On September 27, 1929, President Herbert Hoover presented the Medal of Honor to World War I hero Michael Valente of New York during a formal White House ceremony.
Eleven years earlier, in September 1918, during the assault on the Hindenburg Line in France, Pvt. Valente’s unit was pinned down by intense German machine-gun fire. Valente and another soldier then charged the enemy positions, eliminating two machine-gun nests, killing the gunners, and capturing several prisoners.
Although his heroism had taken place in the final months of World War I, official recognition came more than a decade later—an unusually long delay that reflects how slowly wartime recommendations could move through the military’s administrative process.
Photo: Library of Congress; no known restrictions.
I just find that my blood line is related to Michael Valente through my Ancestors. Com That he is my 2nd. Great -Grandfather. I didn’t realize he was the United States of America a Hero in World War 1. My grandmother Martha told me that I come a long line of Militarys.