As Medal of Honor convention nears, recipient reflects on service

From Sept. 30 to Oct. 3, Detroit will host the 2026 Congressional Medal of Honor Society Convention. This marks the first time that the convention, the largest annual gathering of America's 63 living Medal of Honor recipients, will be in Michigan. Today we hear from Vietnam War veteran Donald Ballard.

From the highest of highs, to the lowest of lows, Donald Ballard has experienced much.

The 80-year-old Ballard, of Missouri, was in Vietnam from December 1967 to October 1968. As a Navy hospital corpsman second class in the Vietnam War, Ballard was part of Company M, 3d Battalion, 4th Marines, 3d Marine Division. His Medal of Honor action took place on May 16, 1968 in Quang Tri Province, Vietnam. That day also happened to be his daughter’s second birthday.

“We were constantly getting new guys into the outfit. We lost so many then they would send us replacements,” Ballard said. “We had three guys that came to us that weren’t acclimated to the weather, the heat. They developed heat stroke, so I had to medevac them out because they would be a burden on us.”

Donald Ballard is seen here, second from the right, outside of the New York Stock Exchange with fellow Medal of Honor recipients. Ballard will be in Detroit later this year for the Congressional Medal of Honor Society Convention. (Photo courtesy of Congressional Medal of Honor Society)

As his Medal of Honor citation states, during the afternoon hours, Company M was moving to join the remainder of the 3d Battalion in Quang Tri province.  

“After treating and evacuating two heat casualties, Ballard was returning to his platoon from the evacuation landing zone when the company was ambushed by a North Vietnamese Army unit employing automatic weapons and mortars, and sustained numerous casualties,” the citation reads. 

That day, Ballard, who is now the only recipient who resides in Missouri, was with a squad of about five or six Marines and a radioman who was calling in helicopters.  

“Now we’re going back up the hill to find our group and our whole company moved out,” he said. “The six of us were in the middle of Vietnam someplace. We had no protection, so when the helicopter came in we had to hide because it brought the enemy activities and they started shooting the helicopter,” he shared. “We quickly loaded them and got the hell out of the landing zone. We tried to catch up with our existing unit and they get into a firefight, walk into an ambush and we developed a lot of casualties.” 

Treating a Marine who was shot in the leg, Ballard transported him on his shoulders to a bomb crater. 

“It was a staging area so I could call in a medevac. When I took him off my shoulder I laid him on the ground and when I did, I laid him on top of a grenade that blew up, blew both of his legs off, tore the face off of one of the Marines that was already laying there,” Ballard said. 

While working on two patients, a grenade came in and hit Ballard in the helmet.  

“It fell right by my legs,” he recalled. “Not knowing what to do with it, I flung it out of the bomb crater and it went over. You holler ‘grenade’ so everybody can hide or take cover.” 

It was about 20 minutes later when Ballard called for some stretcher bearers, preparing to move down the hill. 

“Then some enemy soldier from some place threw another grenade on us and it landed behind me,” he said. “One of my patients that had his face blown off started hollering ‘Doc, Doc.’ I turned around and there’s a damn grenade laying there and I had to lunge for it and grab it. I was off-balanced, so I couldn’t throw it. I pulled it up under my chest. It was false bravery earlier when I picked up that hand grenade and threw it out. That gave me false bravery that I could get rid of it. It was under my chest and I rolled up on the patient with no legs and flung it off in the air and it went outside the bomb crater where it went off. I was just praying that I didn’t throw it on my own guys.” 

 When the grenade failed to detonate, Ballard calmly arose from his dangerous position and resolutely continued his determined efforts in treating other marine casualties. His citation concludes by indicating that Ballard prevented possible injury or death to his fellow marines.  

Looking back on his Medal of Honor action nearly 60 years later, Ballard said the fact that he attempted suicide in covering the grenade and failing was one of his wife's claims to their divorce. 

“She said ‘you loved them more than you loved me.’” Ballard said. “And that day, that was true. I had to deal with suicide tendencies myself. Mentally, I was not there. There were times when I didn’t care if I lived or died. I wished I could die just to end it.”  

Just less than two years to the date of his action, Ballard was presented the Medal of Honor on May 14, 1970 in the White House by President Richard Nixon. At the time of the presentation, Ballard was 24 years old, and married with two children.  

When Ballard comes to Michigan this fall, it will mark his first time in the Wolverine state. Speaking of the convention, he calls it a fun week of activities that promote and protect the Medal of Honor and a good chance for fellowship among recipients. For more details on the convention, visit medalofhonordetroit.com.