Rochester, N.Y. Marine, receives Navy Cross


Marine Capt. Brian R. Chontosh received the Navy Cross Medal from the Commandant of the United States Marine Corps, Gen. Michael W. Hagee, during an awards ceremony Thursday at Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Training Center, Twentynine Palms, Calif. Photo by: Cpl. Jeremy Vought

Submitted by: MCB Camp Pendleton
Story Identification #: 200456162723
Story by Cpl. Jeremy Vought


MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif.(May 6, 2004) -- Marine Capt. Brian R. Chontosh received the Navy Cross Medal from the Commandant of the United States Marine Corps, Gen. Michael W. Hagee, during an awards ceremony Thursday at Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Training Center, Twentynine Palms, Calif.

Three other Marines received medals for valor at the same ceremony.

Chontosh, 29, from Rochester, N.Y. , received the naval service's second highest award for extraordinary heroism while serving as Combined Anti-Armor Platoon Commander, Weapons Company, 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom March 25, 2003. The Medal of Honor is the highest military award.

While leading his platoon north on Highway 1 toward Ad Diwaniyah, Chontosh's platoon moved into a coordinated ambush of mortars, rocket propelled grenades and automatic weapons fire. With coalitions tanks blocking the road ahead, he realized his platoon was caught in a kill zone.

He had his driver move the vehicle through a breach along his flank, where he was immediately taken under fire from an entrenched machine gun. Without hesitation, Chontosh ordered the driver to advanced directly at the enemy position enabling his .50 caliber machine gunner to silence the enemy.

He then directed his driver into the enemy trench, where he exited his vehicle and began to clear the trench with an M16A2 service rifle and 9 millimeter pistol. His ammunition depleted, Chontosh, with complete disregard for his safety, twice picked up discarded enemy rifles and continued his ferocious attack.

When a Marine following him found an enemy rocket propelled grenade launcher, Chontosh used it to destroy yet another group of enemy soldiers.

When his audacious attack ended, he had cleared over 200 meters of the enemy trench, killing more than 20 enemy soldiers and wounding several others.

"They are the reflection of the Marine Corps type who's service to the Marine Corps and country is held above their own safety and lives," said Gen. Hagee, commenting on the four Marines who received medals during the ceremony. "I'm proud to be here awarding the second highest and third highest awards for bravery to these great Marines."

"These four Marines are a reflection of every Marine and sailor in this great battalion," said Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps, Sgt. Maj. John L. Estrada.

"I was just doing my job, I did the same thing every other Marine would have done, it was just a passion and love for my Marines, the experience put a lot into perspective," said Chontosh.

In effect since April 1917, and established by an Act of Congress on Feb. 4, 1919, the Navy Cross may be awarded to any person who, while serving with the Navy or Marine Corps, distinguishes himself/herself in action by extraordinary heroism not justifying an award of the Medal of Honor.

The action must take place under 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; or, while serving with friendly foreign forces engaged in an armed conflict in which the United States is not a belligerent party.
To earn a Navy Cross the act to be commended must be performed in the presence of great danger or at great personal risk and must be performed in such a manner as to render the individual highly conspicuous among others of equal grade, rate, experience, or position of responsibility.

More than 6,000 Navy Crosses have been awarded since World War I.

Outstanding! A dupe topic but I will gladly read it again!

A true Marine.

great stuff! would love to see this on the news...

Thank you Capt. Chontosh.

Why do I get choked up when I read stories like that?

Pride, gratitude?  I don't know but it sure stirs my soul.  

Quoted: great stuff! would love to see this on the news...

News hell!
I want to see the movie made about this .
I want this Marine awarded the Medal of Honor!

Thats what I think of when I think Marines.
God bless all those in service to this great country.
M

Quoted: great stuff! would love to see this on the news...

Dan Rather would rather swallow ground glass than mention anything like this on the Evening News....

WOW!!!!!  KICK ASS!!!!

Quoted: "I was just doing my job, I did the same thing every other Marine would have done, it was just a passion and love for my Marines, the experience put a lot into perspective," said Chontosh.

