<Tr> <Th> Signature </Th> <Td> </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Th> Website </Th> <Td> Audie L. Murphy </Td> </Tr> <P> Audie Leon Murphy (20 June 1925--28 May 1971) was one of the most decorated American combat soldiers of World War II . He received every military combat award for valor available from the U.S. Army, as well as French and Belgian awards for heroism . Murphy received the Medal of Honor for valor that he demonstrated at the age of 19 for single - handedly holding off an entire company of German soldiers for an hour at the Colmar Pocket in France in January 1945, then leading a successful counterattack while wounded and out of ammunition . Murphy was born into a large family of sharecroppers in Hunt County, Texas . His father abandoned them, and his mother died when he was a teenager . Murphy left school in fifth grade to pick cotton and find other work to help support his family; his skill with a hunting rifle was a necessity for putting food on the table . </P> <P> After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Murphy's older sister helped him to falsify documentation about his birthdate in order to meet the minimum - age requirement for enlisting in the military . Turned down by the Navy and the Marine Corps, he enlisted in the Army . He first saw action in the 1943 Allied invasion of Sicily; then in 1944 he participated in the Battle of Anzio, the liberation of Rome, and the invasion of southern France . Murphy fought at Montélimar and led his men on a successful assault at the L'Omet quarry near Cleurie in northeastern France in October . </P>

Who was the most decorated american soldier in world war ii