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Unsung Hero: Surprising Facts About a Medal of Honor Recipient Who Fought Franco, Hirohito, and Hitler

Khalid Elhassan March 17, 2025 13 min

Black - Edward Allen Carter Jr., and the Medal of Honor he earned but did not receive during his lifetime — Edward Allen Carter Jr., and the Medal of Honor he earned but did not receive during his lifetime. Pinterest

9. A Military Destiny?

At some point during his brief stint fighting the Japanese in 1932, Carter came to believe that he had been visited by a martial spirit. It informed him that he would become a great warrior, but would not die in war. Convinced of his spiritual military destiny, Carter enrolled in a Chinese military school in Shanghai as soon as he was old enough. In addition to excelling in the common fare of military schools, he also learned German as a fourth language, adding it to the English, Hindi, and Mandarin Chinese he already knew, and all of which he spoke fluently. When he turned eighteen, Carter tried to join the US Army, but he was rejected because of racial prejudice. So he became an international soldier.

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.