A true hero.  One giant SALUTE!

Quoted: Proud to be an American!

It feels good, doesn't it!!!

Ooh-Rah!

I see MARPAT!


On a different note here did anyone see the Marine General talking about the Abu Gharib prison deal?
I was trying to see if I could find a link to what he said because it was classic!

It was something like "I don't have to answer for the actions of my Marines!"

Has anyone seen it in writing?


BigDozer66

Damn,   He has nothing to prove in my book


JOB WELL DONE!!!!!!

Excellent story, that man is truly a hero!  Great job!

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Kick ass!!!  What a soldier.  

what a bad-ass. Wow.  

How come we don't see this on fox news?

I'll try this again.

Maybe I won't get as much flak.


Our service people never fail to astound me.

Granted, we on ARFCOM dig out the stories the media doesn't, so I hear it here.

I've heard of guys losing limbs and returning to duty inside of weeks.

I've heard stories of gallantry beyond reproach here.

For years I've wondered where the heroes  were. Now I know.

Since 9-11 there's been a lot of genuine, old fashioned heroes popping up, and this young Marine Officer is one of them.

I'm amazed, yet no longer really surprised when I hear something along these lines.

It really is getting to the point where I routinely expect superhuman things out of our very human service people. They are that amazing.

Truth is, for every deed that goes rewarded with a medal, there are SEVERAL that go unmentioned.

Knowing that  there are quite a few people like that serving makes me feel pretty damned secure.


so I repost:

Yeah? So?

This kind of conduct is what I normally expect from our people.(proud smirk)

(at least it sure seems that way.)

KILLING SPREE!!!

He aint no Audy Murphy!  He is better! SEMPER FI!

Nice, I hope the marines in the tank were awarded something, plus the marine who was "following" him.

Quoted: He aint no Audy Murphy!  He is better! SEMPER FI!

CITATION: 2d Lt. Murphy commanded Company B, which was attacked by 6 tanks and waves of infantry. 2d Lt. Murphy ordered his men to withdraw to prepared positions in a woods, while he remained forward at his command post and continued to give fire directions to the artillery by telephone. Behind him, to his right, 1 of our tank destroyers received a direct hit and began to burn. Its crew withdrew to the woods. 2d Lt. Murphy continued to direct artillery fire which killed large numbers of the advancing enemy infantry. With the enemy tanks abreast of his position, 2d Lt. Murphy climbed on the burning tank destroyer, which was in danger of blowing up at any moment, and employed its .50 caliber machine gun against the enemy. He was alone and exposed to German fire from 3 sides, but his deadly fire killed dozens of Germans and caused their infantry attack to waver. The enemy tanks, losing infantry support, began to fall back. For an hour the Germans tried every available weapon to eliminate 2d Lt. Murphy, but he continued to hold his position and wiped out a squad which was trying to creep up unnoticed on his right flank. Germans reached as close as 10 yards, only to be mowed down by his fire. He received a leg wound, but ignored it and continued the single-handed fight until his ammunition was exhausted. He then made his way to his company, refused medical attention, and organized the company in a counterattack which forced the Germans to withdraw. His directing of artillery fire wiped out many of the enemy; he killed or wounded about 50. 2d Lt. Murphy's indomitable courage and his refusal to give an inch of ground saved his company from possible encirclement and destruction, and enabled it to hold the woods which had been the enemy's objective.

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Really, better? The German troops Lt. Murphy was holding back were "mountain" troops that had been brought in from Norway.

The Germans were trying to get past the area that Lt. Murphy was defending to take a crossroads. If they had taken it they would have been able to threaten the position of the entire 3-ID, and stop it's offensive.

The area that Lt. Murphy was fighting for had to be abaondoned the prior day by 3-ID 30 Inf. Regiment soldiers due to the intense German attack.

Something tells me that Murphy and this Marine are made of the same stuff. Simple as that.

The news of and the story behind Capt. Brian Chontosh's Navy Cross isn't new but it always makes me proud to be from the same nation as such a man.

He demonstrates the courage, motivation, skill, knowledge, and honor that make us all so proud to fly Old Glory!

