounds, too many to count accurately. The division surgeon came forward, looked at the wounds carefully, made an estimate. 24 of the wounds had happened while Solomon was still alive.

 The rest came after he was already dead, after he’d slumped over that gun. Love collected eyewitness statements, found the medics who’d evacuated the wounded from the tent, found soldiers who’d seen Solomon run to the machine gun, found the ones who’d watched him fire into the Japanese attack. He compiled everything, wrote the Medal of Honor recommendation, submitted it up the chain of command.

Major General George Grryer read the recommendation, read it again, called his staff together. They discussed it for an hour. Then Grryer made his decision. He denied the award. His reasoning was simple. Solomon had been wearing a Red Cross brasard on his arm. He was a medical officer. Under the Geneva Convention, medical personnel cannot bear arms against the enemy.

 Solomon had not only carried arms, he’d manned a machine gun, a crew served weapon, killed nearly a 100 enemy soldiers that violated the rules. Love was furious. argued that Solomon had acted in defense of his patients, that he’d removed the brasard before taking up arms, that the Geneva Convention allowed medical personnel to defend themselves and their patients.

 Grryer wouldn’t budge. The recommendation was denied, filed away, forgotten. The war moved on. The 27th Division left Saipan, fought on Okinawa, lost more men. Love kept his notes, kept the witness statements, kept thinking about Ben Solomon lying dead over that machine gun, about those 98 Japanese soldiers he’d killed, about the 30 wounded Americans he’d saved. 1945 came, the war ended, the division went home.

 Love went back to civilian life, but he couldn’t let it go. That denial still burned. 7 years later, he tried again. In 1951, Love resubmitted the Medal of Honor recommendation. He left the army, was working as a writer, but he still had all his notes from Saipan, all the witness statements, the photographs of Solomon’s body, the count of 98 dead Japanese soldiers.

 He typed up a new recommendation, sent it through the office of the chief of military history. 6 months later, it came back denied again. New reason this time. The time limit for submitting World War II awards had expired. There was a deadline 5 years after the end of hostilities. That deadline had passed in 1950. Too late now. File closed. Love tried to argue.

Said the original recommendation had been submitted in 1944 during the war. Within days of the action, that should count. The army disagreed. The original recommendation had been denied. This was a new submission. New submissions had to follow the time limit. Case closed. He put the file away. Went on with his life. But he never forgot.

 Never stopped thinking about it. That dentist who’d saved 30 men, who’d killed 98 enemies, who died alone behind a machine gun while the rest of his battalion retreated, who got nothing for it except a grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park. The years passed. The Korean War came and went. Vietnam started.

 The army got bigger, got smaller, changed uniforms, changed tactics, changed everything except its decision about Ben Solomon. Then in 1969, someone else tried. Lieutenant General Howal Jennings, the surgeon general of the United States Army. He’d heard about Solomon, read Love’s original report, decided this was wrong.

 A medical officer had saved lives and taken lives and got punished for it by being denied recognition. Jennings submitted a new Medal of Honor recommendation. It moved up the chain, reached Stanley Rzor, the Secretary of the Army. Rzor read the file, read the witness statements, read about the 98 dead enemies, about the four times Solomon moved that gun, about the 76 bullet wounds. Rizor approved it, forwarded the recommendation to the Secretary of Defense.

 The Secretary of Defense sat on it for two years, didn’t approve, didn’t deny, just sat there on someone’s desk gathering dust. Then in 1972, it came back. Denied again. The reason was vague based on circumstantial information, not enough direct witnesses, too much time had passed. the usual bureaucratic language that meant no without saying no.

 Jennings was furious, tried to push it through again, got stonewalled. The defense department wouldn’t budge. By this point, most of the witnesses were dead. The second battalion had taken heavy casualties on Okinawa. Only about 30 men from the Saipan battle survived the entire war. Most were scattered across the country now. Hard to find, hard to verify their stories decades later.

 The army tried to honor Solomon in other ways. In 1973, they dedicated a dental clinic at Fort Benning to his memory. Named it the Captain Ben L. Solomon Dental Clinic. Put up a plaque with his story. It was something, but it wasn’t the Medal of Honor. USC kept his memory alive, too. The dental school had a display, photographs of him in uniform, his dental degree, a replica of his captain’s bars. Alumni knew his story. talked about him.

