“Last Man to Leave”: Pfc. Richard Eller Cowan at Krinkelter Wald
Follow the Beyond the Call team into the frozen woods of Belgium during the opening days of the Battle of the Bulge, where twenty-two-year-old Private First Class Richard Eller Cowan, a heavy machine gunner with the 23rd Infantry Regiment, helps hold a thin American line near Krinkelter Wald against repeated German assaults, including an attack backed by a massive Royal Tiger tank. This episode traces Cowan’s path from a college student in Wichita and Oberlin to the front lines of Europe, then walks you step by step through his final stand along a narrow firebreak, where he holds his fire until the enemy closes, tears into their ranks at deadly range, and keeps his gun in action under artillery, rockets, and machine-gun fire so his comrades can withdraw. We then follow the aftermath, from the rediscovery of his shattered position to the words of his Medal of Honor citation, and reflect on what his sacrifice meant for the men he saved and for the generations that remember him today.
