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Fascinating and Lesser Known People Who Changed American History

Khalid Elhassan May 5, 2020 33 min

Normandy landings - Operation Overlord — Men of the 320th in Normandy. YouTube

30. Ed “Too Tall” Freeman Fought in Three Wars

Ed “Too Tall” Freeman was among those who fought in WWII, Korea, and Vietnam. He dropped out of high school to join the US Navy during WWII, and ended up serving aboard the USS Cacapon, an oil tanker that supplied the American advance in the Pacific. It took him through operations in the Solomons, the Philippines, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa.

Discharged from the Navy after the war, Freeman graduated high school, then enlisted in the Army in 1948. Two years later, he was a first sergeant in Korea, fighting in the Battle of Pork Chop Hill. Out of 257 Americans at the start of that battle, Freeman was one of only 14 survivors. His conduct earned him a battlefield commission and command of a company, which he promptly led back up Pork Chop Hill. With two wars under his belt, Freeman bided his time to fight in a third.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.