Ryan M. Pitts

Medal of Honor

Pitts was awarded the Medal on July 21, 2014 for actions on July 13, 2008 during the Battle of Wanat. As part of the 173rd Airborne Brigade, Sgt. Pitts served as a Forward Observer. Along with Salvatore Guinta and Kyle J. White, Pitts is the third recipient of the Medal of Honor from 2nd Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment. Pitts was medically discharged in 2009.

Personal Life

Pitts lives in Nashua, New Hampshire, with his wife, Amy, and son, Lucas. He works in business development.

Awards and Decorations

Military awards

Staff Sergeant Pitt's awards and decorations include the Medal of Honor, Bronze Star Medal w/ "V" Device, Purple Heart, Meritorious Service Medal, Army Commendation Medal w/ "V" Device and three Bronze Oak Leaf Clusters, Army Achievement Medal, Army Good Conduct Medal with Bronze Clasp and two Loops, National Defense Service Medal, Afghanistan Campaign Medal with Two Campaign Stars, Global War on Terrorism Medal, Noncommissioned Officer Professional Development Ribbon, Army Service Ribbon, Overseas Service Ribbon with Numeral "4", NATO Medal, Presidential Unit Citation, Valorous Unit Award, Combat Action Badge, Pathfinder Badge and Parachutist Badge.

Medal of Honor citation

Sergeant Ryan M. Pitts distinguished himself by extraordinary acts of heroism at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a Forward Observer in 2d Platoon, Chosen Company, 2d Battalion (Airborne), 503d Infantry Regiment, 173d Airborne Brigade, during combat operations against an armed enemy at Vehicle Patrol Base Kahler in the vicinity of Wanat Village, Kunar Province, Afghanistan on July 13, 2008.

Early that morning, while Sergeant Pitts was providing perimeter security at Observation Post Topside, a well-organized Anti-Afghan Force consisting of over 200 members initiated a close proximity sustained and complex assault using accurate and intense rocket-propelled grenade, machine gun and small arms fire on Wanat Vehicle Patrol Base. An immediate wave of rocket-propelled grenade rounds engulfed the Observation Post wounding Sergeant Pitts and inflicting heavy casualties. Sergeant Pitts had been knocked to the ground and was bleeding heavily from shrapnel wounds to his arm and legs, but with incredible toughness and resolve, he subsequently took control of the Observation Post and returned fire on the enemy.

 As the enemy drew nearer, Sergeant Pitts threw grenades, holding them after the pin was pulled and the safety lever was released to allow a nearly immediate detonation on the hostile forces. Unable to stand on his own and near death because of the severity of his wounds and blood loss, Sergeant Pitts continued to lay suppressive fire until a two-man reinforcement team arrived. Sergeant Pitts quickly assisted them by giving up his main weapon and gathering ammunition all while continually lobbing fragmentary grenades until these were expended.

At this point, Sergeant Pitts crawled to the northern position radio and described the situation to the Command Post as the enemy continued to try and isolate the Observation Post from the main Patrol Base. With the enemy close enough for him to hear their voices, and with total disregard for his own life, Sergeant Pitts whispered in radio situation reports and conveyed information that the Command Post used to provide indirect fire support.

Sergeant Pitts' courage, steadfast commitment to the defense of his unit and ability to fight while seriously wounded prevented the enemy from overrunning the Observation Post and capturing fallen American soldiers, and ultimately prevented the enemy from gaining fortified positions on higher ground from which to attack Wanat Vehicle Patrol Base. Sergeant Ryan M. Pitts' extraordinary heroism and selflessness above and beyond the call of duty are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, Company C, 2d Battalion (Airborne), 503d Infantry Regiment, 173d Airborne Brigade and the United States Army.

My Birth State

Why is Tennessee Known as the Volunteer State?

Due to its natural resources and products it manufactures, the state of Tennessee has had many nicknames, including the "Big Bend State" and "Hog and Hominy State." At one time it was even dubbed "The Mother of Southwestern Statesmen" due to its preponderance of government leaders throughout the years. But the "Volunteer State" is by far the longest-lasting nickname for Tennessee. 

