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Master sergeant, U.S. Army
Roderick 'Roddie' Waring Edmonds, was a U.S. Army infantryman renowned for his courageous stand during World War II. As the highest-ranking American non-commissioned officer captured by German forces in December 1944, Edmonds was interned at Stalag IX-A, a prisoner-of-war camp in Ziegenhain, Germany. On January 27, 1945, Edmonds refused an order by German officers to identify Jewish-American soldiers, possibly for separate execution, instead defiantly declaring that "We are all Jews here." The captors relented, sparing the lives of up to 300 Jewish-American prisoners of war.
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