Quoted: He aint no Audy Murphy!  He is better! SEMPER FI!

Capt. Chontosh is one hell of a man, Marine and American...But let's not start talk'en crazy!


One-Man Stand at Holtzwihr  

Audie Murphy earned the Medal of Honor and lasting fame during a fierce engagement near Colmar, France, and ended the war as America’s most decorated soldier.  


On a frigid January afternoon in 1945, Company B, 15th Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division, was attacked on the outskirts of Holtzwihr, France, by six tanks and an estimated 250 German infantrymen, who were determined to wrest the Bois de Riedwihr from the Americans. Certain that his decimated company could not withstand the German onslaught, First Lieutenant Audie L. Murphy ordered his men to fall back to safety deep in the forest. After expending all his carbine ammunition at the enemy, Murphy himself prepared to fall back. Suddenly, he spotted a .50-caliber machine gun on the turret of a burning tank destroyer. Knowing that his position had to be held at all costs, Murphy climbed on top and began firing the machine gun at the oncoming Germans.

Native Texan Murphy, destined to become a postwar film star, made his courageous stand during the Colmar offensive, which eventually drove the Germans from their last foothold on French soil. The 3rd Infantry Division’s role in the offensive was to advance near the Bois de Riedwihr, a large forest in the northern sector of the Colmar Pocket that stretched between the heavily fortified villages of Riedwihr and Holtzwihr. Lieutenant Colonel Keith Ware, executive officer of the 15th Regiment, later recalled how imperative it was to secure the forest, explaining, “Its possession was of cardinal importance, as the woods dominated the German stronghold of Holtzwihr, the reduction of which was essential to the prompt accomplishment of the 3rd Division’s offensive tasks.”

On January 23, the 30th Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division, captured the woods and reached the outskirts of Holtzwihr and Riedwihr, where the Americans encountered 10 enemy tanks and tank destroyers accompanied by at least 100 infantrymen. The result was disastrous. Without cover and unable to dig foxholes in the frozen earth, the American unit was cut to pieces. Shattered, understrength and badly disorganized, the 30th was forced to withdraw from the Bois de Riedwihr.

The 15th Regiment was ordered to retake that same ground the next day. The subsequent fighting was so furious that the regiment’s Company B, among others, was decimated. With the exception of Lieutenant Murphy, all the officers were killed, and 102 of the company’s 120 enlisted men were either killed or wounded before they even reached their assigned position. By midnight on January 25, Company B had penetrated 600 yards into the woods and was in position north of Holtzwihr.

Within the hour fresh supplies reached the weary survivors of Company B. After the men were resupplied, they were ordered to move up to the south end of the woods, facing the village of Holtzwihr, and hold the line until relief came. Advancing through snowy darkness in the early morning hours, the men reached their assigned position before dawn. Once there, the weary GIs began a futile attempt to dig foxholes in the frozen ground.

Murphy later recalled his men’s frustration: “This night seemed unusually long and the snow colder than I ever dreamed it could be. The sound of picks on frozen ground beat against my eardrum like mad. The 18 men left in Company B had been digging in that goddamned snow covered granite and the only benefit received from it was the exercise, which kept them from becoming stiff and immobile with the cold. And even when one stopped digging it was necessary to walk about to keep your feet from freezing.”

Murphy, who had taken over the depleted company during the night, feared a dawn attack and was concerned that his men could not stand up to an assault. “Strange, but it seems dawn breaking means more than any other time of the day or night, to an infantryman,” he said of that suspense-filled evening. “It is an accepted time to attack or be attacked.” Mercifully, as the overcast dawn broke, two M10 tank destroyers from Lt. Col. Walter E. Tardy’s 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion arrived just in time to support Company B’s position. But to the relief of Murphy and his men, the Germans did not attack at daybreak.

Murphy took advantage of the unexpected lull to begin forming his lines, using one tank destroyer and five armored vehicles from the 3rd Reconnaissance Troop to protect his right flank. Company A connected loosely with his left flank. The second tank destroyer selected a position approximately 40 yards ahead of the lines. Murphy then set up his command post in a drainage ditch 10 yards in front of the rear tank destroyer. He maintained contact with battalion headquarters, a mile to the rear, by a field phone.

