On the autumn day in 1951 when Private William Speakman of the Black Watch won the Victoria Cross for heroically beating off a Chinese assault with hand grenades (TIME, Jan. 7, 1952), Private Patrick E. Lydon, 26, lay in a nearby trench, cringing with fear. Last week, before a court-martial, his lieutenant told what had happened:
"I said . . .'Lydon, where are you going . . . where's your rifle?' He said, 'I'm hurt, I'm frightened' ... He said he had broken his little finger, but it seemed perfectly all right to me. He was lying on the floor under a...
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