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Services Feb. 12 for decorated vet

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ASSOCIATED PRESS / 2000
Barney Hajiro, shown receiving the Medal of Honor from President Bill Clinton, will be remembered in services Feb. 12.

Services for Barney Hajiro, the oldest Medal of Honor recipient, will be held 4 p.m. Feb. 12 at Hosoi Mortuary.

Visitation will begin at 3 p.m. Aloha attire.

Burial with full military honors provided by the Army Reserve’s 100th Battalion/442nd Infantry will be at 11:30 a.m. Feb. 14 at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.

Hajiro, 94, died Friday at the Maunalani Nursing and Rehabilitation Center.

He was one of 20 Medical of Honor recipients who served with the famed, segregated Japanese-American 100th Battalion and 442nd Regimental Combat Team in World War II.

On Oct. 29, 1944, during one of the 442nd’s fiercest campaigns in the forests of France’s Vosges Mountains to free the towns of Bru-yeres and Biffontaine, Hajiro led a charge up "Suicide Hill," drawing fire and single-handedly destroying two machine gun nests and killing two enemy snipers before being wounded by a third machine gun. The efforts by the 442nd to rescue the Texas 36th Division’s "Lost Battalion" is considered one of the key battles in Army history.

He is survived by wife Esther, son Glenn, grandson Ian, brothers Tokuro Hajiro and Umeo Hashiro, and sister Pearl Yoshikawa.

 

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