By most accounts, Tennessee first earned its nickname as the volunteer state during the War of 1812 due to the large numbers of Tennesseans who volunteered to serve in battle against Great Britain. Although the men never faced battle, General Andrew Jackson brought the soldiers home at his own expense. Later, Jackson led 2000 Tennessee volunteer soldiers in a successful battle against the British in 1815 at the Battle of New Orleans. Following such success, as many as 30,000 Tennesseans again volunteered in the Mexican War. 

As years passed, Tennessee residents have been called "Big Benders," "Butternuts,"and "Volunteers." The name "Butternuts" referred to the color of the uniforms of Tennessee soldiers during the Civil War. "Big Benders" references the area of the Tennessee River, called the Big Bend River by Native Americans. In reference to the volunteer state, the nickname volunteer is often shortened to "vols."

Davy Crockett is one of one of the most famous volunteers from the volunteer state. Known as the "King of the Wild Frontier," Crockett was a politician and a soldier. He first enlisted as a rifleman in 1813. Later, Crockett entered politics. In the first quarter of the 19th century, he served two terms in the United States House of Representatives. Another famous resident from the volunteer state is Alvin York, who was influential in World War I. York was responsible for capturing and killing many enemy troops.

Tennesseans continued to be avid volunteers in World War II, both at war and on the home front in nearby Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where the Manhattan Project produced the first atomic bomb. One of the earliest known references of the volunteer nickname is by Jacob Hartsell, a captain in the 2nd East Tennessee militia. He wrote a poem, The Brave Volunteer, based on his experience alongside fellow Tennesseans in battle.

In addition to the volunteer state nickname, the athletic teams of The University of Tennessee are also known as the Volunteers. The student yearbook of the university was first named The Volunteer in 1897. The football team was first identified as the Volunteers by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in 1902 when referring to a game between the University of Tennessee and Georgia Tech. By 1905, Tennessee announced the Volunteers as its official sports team name. The female sports teams are dubbed the “Lady Volunteers.”

World War II, 1939-1945

During World War II Tennessee and its citizens contributed generously to the war effort. Many put their lives on the line as soldiers, sailors, and airmen: 315,501 Tennesseans served in the various theaters of the war, and 5,731 lost their lives.

Hundreds of thousands of soldiers from across the nation trained at various Tennessee military camps: Camp Forrest was an induction and infantry training center, Fort Campbell was an armor training facility, and Fort Tyson was a barrage balloon center near Paris, Tennessee. Pilots trained at several small airports throughout the state; important bases for the training of pilots and crews were located in Smyrna and near Dyersburg, and an air ferry command was located in Memphis. The 3800-acre Naval Air Station (NAS) Memphis, located in Millington, was the country's largest inland naval base.

Many Tennessee servicemen were inducted at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, in the early stages of the war. Later in the war, Tennessee servicemen would be inducted at Camp Forrest. Tennessee women joining the WAC (Women's Army Corps) trained at Fort Oglethorpe throughout the war. Other women served in the Navy WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service), the Coast Guard SPARS (a contraction of the Coast Guard motto Semper Paratus), the Women Marines, and the WASPS (Women's Air Force Service Pilots). 

Workers assembling P-38 Lightning fighters
at the Vultee Aircraft Corporation factory,
Nashville, TN, ca. 1941

Library Photograph Collection

Over twenty counties in Middle Tennessee were used for the Tennessee Maneuvers, which were headquartered at Cumberland University in Lebanon (officially referred to as "somewhere in Tennessee?). The central part of the state was selected as the site of these war games not only because of its proximity to railroads and federal highways, but also because of the similarity between its terrain and that of western Europe. Red and Blue "armies" faced each other in complex and realistic training exercises. More than 800,000 men and women participated in the Tennessee Maneuvers, which, though successful in training military personnel, also produced over $4 million in claims by individuals and municipalities for destruction of property by the opposing "armies."

