Hometown: Austin, TX
Branch: U.S. Marine Corps
Unit: Company C, 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division
Military Honors: Medal of Honor, Purple Heart
Date of Sacrifice: May 29, 1951 - KIA in Kwagch’i-Dong, Korea
Age: 21
Conflict: Korean War 1950-1953

Whitt Moreland’s father, Lloyd, worked as a machine operator for a construction company, which required the family to move frequently. Whitt was born on March 7, 1930, in Waco, Texas. Lloyd and Patsy Ann (Whittington) Moreland moved the family around the Austin and San Antonio areas as his job demanded.

When Whitt was 12 years old, he joined the Boy Scouts. That same year, the family welcomed his baby sister, Elizabeth.

While living in Austin, Whitt attended Fulmore Junior High School and Austin High School. A family move 140 miles west made him finish his high school years at Junction (TX) High School.

Moreland was a devout Methodist and was well-liked and easy-going, according to the local newspaper. He also loved to compete. He played two seasons of high school football, earned two varsity letters as a track athlete—specializing in the 440 relay—and participated in local rodeos.

Moreland held a variety of jobs as a young man—ranching, construction, and working at Austin National Bank. His father told the Austin American that Whitt loved horses and had an ambition to own and operate a ranch in West Texas after his service.

After graduating from Junction High School in 1948, Moreland enlisted in the United States Marine Corps the following September, at age 18. While training at Camp Pendleton in Southern California, Moreland was flown across the country to Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia, to run with the 440-yard relay team in the all-Corps track meet.

He was discharged from the Marines after a year and immediately enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve.

His time in the Reserve was short-lived. When communist North Korean forces moved south to invade the non-communist Republic of Korea on June 25, 1950, the United Nations approved the use of force—including American forces—to defend the south. Whitt Moreland was reinstated to active duty that year.

With the rank of private first class, Moreland was assigned as an intelligence scout for Company C, 1st Battalion, 5th Marines Regiment, 1st Marine Division. His unit was deployed to Korea shortly after his reinstatement.

According to the U.S. Department of Defense:

On May 29, 1951, a 21-year-old Moreland volunteered to go with a rifle platoon on a mission to assault a strongly defended enemy position on a hillside near Kwagch’i-Dong, Korea. They succeeded in taking over the enemy emplacement.

Afterward, Moreland led a party to neutralize another enemy bunker he’d seen about 400 meters ahead. He and his fellow Marines pushed through a fire-swept area and were almost at the bunker when the enemy launched a volley of hand grenades at them.

What happened next would earn PFC Whitt Moreland the military’s highest decoration for valor—the Congressional Medal of Honor. His citation reads, in part:

Quick to act despite the personal danger involved, he kicked several of the grenades off the ridgeline where they exploded harmlessly and, while attempting to kick away another, slipped and fell near the deadly missile.

Aware that the sputtering grenade would explode before he could regain his feet and dispose of it, he shouted a warning to his comrades, covered the missile with his body and absorbed the full blast of the explosion, but in saving his companions from possible injury or death, was mortally wounded.

His heroic initiative and valiant spirit of self-sacrifice in the face of certain death reflect the highest credit upon Pfc. Moreland and the U.S. Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life for his country.

Moreland was laid to rest in Mount Ida, Arkansas, in his mother’s family cemetery. On August 4, 1952, Lloyd and Patsy Moreland were presented with his Medal of Honor in a ceremony at the state capitol building in Austin, Texas. Hundreds attended, including Boy and Girl Scouts in their uniforms.

PFC Whitt L. Moreland’s name is engraved on the Wall of Remembrance at the Korean War Veterans Memorial, on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. (Panel 88).

Sources
U.S. Department of Defense, Medal of Honor Monday: Marine Corps Pfc. Whitt Moreland
The Austin Statesman, July 29, 1952: Whitt Had the Makings Of a Hero in Boyhood
The Austin Statesman, Jun. 23, 1952: Austin Marine Honored For Heroism in Korea
Congressional Medal of Honor Society: Whitt Lloyd Moreland
HonorStates.org: Whitt Lloyd Moreland
Burial Site: Find a Grave