A commanding officer about to pin the Purple Heart onto an unconscious, gravely injured soldier surely did not expect what happened next.
U.S. Army Ranger Cpl. Josh Hargis was gravely injured and on a hospital bed in Afghanistan, hooked up to breathing tubes and heavily bandaged as he was awarded a Purple Heart for courage shown in the battlefield.
Thought to be unconscious, his commanding officer did not expect Hargis, 24, to still follow military protocol despite his injuries, and raised his heavily bandaged hand in a salute.
"Grown men began to weep and we were speechless at a gesture that speak[s] volumes about Josh's courage and character," one of the officers present in the room wrote to Hargis's wife, Taylor. "I will remember it as the single greatest event I have witnessed in my ten years in the Army."
Hargis, who comes from Cincinnati, was wounded on October 6 when an Afghan woman with a bomb vest detonated herself, killing four members of the 3rd Army Ranger Battalion, wounding 12 other soldiers.
His Ranger Regimental Commander as well as 50 officers and medical staff present in the hospital room in the pinning ceremony all thought Hargis was unconscious. His first movements were thought to have been a seizure and his doctor had initially tried to restrain him.
"He had no idea how strong and driven my husband is," Taylor Hargis said of the touching incident,"He was just showing what it means to be a warrior and an American soldier."
"If you want to know the meaning of strong, it's an Army Ranger."
Hargis has been transferred from Afghanistan towards a military hospital in Germany. From there he has since been flown to San Antonio, Texas, where he will continue recovering at an Army hospital in Fort Sam Houston.
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