In 1917, an Army review board rescinded the Medal of Honor that had been awarded to Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, an Army surgeon and former prisoner of war, more than half a century earlier. Walker refused to send the medal back, wearing it proudly for the remaining two years of her life.
So her family has a sense of how she’d respond to President Donald Trump’s June 10 announcement that nine Army bases renamed in 2023 – including one honoring her – would revert to their original names, initially given to commemorate Confederate Civil War generals.
Of the nine bases given new namesakes two years ago, only Fort Walker commemorated a Union hero from the Civil War.
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Long after Walker’s death, her act of resistance was rewarded: President Jimmy Carter formally reinstated her Medal of Honor in 1977. That restoration took place because of a petition championed by other Walker family members.
Marra said she suspected the recent renaming would prompt another petition.