José F. Jiménez

He charged enemy positions to protect his hard-pressed unit.

Jose Francisco Jimenez was born in Mexico City on 20 March 1946. He attended schools in Morelia before moving to Arizona, where he completed his schooling at Red Rock and Santa Cruz Valley Union High School in Eloy. He enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve at Phoenix in June 1968 and entered the regular Marine Corps that August.

After recruit training at San Diego, he completed infantry training at Camp Pendleton. He went to Vietnam in February 1969 and joined Company K, 3rd Battalion, 7th Marines, 1st Marine Division. He served as a guide and fire-team leader and became a lance corporal in June.

On 28 August 1969, south of Da Nang in Quang Nam Province, his unit came under concentrated fire from concealed enemy positions. Jimenez moved forward on his own initiative, attacked an anti-aircraft emplacement and continued against another position that was holding up the advance. His actions drew fire away from other Marines and helped them move forward.

He was mortally wounded while continuing to assault the defended positions. The Medal of Honor recognised the initiative and persistence with which he protected his comrades and broke the resistance confronting them. He was twenty-three.

His family received the posthumous award from President Richard Nixon in 1970. Originally buried in Mexico, he was returned to the United States and reinterred with military honours at Glendale Memorial Park, Arizona, on 17 January 2017. The ceremony reunited the memory of his Mexican childhood, his Arizona community and the Marines with whom he had served.