Camps Forrest, Campbell, and Tyson had other uses besides inducting and training soldiers. All three bases additionally served as prisoner-of-war camps for German, Italian, and Austrian POWs through 1946. Prisoners were also held at Tellico Plains, Crossville, Memphis, (My home town - Lawrenceburg), and Nashville. Camp Forrest, which was the headquarters for several permanent and temporary POW camps in five southeastern states, processed approximately 68,000 prisoners.

Stephen Gaskin, founder of The Farm, dies at 79

  Noah's note: Marine Stephen Gaskin and I were in the same First Marine Division, during the Korean War. Gaskin later bought land near my birth place in Summertown, Tennessee and named it "The Farm."

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Ina May and Stephen Gaskin settled on The Farm in Summertown in 1971. Stephen Gaskin died Tuesday, July 8.

 

Stephen Gaskin - an often tie-dye-clad hippie philosopher, a proud "freethinker" and iconic founder of The Farm - died Tuesday morning at his home. He was 79.

More than four decades ago, Mr. Gaskin "an ex-combat marine with crystalline blue eyes " led a caravan of nonconformists across the country, taking his band of beatnik brethren deep into the Tennessee woods and establishing what would become The Farm, one of the country's oldest surviving communes.

It was the vision of a man who spoke with pride about the lineage of freethinkers from which he came.

Related: Historical timeline of The Farm in Summertown

In his home, months before his death, Mr. Gaskin rose from his seat at an ornately carved table made of New Mexico white pine, a piece created by the generation before him that stood as a centerpiece in the kitchen his Tennessee home on The Farm.

"Come here," Mr. Gaskin beckoned, a playful eagerness in his eyes, "I want to show you something."

He walked to a sepia-hued photo and gleamed at its smiling subjects. On the right stood his great grandfather, a U.S. Marshal in the Oklahoma Indian territory whose thick mustache is befitting the law men in old Westerns. Born in 1850 he was a drummer-boy in the Union home guard in the Civil War.

"He was also a freethinker and a student of the world's religions," Mr. Gaskin said.

On the left was his grandfather, in the middle his young mother holding Stephen, a toddler who is not much more than 1.

Four generations of free thinkers who once played dominos together in Texas, he said.
Just four of many family members who embraced open thought.

Mr. Gaskin's grandmother, who drove a covered wagon from Tennessee to Texas, was a freethinker and a suffragette who marched in the streets for the right of women to vote, Gaskin wrote in a 1997 opinion piece published in The Tennessean. Her brother, Mr. Gaskin's great-uncle Charles, helped organize the longshoremen's union on the waterfront in San Francisco in the 1930s and '40s, he wrote.

"We have been freethinkers for generations," Gaskin wrote. "And, as is provided for in the Constitution, I have passed my philosophical and religious ways on to my children, who are very proud of their heritage and ancestors."
That philosophy was imparted to more than just his biological kin. Mr. Gaskin was a man whose teachings inspired thousands to follow him across the country.

His vision first evolved in California, where Mr. Gaskin - part of the Fifth Regiment, U.S. Marine Corps - alighted in the late '50s after combat in Korea.

A war-veteran-turned-Beatnik, Mr. Gaskin experienced "revelations" as the G.I. Bill and scholarship beneficiary journeyed through syllabi at San Francisco State College.

He earned his master's in 1964, and spent two years teaching English and creative writing at his alma mater.

In 1967, Mr. Gaskin initiated an informal philosophy seminar that would become known as Monday Night Class. The "hippie guru," discussed religion, politics, sex and drugs. He believed in Tantric thought, telepathy and togetherness — and in an era when youth was disillusioned by the Vietnam War, disturbed by increasing injustice and encouraged by the successes of civil rights, he helped young people feel empowered.

Later, Mr. Gaskin wrote that he became a spiritual leader because "there was a bunch of stuff I wanted to know really bad, and I went out looking to learn it," he said in a early 1970s publication of The Farm Report, "and I found out that it was really hard to answer the questions I wanted answered."

After researching for a while, he wrote, and working with others, he found he could answer those questions - "and that somebody ought to do it, and so I would just do that.