 The Jewish dentist who tried to join the army before the war started. Who got rejected, who got drafted anyway, who died defending his patients on a beach in the Pacific. The 1980s came. Then the ’90s. Solomon’s story faded. Became one of thousands of World War II tales that nobody remembered anymore. The men who’d known him were dying off. The officers who’d recommended him for the Medal of Honor were dead.

 Even Edmund Love died in 1990. Took his frustration about that denied recommendation to his grave. But the file still existed, buried in the archives at the office of the chief of the dental corps. Forgotten: Gathering dust until 1995 when an Army dentist named Colonel John King was doing research for a book about the dental corps in Vietnam.

 He was digging through old files looking for interesting stories. found Ben Solomon’s case. King read the witness statements, read about the machine gun, the 98 dead Japanese, the 76 wounds, the four times Solomon moved that gun while dying. King couldn’t believe it. This was a Medal of Honor action, clear as day. Why hadn’t he gotten it? He dug deeper, found the denial from 1944, found the Geneva Convention argument, found all the subsequent denials, found Love’s attempts, found Jennings’s attempt, found 50 years of bureaucratic rejections. King decided someone needed to try again. Around the same time, Dr.

Robert West was working at USC. He was an alumnest of the dental school. Was helping write a book for the school’s centennial anniversary. Started researching notable alumni. Found Ben Solomon’s story. Got obsessed with it. Started asking questions. Someone put West in touch with King. They compared notes. Realized they were both working on the same case. Decided to team up.

King had the military connections. West had the civilian connections. together they might actually get this done. West contacted Congressman Brad Sherman. Sherman represented the district that included USC. West laid out the case, showed him the evidence, the witness statements, the photographs, the body count.

 Sherman agreed to help, started pushing the case through Congress. This time they had something the previous attempts didn’t have. Public attention, media coverage. USC got involved officially. The dental school made it a cause. Alumni started writing letters. Veterans groups joined in. The pressure built. The case moved through channels again slowly. The Army reviewed it.

 The Medal of Honor board reviewed it. They looked at the Geneva Convention question again, decided that Solomon had been acting in defense of his patients, that he’d removed his Red Cross brasard before taking up the machine gun, that the rules allowed medical personnel to use weapons in self-defense. In 2001, Congress passed legislation waving the time limit for Solomon’s award. President George W. Bush signed it. The path was clear.

 On May 1st, 2002, 58 years after Ben Solomon died on that beach, Bush presented the Medal of Honor to Dr. Robert West in the Rose Garden. West accepted it on behalf of USC’s School of Dentistry. The ceremony took place in the Rose Garden on a sunny May afternoon. President Bush stood at the podium. Dr. Robert West stood beside him.

 Veterans from the 27th Infantry Division were in the audience. Some in wheelchairs now, some using canes, all in their 80s, all remembering Saipan. Bush read the citation. Every word of it. Captain Ben L. Solomon was serving at Saipan in the Marianas Islands on July 7th, 1944 as the surgeon for the Second Battalion, 105th Infantry Regiment, 27th Infantry Division.

 The regiment’s first and second battalions were attacked by an overwhelming force estimated between 3,000 and 5,000 Japanese soldiers. The citation described the tent, the wounded men, the Japanese soldiers crawling under the canvas walls, Solomon kicking the knife, shooting, bayonetting, headbutting, ordering the evacuation, running to the machine gun, the four times he moved it, the 98 dead enemies, the 76 bullet wounds.

 Bush finished reading, looked out at the audience, said Solomon was one young man who was the match for 100, a person of true valor who now receives the honor due him from a grateful country. He presented the medal to West. West accepted it with tears in his eyes. The medal went back to USC, put on display at the dental school where it sits today.

 Ben Solomon became only the third dentist in American military history to receive the Medal of Honor. The first was Weeden Osborne in World War I. The second was Alexander Gordon Lyle in the same war. Solomon was the third and so far the last. He was also one of only three Jewish Americans to receive the Medal of Honor for World War II actions. The other two were Raymond Zusman and Ben Schwarzwalder.

 All three fought in different theaters. All three performed actions far beyond normal duty. All three survived in memory long after they died in battle. Two other men received the Medal of Honor for actions during that same bonsai attack on July 7th. Lieutenant Colonel William O’Brien commanded the first battalion.