Company B was “stretched across a butt-end of a large ‘U’ whose sides were formed by two great fingers of trees that led toward Holtzwihr,” Murphy recalled. The heavily fortified village was now in plain view over the rolling, snow-covered fields. The two tank destroyers sat astraddle a narrow dirt road that ran deep into the woods. Murphy knew German armor would have to advance along the roadway. Early in the afternoon, he phoned back to 1st Battalion headquarters for last-minute instructions. He was informed that the 2nd Battalion, 30th Regiment, had not yet arrived to reinforce his company. “Hold your position” were his orders.

At 1400 hours on January 26, 1945, German armor and infantry moved out from Holtzwihr, preceded by an artillery barrage. “From my forward shallow emplacement I saw the counterattack forming with six tanks and about 250 foot soldiers garbed in white suits,” Murphy recalled, “so it would’ve been impossible to spot them sooner or any farther away than a mile. I alerted the men and ran for the field phone and called the artillery officer at battalion headquarters and arranged for 2nd Battalion to fire. I no sooner gave the order to fire than all hell broke loose. The Germans had started their preliminary barrage.” Private First Class Donald Eckman remembered: “You could see the pennants on the antenna of the German tanks....That got our attention right away....We also saw a huge sea of white infantry coming toward us.”

The infantry belonged to the German 2nd Mountain Division, which had been transferred to the Colmar region from Norway. The men had been trained for operations in mountainous terrain. Individual companies of this division were brought down from Norway and fed into the lines as soon as they arrived. By committing this elite division to action at Holtzwihr, the German commanders demonstrated how vital they believed it was to hold a bridgehead west of the Rhine.

The German tactical objective was to gain control of the road that led from Holtzwihr through Murphy’s position and into the woods beyond the regimental headquarters. If successful, the enemy attack would clearly threaten the 3rd Division’s entire position. Murphy recognized the importance of holding the road at all costs.

Once the enemy came within range, Tardy’s tank destroyers opened fire. Unfortunately, their 90mm shells bounced harmlessly off the steel sides of the oncoming German armor. “I saw the enemy tanks get direct hits,” said Murphy, but the rounds proved ineffective against the heavily armored German tanks. Advancing and firing viciously, they knocked out a Company B machine-gun crew. Then the rear tank destroyer was hit by an 88mm shell that pierced its thin armor and killed the commander and gunner. The surviving crew members scurried out and retreated into the woods.

Undaunted, the crew in the lead tank destroyer, after surviving several close calls, mounted an attack on its own. Staff Sergeant Joseph Tardiff and Corporal Robert Hines simultaneously blazed away with .50- and .30-caliber machine guns, cutting down the oncoming enemy infantrymen. Suddenly, however, the crew lost control of the tank destroyer when they tried to maneuver into a better firing position. The vehicle slid off the road and into a drainage ditch, leaving its main gun at a useless angle that prevented it from being trained on the enemy. Stuck fast in the ditch, the tank destroyer became a sitting duck for German fire. The crew climbed out and hastily retreated to the forest.

With both American tank destroyers out of action and large enemy infantry and armored forces moving on his position, Murphy realized that the remnants of his company could hold out no longer. He ordered his men to fall back to safety deep in the forest while he stayed behind, directing artillery fire. Private First Class Irving Kelly was reluctant to leave Murphy. “I remember being mad as hell when Murph told us to go back,” Kelly recalled. “We wanted to stay and fight by his side. I remember vividly that Sergeant Harold Corl and myself were the last two to leave.” Due to a technical problem with forward observer 1st Lt. Walter Weispfenning’s radio, Murphy remained at his post, directing artillery fire over the field telephone. “It was not a heroic act,” said Murphy. “I figured if one man could do the job, why risk the lives of others.”