"I also saw that one man, if he was honest and kept the faith and pushed long enough, could move enough of the world to make a difference. ... And that was such a turn-on of an idea that I thought I'd try to do it, and I've been doing it ever since, and so far it's working."

Thousands seeking change attended his classes - many found it.

When the American Academy of Religion sent Mr. Gaskin on a 42-state speaking tour, many of his acolytes followed.

In a convoy of campers, VW vans, trucks and brightly decorated school buses, they crossed the country. When they returned to California, the whole West Coast scene "had gone decadent," Mr. Gaskin recalled in a 2013 interview with The Tennessean. Adrift and searching for something better, he suggested they all "go out to the middle and find some land."

They found it just outside Summertown, where an independent-minded moonshiner sold them 1,000 acres at $70 per acre.

"The rednecks took to us good," Mr. Gaskin recalled to The Tennessean in 2013. "They liked us."

They pooled their money and began making decisions by consensus. On a budget of $1 per person per day with no grants, food stamps or welfare, the 320 original settlers bought the land, erected buildings from salvaged wood, found water supplies and became agriculturally self-sufficient within four years.

They created a motor pool with a parts department, a welding shed and a couple of flatbeds made by torching caravan vehicles.

They communicated first by high-powered CB radio, then by a burgeoning system of interlocking phone lines powered by batteries and connected to about a dozen devices - a hippie party line.

Anyone who became a member of The Farm accepted Mr. Gaskin as his or her spiritual teacher, and a person's inner business became everybody's business.

Mr. Gaskin often addressed his role as a leader by saying this, as quoted in a version of The Farm Report from the early 1970s: "I'm a teacher, not a leader. If you lose your leader, you're leaderless and lost, but if you lose your teacher there's a chance that he taught you something and you can navigate on your own."

Mr. Gaskin worked on community relations, helping the local community accept the "good hippies," many who were college-educated suburban kids.

There were a few hitches.

Early in the years of The Farm, a few men were caught growing marijuana. Though Mr. Gaskin said he was not part of growing, he took equal responsibility.

"The cops said, 'Whose pot is this?'" Mr. Gaskin recalled to The Tennessean in 2013. "And I said, 'We're a collective. What's here is part mine.'"
Mr. Gaskin appealed in court, but in 1974, he and several other men spent nearly a year in the Tennessee State Penitentiary.

When he was released, he married Ina May – a woman who established her own fame as nationally recognized midwife.

They had three children. Eva Gaskin, who was delivered by midwives Gaskin trained herself, and sons Samuel and Paul. Mr. Gaskin also had two other children, Dana and Floyd.

The 1,750-acre spread of land in Summertown on which they settled in 1971 to form their own society was, for some, it was an adolescent experiment; for others, such as the Gaskins, a lifelong commitment.

Mr. Gaskin took pride in being a freethinker — and inspiring his family and Farm kinfolk to feel the same.

"I believe in the Constitution," he wrote in a 1997 opinion piece published in The Tennessean. "I think it is one of the most important documents in history. I think it protects freedom of religion for all Americans, and also freedom from religion.

"I am not a backslider," he continued, "who needs to be roped and tied and turned back in with the rest of the herd. I come from a long and proud American tradition that includes the likes of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson and Helen Keller and Lena Horne and Henry David Thoreau and Samuel Clemens and Herman Melville.

"I think the importance of the United States lies in the sincere attempt to live without royalty and with respect for other people's religions.

When I hear someone say that the separation of church and state is a myth, or that the Constitution is only man's law, it makes my blood run cold.

"I consider any attempt to take this country over in the name of any religion to be as repugnant and unconstitutional as a takeover by international communism or fascism."

By 1980, The Farm's population swelled to more than 1,200. But a financial crisis led to a reorganization. The group made some bad investments. Members did not have insurance and faced large medical bills. With The Farm more than $400,000 in debt, a large corporate hospital placed a lien against the land.