 When the Japanese overran his position, he manned a jeep-mounted machine gun, killed dozens of attackers, got shot multiple times, kept fighting, died still firing his pistol at advancing Japanese soldiers. Private First Class Thomas Baker was a rifleman in the same battalion, got shot in the initial attack, too badly wounded to move. His squad tried to carry him. He refused, told them to leave him.

 They propped him against a tree, left him a pistol with eight rounds. When they came back the next day, they found him dead. His pistol was empty. Eight dead Japanese soldiers lay around his position. O’Brien and Baker both got the Medal of Honor in 1945. Right after the war ended, no questions about Geneva conventions, no debates about medical personnel, no 58-year weight, just immediate recognition for immediate heroism.

 Solomon had to wait because he was a dentist who’d picked up a gun. The citation that finally came made him one of fewer than 4,000 Americans who’ve received the Medal of Honor since it was created in 1861. One of 353 who received it for World War II actions. One of 94 who received itostumously for actions in the Pacific Theater. His grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park has a new marker now.

lists his rank, his unit, his medal of honor. Visitors come sometimes, leave coins on the headstone like they do at military graves. Quarters mostly means someone who served with the deceased came to pay respects. Ben Solomon gets a lot of quarters. USC added his name to their veterans memorial. The dental school made his story part of their standard curriculum.

 Every incoming class learns about him, about the dentist who wanted to be an infantryman who got forced into dentistry by the army who ended up doing both jobs on the same day. The army uses his story in training. Now, combat medics learn about him, about the line between being a non-combatant and defending your patients, about when it’s acceptable to take up arms, about what it means to hold a position alone against overwhelming odds.

 Military historians study that bonsai attack, the largest of the Pacific War. 4,000 attackers, 15 hours of fighting, 83% casualties in two American battalions. It was the kind of desperate suicidal assault that characterized the last year of the Pacific campaign. The kind that made American commanders realize invading Japan itself would cost hundreds of thousands of lives. the kind that led directly to the decision to use atomic bombs.

 Saipan changed the war, gave America air bases within bombing range of Japan, led to the B29 raids on Tokyo, led to the firebombing that killed more civilians than both atomic bombs combined, led to Japan’s eventual surrender. Ben Solomon died in the battle that made all of that possible. His battalion was rebuilt after Saipan. Got replacements, trained them, shipped them to Okinawa, fought there, too.

 Lost more men. The survivors went home when the war ended, scattered across America. Went to college on the GI Bill, started families, started businesses, got old, started dying off. The last survivor of that bonsai attack died in 2018. He was 94 years old, had been 18 on Saipan. Remembered the screaming, the bodies, the machine gun fire that lasted all night.

 Remembered a dentist who’ patched him up 3 days before the attack. Remembered hearing later that the dentist had died manning a machine gun. Saved a bunch of wounded guys, killed nearly a hundred Japanese. Got nothing for it. When they told him in 2002 that Solomon finally got his medal, he cried. said it was about time. Said Ben had saved his life. Twice.

 Once by patching his wounds. Once by holding that machine gun position long enough for the medics to get him out. Said he’d waited 60 years to see that dentist get recognized. Now they’re all gone. The men who fought on Saipan, the men who saw Solomon die, the men who counted those 98 bodies, all dead. Only the records remain.

 the witness statements, the photographs, the citation, the medal at USC, and one question that nobody alive can answer anymore. What was going through Ben Solomon’s mind during those final minutes? He knew he was dying. The chest wound told him that the blood in his lungs, the way breathing got harder with each minute. He treated enough chest wounds to recognize the signs. Hours at best, maybe less.

 probably less given how much blood he was losing from the other wounds. He knew his patients were getting away. The medics had followed his orders, evacuated the tent, carried the wounded toward the regimental aid station. Every minute he held this position gave them more distance, more time, better odds of survival. He knew the math. 30 wounded men versus one dentist. Easy calculation.

 30 lives worth more than one. He’d made that calculation dozens of times in the past week. Which patient gets the plasma? Which patient gets evacuated first? Which patient gets the morphine? Always calculating, always choosing. This was just another choice. He knew the gun. Had trained on it for a year before the army made him a dentist.

