Heroes of the Medal of Honor LUCIAN ADAMS

Armed with a Browning Automatic Rifle and hand grenades, this lone sergeant silenced three enemy machine gun emplacements in the mountains of northeastern France

- MICHAEL E HASKEW

The slog was relentless. Through dark, deep forest and across broken terrain, mountain peaks studded with bare hillocks, draws and ridgelines, the US Seventh Army had fought its way northward nearly 500 miles (800km) from the French Riviera.

The Germans had contested virtually every mile of the advance since the Allies had come ashore in southern France during Operation Dragoon on 15 August 1944, intent on supporting the D-Day offensive in Normandy and opening the Mediterranean ports to supply and reinforcement convoys. Once a junction had been affected with the armies advancing from Normandy, the Allies intended to press further across the frontier of the Third Reich on a broad front, bringing the Second World War home to Nazi Germany and striking a fatal blow to the enemy.

In late October, after ten weeks of fighting, the veteran US 3rd Infantry Division had battered its way northward through the Vosges Mountains to the vicinity of the French town of La Bourgonce, with the village of St Die identified as an immediate objective. While high-ranking officers planned grand strategy, their aims were being prosecuted and advanced, as always, by small unit actions on the ground.

Two days after his 22nd birthday, 28 October 1944, Staff Sergeant Lucian Adams, Company I, 3rd Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Division, was with his squad in an area noted on maps as the Magdeleine Woods. The 30th Infantry was poised to support the neighbouring 7th Infantry Regiment, moving to capture Hill 616 and open Route N-420, the highway north of Le Haut Jacques Pas, where the 7th Regiment had run into substantial resistance, probably from the German 716th Division and elements of the tough 201st Mountain Battalion.