Jackson, Miss. -- Jack Lucas, a North Carolina native who at 14 lied his way into military service during the Second World War and became the youngest U.S. Marine to receive the Medal of Honour, has died. He was 80. He had been battling cancer and died Thursday after he requested doctors at a hospital in a Hattiesburg, Miss., to remove him from a dialysis machine.
In February, 1945, he was just six days past his 17th birthday when his heroism at Iwo Jima earned him the America's highest military honour. He used his body to shield three fellow squad members.
"A couple of grenades rolled into the trench," he told reporters in October 1945. "I hollered to my pals to get out and did a Superman dive at the grenades. I wasn't a Superman after I got hit. I let out one helluva scream when that thing went off."
Mr. Lucas was left with more than 250 pieces of shrapnel in his body and every major organ, including six pieces in his brain and two in his heart, and endured 26 surgeries in the following months.
Big for his age and eager to serve, he was just 14 when he joined up by forging his mother's signature. Military censors later discovered his real age through a letter to a 15-year-old girlfriend. He was given the job of driving a truck in Hawaii. Instead, he stowed away aboard a ship headed for combat. He turned himself in to avoid being listed as a deserter and volunteered to fight.
After the war, he earned a business degree and later joined the U.S. Army to become a paratrooper. On a training jump from a plane, both of his parachutes failed. He survived by executing a last-second roll.