 Knew how to clear jams. Knew how to traverse. Knew how to fire in controlled bursts to prevent overheating. Knew all of it. The muscle memory was still there even after 2 years of pulling teeth instead of triggers. He knew he wasn’t going home. That was clear from the start.

 From the moment he ran to that machine gun, from the moment he saw how many Japanese were attacking. 4,000 soldiers charging toward a few hundred Americans. The only question was how long he could hold, how many he could kill, how much time he could buy. But what else did he think about in those final minutes? What goes through a man’s mind when he knows death is coming and keeps fighting anyway? Maybe he thought about his family, his parents back in Milwaukee, wondered if they’d ever know how he died, if they’d get a telegram saying killed in action, if they’d understand what that meant, if they’d be proud or just sad. Maybe he

thought about his dental practice in Los Angeles, the office he built, the patients he treated, the comfortable life he’d walked away from when that draft notice came. wondered if it had been worth it, if anything he’d done made a difference.

 Maybe he thought about the men he’d saved, the 30 in the tent, the dozens more over the past 10 days, the ones who’d live because he’d clamped an artery or packed a wound or kept them alive long enough to reach the hospital. Wondered if they’d remember him, if they’d tell their family someday about the dentist who turned surgeon. Maybe he thought about the men he couldn’t save.

 The ones who died on his operating table. The ones who’d bled out before reaching him. The ones he’d given morphine and told them it would be okay when he knew it wouldn’t. The guilt that comes with being a doctor with having to choose. Maybe he thought about the Japanese soldiers he was killing.

 wondered if they had families, if they’d been drafted like him, if they wanted to be here any more than he did. Or maybe he didn’t think about that at all. Maybe when you’re fighting for your life and your patients lives, the enemy is just targets, just threats to eliminate. Maybe he thought about nothing at all. Maybe the pain was too much, the blood loss too severe, the adrenaline too high.

 Maybe his world had narrowed to just the gun and the targets and the trigger. Fire, traverse, fire, reload, fire. Nothing else existing except the immediate action of staying alive long enough to kill the next attacker. Medical science can tell us what was happening to his body. The 76 bullet wounds, the bayonet wounds, the blood loss, the shock, the way his organs were shutting down one by one, heart rate increasing as blood pressure dropped, breathing becoming rapid and shallow, vision narrowing, consciousness fading.

A human body holds about 5 L of blood. Lose 30% and you go into hemorrhagic shock. Lose 40% and you start losing consciousness. Lose 50% and you die. Solomon lost more than 50%. Had to have the blood trail alone showed that four separate locations. Four times he moved that gun.

 Four blood trails leading from one position to the next. The human body can do remarkable things when it has to. Adrenaline overrides pain. Redirects blood flow to essential organs. Keeps you conscious when you should be passing out. Keeps you fighting when you should be dead. But it has limits. Even adrenaline has limits.

 Those limits were approaching fast for Ben Solomon. The ammunition was gone. The pistol was empty. He’d used the machine gun as a club until he couldn’t lift it anymore. He’d taken bayonet thrusts that should have killed him immediately. Should have pierced his heart or lungs or major arteries. Some probably did. He kept fighting anyway.

 The Japanese soldiers who finally killed him probably couldn’t believe what they were seeing. this American who wouldn’t die, who kept getting up, kept swinging, kept fighting even with a dozen bayonet wounds. They stabbed him again and again, made sure he was dead, stabbed him some more after he was dead, just to be certain. When the counting party found him the next day, they could see what had happened.

The defensive wounds on his hands, the way he’d fallen forward over the gun, the blood trail showing he tried to move it one more time, failed. collapsed there, died there, alone except for 98 dead enemies. Edmund Love described it in his report.

 Said you could visualize Solomon wounded and bleeding, trying to drag that gun a few more feet. The blood on the ground showing how hard it must have been, especially that last move when his strength was almost gone. When death was moments away, when he moved the gun anyway because he wasn’t done yet, that image stayed with love for 50 years.

 A dentist dying behind a machine gun, fighting to the last breath, saving men he’d probably never met before that week, killing enemies who’d have killed those men if he hadn’t stopped them, getting nothing for it except a grave and a denied metal recommendation. But now we know the full story. Now we know it took 58 years to get it right.

