An Army of One: Rudolph Davila’s Spectacular WWII Heroics

The American rifle company and machine gun platoon were trying to break through the Nazi strongholds around Anzio during World War II. When a group of Nazis ambushed the Americans, Staff Sergeant Rudolph B. Davila turned into an army of one.

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Davila died in January 2002, but on May 28, 1944, many of his comrades must have assumed he would not live the day. The U.S. Army staff sergeant spotted the German ambush just as he crested a hill. “[T]his hill was just covered with grass, tall grass. There was no cover for the rifle company that was lying there on the forward slope,” Davila later recalled, according to historian Tara Ross. The machine gunners didn’t want to advance into the ambush