He ordered fire directly on top of the advancing Germans, communicating target instructions to 1st Battalion headquarters while at the same time shooting at the enemy infantry with his carbine. “I loved that artillery,” Murphy recalled. “I could see Kraut soldiers disappear in clouds of smoke and snow, hear them scream and shout, yet they came on and on as though nothing would stop them.” The Germans had advanced to within 50 yards of Murphy when a nervous lieutenant from battalion headquarters inquired about the enemy’s position. Murphy replied, “If you just hold the phone a minute, I’ll let you talk to one of the bastards.”

After exhausting his carbine ammunition, Murphy was preparing to fall back when the .50-caliber machine gun on the turret of the burning tank destroyer caught his eye. Soon the fire would reach the vehicle’s fuel and ammunition, but Murphy knew the gun was his only chance to stop the Germans. He climbed aboard the tank destroyer and began spraying the big .50-caliber at the enemy. Private First Class Anthony V. Abramski later reported, “I saw Lt. Murphy climb on top of the burning tank destroyer while bursts of machine pistol fire from the advancing infantry battered against the hull and tread.”

Murphy knew that the .50-caliber would have no effect on the tanks, so he concentrated his fire on the advancing infantry. “I would not waste my ammunition on something that direct hits by 90mm shells could not slow down,” he said. “I concentrated on the foot soldiers, believing that the tanks would not advance very far without them.” Private Charles Owen, one of the 18 men left in Company B, watched in awe as Murphy raked the oncoming enemy. “Boy, he was effective on that .50-caliber,” said Owen. “I don’t know whether he’d ever had .50-caliber training or not. But the Germans were deathly afraid of .50-calibers; they had armor-piercing capabilities.”

Another observer, Sergeant Elmer Brawley, who witnessed the engagement from the fringe of the woods, added, “The German infantrymen got within 10 yards of Lieutenant Murphy, who killed them in the draws, in the meadows, in the woods-wherever he saw them.” Murphy’s deadly fire on the supporting infantry eventually forced the tanks to return to an area in front of the woods. “These tanks added their murderous fire to that of the Kraut artillery and small-arms fire that showered the lieutenant’s position,” Brawley said.

The billowing smoke from the tank destroyer, combined with the constant roar of battle, prevented the Germans from detecting where the machine-gun fire was coming from. According to Murphy, “With all the crackle of firearms and big shells exploding all around, they probably didn’t even hear my machine-gun fire, much less guess its point of origin.” Although the smoke provided some concealment, it also interfered with Murphy’s visibility, which allowed some enemy soldiers to creep up unnoticed on his right flank. He wrote: “When I first saw them, they had stopped in the drainage ditch directly in front of me and were frantically discussing something. I pressed the trigger and slowly traversed the barrel-the bodies slumped in a stack position.”

Suddenly, two 88mm shells slammed into the tank destroyer. The concussion and shock of the explosion threw Murphy violently against the turret, nearly knocking him to the ground. “Lieutenant Murphy was enveloped in clouds of smoke and spurts of flame,” Weispfenning recalled. Miraculously, Murphy managed to maintain his composure and continued to fire the machine gun. The only time he stopped firing was when he had to reload or relay firing instructions to artillery. Years later, displaying his characteristic dry wit, Murphy remarked: “I remember getting the hell shook out of me, but that was nothing new. I also remember for the first time in three days my feet were warm.”

Amazingly, his luck continued to hold when the gray clouds broke long enough for American fighter-bombers to assemble above the raging battlefield. After hearing the glorious sound of the approaching planes, Murphy had the artillery mark the German positions with smoke shells so the pilots could start strafing. The enemy attack, although slowed, still pressed forward, however. Once again, the infantry threatened to overrun the strongpoint, now held down by a single American. In a daring move, Murphy continued to call for artillery fire, even though it was falling uncomfortably close to him by that time. “I figured that I could luck it out of that barrage if the Krauts could,” he said.

With the renewed barrage, the Germans finally realized that someone had them zeroed in with artillery. However, they still could not locate the source of the machine-gun fire that was cutting their ranks to pieces. A small group of Germans managed to infiltrate the woods as far back as the 1st Battalion headquarters, but the majority of the enemy infantry began to fall back toward Holtzwihr. Without the protection and support of the foot soldiers, the German armor wisely left the field. “I can understand why the Kraut infantry missed me,” deadpanned Murphy. “But I can never forgive the German tank men for their poor marksmanship. It was real sloppy.”