In 1983, they took a vote and the communal life lost. In the once-cashless society, members started to pay monthly dues and only The Farm's 1,750 acres were held in common. The debt was paid off in about four years, and the society survived in a new way of life. Mr. Gaskin transitioned from a spiritual leader to another resident of the cooperative. He remained on The Farm until his death.

"I'm just grateful the people around here had a big enough heart to take us in," he said.

Civil War Marines

The Confederate States Marine Corps

        The Confederate States Marine Corps (CSMC) was established by an act of the Confederate Congress 16 Mar. 1861. Corps strength was authorized at 46 officers and 944 enlisted men but actual enrollment never came close to that number. (A figure for 30 Oct. 1864 lists only 539 officers and men.) Though the officers were mostly former U.S. Marine officers, the head of the corps, Commandant-Col. Lloyd J. Beall, was a former U.S. Army paymaster with no marine experience.

        The CSMC was modeled after the U.S. Marine Corps, but there were some differences: the Confederates organized themselves into permanent companies, replaced the fife with the light infantry bugle, and wore uniforms similar to those of British marines. Ashore they provided guard detachments for Confederate naval stations at Mobile, Savannah, Charleston, Charlotte, Richmond, and Wilmington and manned naval shore batteries at Pensacola, Hilton Head, Fort Fisher, and Drewrys Bluff. Seagoing detachments served aboard the various warships and even on commerce destroyers.

        Confederate marines saw their first naval action aboard the CSS Virginia (Merrimack) off Hampton Roads, Va., 8-9 Mar. 1862, and near wars end were part of the naval brigade that fought at Sayler's Creek, Va.

        Despite desertions and even near-mutinies, most marines served well and deserved Navy Sec. Stepehen R. Mallory's praise for their "promptness and efficiency." The corps weakness was due largely to internal squabbles over rank, shore duty, and administrative assignments. And, with no funds for bounties, the corps could not easily enlist recruits. Until 1864 the monthly pay of enlisted men was $3 less than that of equivalent army grades. Only late in the war were the marines allowed to draw from army conscripts to augment their ranks.

The United States Marine Corps

        The United States Marine Corps (USMC) was not utilized to full advantage during the Civil War. Already weakened by the resignations of many of its best officers, the USMCs morale suffered further as a result of feuding between staff and line officers and senior officers who regarded themselves administrators rather than field commanders. Another blow to morale was the practice of appointing new junior officers by patronage.

        In 1861 Congress authorized the United States Marine Corps to be enlarged to 93 officers and 3,074 enlisted men, and Abraham Lincoln increased that number by another thousand. However, recruiting was hindered by a lack of funds for bounties and longer terms of enlistment than for men in the volunteer army. By 1863 negative feelings toward the USMC resulted in a congressional resolution that would have transferred the corps to army control. The resolution was defeated, however, and when Marine Commandant-Col. Jobn C. Harris died in 1864, Sec. of the Navy Gideon Welles retired several senior officers to appoint Maj. Jacob Zeilin his successor. Zeilin, at 59, was a combat veteran of the Mexican War and an officer of proven ability.

        Harris had governed the corps by carefully following all naval regulations and by staying clear of army operations, and Zeilin continued this policy. As a consequence, marines did not play a major role in expeditions and amphibious operations during the war. Both Harris and Zeilin failed to recognize the possibilities of amphibious assault, regarding such operations as a responsibility of the army. Some 400 marines did participate in the navy's unsuccessful landing operation against Fort Fisher, 13-14 Jan. 1865; the army landing finally won the battle there.

        During the war marines continued their traditional role as ship guards, also manning batteries and participating in limited operations ashore. They did not always perform well, as at First Bull Run, where a marine battalion of mostly raw recruits was routed. But other marines distinguished themselves during landing and gunboat attacks and especially as members of gun crews. 17 marines received the Medal of Honor for conspicuous bravery; 13 of these were sergeants and corporals serving as gun captains and gun-division commanders.

        Marine recruiting improved by 1864 with changes in the conscription laws and with bounty money finally available. When the war ended, the corps was at full strength. A total of 148 marines were killed in action, while 312 more died from other causes.
Source:  "Historical Times Encyclopedia of the Civil War"