A point of history...

Here's something for you.

Just finished watching "Zulu", it's on Instant View on Netflix, if you haven't seen it shame on you. I've seen it numerous times but you can never see a good movie too many times and "Zulu" is a CLASSIC.

Richard Burton narrates a small blurb at the end, citing that of the 1347 Victoria Crosses awarded since the inception of the award in the British military (all branches) for actions of gallantry under fire above and beyond the call of duty, eleven (11) of those Crosses were awarded to the defenders of the mission at Rourke's Drift, Natal, January 22-23 1879.

I have three different sources that quote three different numbers for the defenders... The highest number is 123, the lowest 114. The sources were in agreement that the attacking Zulus numbered no less than 4000, no more than 5000. Either way, just shy of ten percent of the survivors were awarded the Victoria's Cross. A staggering number.

Which made me think about American actions and the Medal of Honor.

Of the 120,000 + Union troops at Gettysburg, 63 were awarded the Medal of Honor. It remains the highest single number of awards for one event. In terms of the percentage of awards in proportion to the number of combatants, it isn't even close to Rourke's Drift.

(A complete aside... The War on Terror has seen six (6) Medal of Honors awarded, three Army, Two Navy and one Marine. All posthumous.)

Some other comparable numbers... The Normandy Campaign saw twelve (12) Medals of Honor awarded, The Battle of the Bulge seventeen (17), Guadalcanal eleven (11), Iwo Jima twenty-seven (27), (23 to Marines, which represented 30% of the total number of Medals of Honor awarded to Marines during WW2) and Okinawa twenty-four (24).

It's a great movie.