Just as the Germans began to fall back, Murphy’s field telephone went dead. Exhausted and bleeding profusely, Murphy climbed off the burning tank destroyer and limped back into the forest. “I turned from the Germans and never looked back,” he recalled. “I was too weak from fear and exhaustion to care anymore.” Shortly after reaching the woods, Murphy heard the tank destroyer blow up, blasting off the turret on which he had been standing.

Although steel and rock fragments riddled the field map that he had carried during the battle, Murphy had been incredibly lucky. His trousers were soaked with blood from an old wound, suffered the previous October, that had been reopened in the course of his frenzied ordeal. “Murph was a daredevil; he took chances that others just wouldn’t take,” recalled Brad Croeker, a Company B private. “He was too daring for most of us. His middle name was lucky.” Bill Weinberg added: “I think he was just willing to stick his neck out. But it was a matter of being careful, too. He took more chances than others, but he did it in a calculated way.”

When Murphy got back to his company, he helped organize a counterattack. In sworn testimony, Sergeant Brawley stated: “Lieutenant Murphy, refusing to be evacuated, led us in a strong attack against the enemy, dislodging the Germans from the whole area.” Murphy continued advancing until the men of Company B had reoccupied their original positions.

Frozen and exhausted, the GIs spent the rest of the afternoon holding their ground. “That night we lay among our dead comrades who fell that afternoon,” Murphy said. Croeker recalled: “We were right beside the Colmar Canal. After that bloody day was over, we went down to the canal to get a drink....The bodies were so thick, you had to push them aside to get a drink of water.”

Strengthened by replacements, the 3rd Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment, captured Holtzwihr on January 27. The Germans, disheartened by their lack of progress against the Americans, pulled most of their men and materiel out of the area. Except for small pockets of enemy resistance, the areas east of the Ill River and north of the Colmar Canal were clear of enemy forces by January 28.

On June 2, 1945, Lt. Gen. Alexander Patch, commanding general of the Seventh Army, presented Lieutenant Murphy with the Medal of Honor. The official citation reads in part: “For an hour the Germans tried every available weapon to eliminate Lieutenant Murphy, but he continued to hold his position....His directing of artillery fire wiped out many of the enemy; he killed or wounded about 50. Lieutenant Murphy’s indomitable courage and his refusal to give an inch of ground saved his company from possible encirclement and destruction and enabled it to hold the woods, which had been the enemy’s objective.”

Charles Owen recalled years later: “He saved our lives. If he hadn’t done what he did, the Germans would have annihilated us. We were already beat down pretty bad and about out of ammunition.”

For Murphy, the Medal of Honor was the crowning achievement of an illustrious combat career. By the end of the war, he had received every medal for valor that his country had to offer, including two Bronze Stars, the Distinguished Service Cross, two Silver Stars, three Purple Hearts and the Legion of Merit-making him the most decorated American soldier during World War II.

After the war, Murphy returned to Texas, but the reluctant hero was invited to Hollywood in September 1945 by actor James Cagney, who had seen his photo on the cover of Life magazine. Murphy made more than 40 films, including To Hell and Back, The Red Badge of Courage and many Westerns. On May 28, 1971, a private plane crashed outside Roanoke, Va., killing the five people aboard, including passenger Murphy, 46.

I have a feeling that this kind of stuff happens more than we hear.  I have never been in combat, someone who has can chime in if they like.

Quoted: Something tells me that Murphy and this Marine are made of the same stuff. Simple as that.

Bam!!!
I'm proud of my Army and that Marine makes me proud to be an American.

Actually, the good Captain's story reminds me more of Sgt York than Audie Murphy....

Either way--brave man, top-notch Marine.  

Quoted: Actually, the good Captain's story reminds me more of Sgt York than Audie Murphy.... Either way--brave man, top-notch Marine.

Agreed!