He had to fight for the privilege of dying on a beach. That is not a metaphor.
Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr. wrote three separate letters to his commanding officer, Major General Raymond Barton, requesting permission to land with the first wave at Utah Beach on June 6, 1944. Barton denied all three. Roosevelt was 56 years old, suffered from arthritis severe enough that he walked with a wooden cane, and had already survived one war — the First World War, in which he had been wounded and gassed. Barton's concern was understandable.
Roosevelt's fourth request was granted. He would explain his reasoning later in a letter to his wife Eleanor: "I went because I felt I could steady the boys."
The Wrong Beach
The 4th Infantry Division's assault on Utah Beach began to go wrong before the first landing craft touched sand. A strong current had pushed the entire flotilla approximately 2,000 yards south of the designated landing zone. Instead of landing at the planned sectors, the first waves found themselves on an entirely different stretch of beach — one that, as it happened, was less heavily defended than the intended target.
A less experienced officer — or a healthy one with more to lose — might have ordered the boats to redirect. The current was strong. The men were already shaken. The original plan called for a specific beach, specific exits, specific roads. Landing in the wrong place meant that every piece of planning done for Utah Beach was, at best, partially useless.
Roosevelt walked the beach with his cane while bullets still flew, personally surveying the terrain, conferring with the battalion commanders who were looking to him for direction. Then he made the decision that military historians have since described as one of the finest acts of field leadership on D-Day.
"We'll start the war from right here."
He did not wait for confirmation from higher command. He improvised. He sent word back to the following waves: land here, not at the original point. He personally led the assault inland, hobbling across the sand with his cane, in a trench coat, calling out directions and encouragement to men half his age.
The Medal of Honor He Never Received While Alive
In seven weeks of fighting in Normandy, Theodore Roosevelt Jr. never left the front. He was seen repeatedly at the most exposed positions, showing up wherever the fighting was heaviest, always on foot, always with the cane.
On July 10, 1944, he wrote to his wife: "I don't know what the next days will bring." Four days later, on July 14, he suffered a massive heart attack and died. He was 56 years old.
The Medal of Honor he had been nominated for was approved — but the paperwork had not yet cleared the chain of command when he died. He was awarded it posthumously, making him and his father, Theodore Roosevelt Sr., the only father-and-son pair in American history to both hold the Medal of Honor.
He is buried at the Normandy American Cemetery, in a plot adjacent to his younger brother Quentin — a World War I pilot killed in 1918 over France, on the same continent, in the same cause. Ted Roosevelt arranged it so that they would be together.
The cane he used on Utah Beach is preserved. It is a simple wooden walking stick, unremarkable by any measure except what it was doing that Tuesday morning in June.
Sources & Further Reading
H.Paul Jeffers, "Theodore Roosevelt Jr.: The Life of a War Hero" (Presidio Press, 2002); Medal of Honor citation, National Archives; Cornelius Ryan, "The Longest Day" (Simon & Schuster, 1959).