 Now, we know that Ben Solomon’s actions on July 7th, 1944 represented something the military struggled to understand. A non-combatant who became a combatant. A healer who became a killer. A man who broke the rules to save lives. And now we know the question that matters most. Not what he thought in those final minutes, but what his actions meant. What they still mean.

 what they say about duty and sacrifice and the impossible choices men make in war. That question has an answer, but it’s not the answer anyone expected. The answer isn’t about heroism. Every soldier on Saipan that day showed heroism. Heroism was common. Men threw themselves on grenades, charged machine gun nests, held positions until they died.

 The Medal of Honor citations from that battle prove it. O’Brien manning his Jeep gun. Baker propped against a tree with eight rounds. Dozens more who never got recognized at all. The answer isn’t about skill. Solomon was skilled with that machine gun, but so were thousands of other gunners. Men who trained longer, fought more battles, killed more enemies over the course of the war. Skill alone doesn’t explain why his story matters.

 The answer isn’t even about the numbers. 98 confirmed kills is remarkable, but other soldiers had higher counts. Fighter pilots, bomber crews, artillery teams, snipers who spent years hunting targets. The body count alone doesn’t make him special. What makes Ben Solomon’s story matter is the choice he made.

 He was a non-combatant, wore a Red Cross brasard, protected under the Geneva Convention, could have evacuated with his patients, should have evacuated. That was the regulation. That was the rule. Medical personnel don’t fight, they heal. But his patients couldn’t move fast enough. The Japanese were coming too fast. Someone had to slow them down.

 Someone had to buy time. The four machine gunners were already dead. Nobody else was available. So the dentist made a choice. He removed his Red Cross brasard. That part matters. He didn’t fight as a protected medical officer. He fought as a combatant. gave up his protection under international law, made himself a legitimate target, did it knowingly, did it anyway.

 Then he picked up that gun and became something the army couldn’t categorize. Not a medic, not an infantry man, something in between. A healer who killed to protect the ones he’d healed. A non-combatant who chose to become a combatant because the situation demanded it. That’s why the army struggled with his Medal of Honor for 58 years. He broke the rules.

The rules exist for good reasons. Medical personnel need protection, need to be trusted by both sides, need to move freely on battlefields to save lives. Those rules save thousands of lives in every war. But rules sometimes conflict with reality. Sometimes the choice isn’t between following rules and breaking rules.

 Sometimes the choice is between abandoning patients and protecting them. Between dying passive or dying active, between letting 30 men get killed or killing to save them. Solomon chose, removed his brasard, picked up the gun, fought, died, got punished for it by being denied recognition for six decades because the system couldn’t handle the complexity, couldn’t accept that sometimes the right choice means breaking the rules.

 The 21st century military understands that now combat medics train with weapons, learn when they can use them, when they must use them. The rules evolved because of cases like Solomon’s. Because reality forced the system to admit that black and white rules don’t work in gray situations. But Solomon never knew that.

 He died thinking he’d done his duty and nothing more. Never knew he’d been recommended for the Medal of Honor. Never knew it got denied. never knew his case would be argued for six decades. Never knew he’d eventually be recognized. He just fought, died, got buried. The 30 men he saved knew though. They went home, told their families, told their children, said a dentist saved their lives twice, once with medical treatment, once with a machine gun. Said he was the bravest man they ever met. Said he deserved the Medal of Honor even if the army disagreed. Those

men are gone now. Their children are old. Their grandchildren are middle-aged. But the story survives because USC kept it alive. Because Edmund Love wrote it down. Because Robert West refused to let it die. Because eventually the system admitted it was wrong. Ben Solomon was born September 1st, 1914. Grew up in Milwaukee. Became an Eagle Scout.

 Went to dental school when Jewish students face quotas at universities. graduated anyway, built a practice, got drafted, tried to fight, got forced to be a dentist, volunteered to be a surgeon, died as an infantryman, got recognized as a hero 58 years too late. He was 29 years old when he died. Had been in combat for 10 days. Had been a surgeon for 10 days.

 Had been manning that machine gun for 15 hours. Killed 98 enemies. Saved 30 friendlies. Died alone behind a gun he shouldn’t have been using according to regulations he’d violated to do what was right. That’s the story of Captain Benjamin Lewis Solomon, the dentist they laughed at until he killed 98 Japanese soldiers with a machine gun and saved 30 American lives by sacrificing his own.

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