Navy corpsman ran through a wall of fire to save his Marines during ambush in Iraq

I once met an old Guadalcanal Marine soon after I got out of the army. Needless to say, there was some friendly ribbing back and forth. While we were insulting each other, I decided to throw my best marine insult at him. I said, "the only good marine is a navy corpsman." Being a medic, I thought I had won the round. He looked at me intently, shook his head and said, "Damn right." He then lifted his shirt up and I saw the stitching across his chest and down to his belly where a Japanese machine gun had creased him during Guadalcanal. I was stunned, I was just joking I said, I didn't mean it. He looked at me and just said that his "doc" was the best of them all that day.

Later on I met William "doc" Lynne, a corpsman with the first marine division on Peleliu and Okinawa. During the battle on Okinawa, doc Lynne performed a tracheotomy under fire on a wounded marine. This was in 1944. In 2010, a bunch of folks got together and wrote a letter to the commandant of the marines telling this story of doc Lynne. There actually was one witness to his action. Although the injured marine died a few days later, doc had grabbed a private and asked him to hold the I.v bottle. Well, he was still alive, and wrote a statement attesting to doc Lynne's claim. At the final reunion of G-2-5 in Detroit, the commanding general of the First Marines presented doc Lynne with a bronze star and "v" device for his actions. The person who read the citation, the private who held the I. V. Bottle. Doc called this the greatest day of his life. Sadly, Doc Lynne passed away four days later.

Well done MARINE (Corpsman).

Way to go "Doc".
Semper Fi