Stone Gardens: A Purple Heart winner from the Korean Conflict was buried in a family plot in rural Montgomery County

Cpl. Whitt Lloyd Moreland

Whitt Lloyd Moreland was born on March 7, 1930, in Waco, McLennan County, Texas, the son of Lloyd W. Moreland and Patsy Ann Whittington Moreland. His mother came from the Whittington family of Montgomery County, Arkansas, whose longstanding family burial ground near Mount Ida would later become his resting place.

Lloyd Moreland worked as a machine operator for a construction company, a job that required frequent moves across Texas. The family lived for periods in the Austin and San Antonio areas. While in Austin, Whitt attended Fulmore Junior High School and Austin High School, became a devout Methodist, and joined the Boy Scouts at age twelve, the same year his sister Elizabeth was born.

He was described as friendly and easygoing yet competitive. He played football for two years and lettered twice in track, specializing in the 440-yard relay. He also competed in local rodeo events. A family move took him west, where he finished his education at Junction High School in Junction, Texas, graduating in 1948. Some accounts note he also spent time at Llano High School during his sophomore and junior years.

After graduation, he worked briefly at an Austin bank and for a construction company.

On September 28, 1948, at age eighteen, he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps for a one-year term at Austin, Texas. He completed recruit training at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, California, finishing in January 1949. He then attended infantry training at Camp Pendleton, California, from January to April 1949.

From April until his discharge on September 28, 1949, he served with Headquarters Battalion, Marine Barracks, at Camp Pendleton. Upon leaving active duty he enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve for a six-year commitment.

When the Korean War began, he was recalled to active duty on November 30 or December 1, 1950. He received replacement and advanced training at Camp Pendleton from December 1950 into January 1951. He deployed from the United States in February 1951 and arrived in Korea in March 1951.

Assigned as an intelligence scout, he joined Company C, First Battalion, Fifth Marines, First Marine Division (Reinforced). Some service summaries place him initially with Headquarters and Service Company of the battalion before attachment to Company C for operations. By late May 1951 the First Marine Division was engaged on the eastern front of the UN May-June counteroffensive, operating in the rugged terrain near the Punchbowl area of North Korea.

On May 29, 1951, near the village of Kwagch’i-Dong, Company C faced strongly defended enemy positions on elevated ground. Private First Class Moreland, serving as an intelligence scout, voluntarily accompanied a rifle platoon in a daring assault against one of those hill positions.

His accurate rifle fire helped neutralize the hostile emplacement and contributed directly to the seizure of the objective. Once the position was secured, Moreland observed another enemy bunker approximately four hundred meters farther forward.

Without hesitation, he led a small party of Marines toward it, advancing boldly through an area swept by enemy fire. As the group closed on the bunker the enemy launched a volley of hand grenades onto their position on the ridgeline. Moreland immediately kicked several of the grenades off the crest so that they exploded harmlessly below.

While attempting to clear another grenade he slipped and fell. Recognizing that the sputtering grenade would detonate before he could regain his feet and dispose of it, he shouted a warning to his comrades, covered the weapon with his own body, and absorbed the full force of the explosion. He was mortally wounded in the blast and died that day at the age of twenty-one.

His action prevented injury or death among the men around him.

Moreland’s remains were recovered and returned to the United States. On October 19, 1951, he was buried in Whittington Cemetery, the family burial ground of his mother’s people, located about two miles from Mount Ida in Montgomery County,.His parents were later interred beside him.

The Medal of Honor was awarded posthumously. Official announcement followed relatively soon after his death. He became the seventeenth Marine to receive the award for actions in the Korean War.

On August 4, 1952, dual ceremonies took place. In Austin, Texas, at the state capitol, Colonel Albert F. Heinze presented the medal to Lloyd and Patsy Moreland before a crowd of more than one- thousand people that included Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts in uniform. Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice John Edward Hickman and other dignitaries participated, and a large portrait of the Marine was also presented to the family, which included his sister Elizabeth.

Simultaneously, a graveside ceremony was held at Whittington Cemetery near Mount Ida. Arkansas Lieutenant Governor Nathan Gordon, himself a Medal of Honor recipient from World War II, took part.

A medal-shaped floral arrangement donated by the Arkansas Florists’ Delivery Association was presented. The officer in charge of the state’s Marine recruiting station read the official citation, a local preacher offered a prayer, and two Marine sergeants served as an honor guard.

Additional posthumous honors include the Purple Heart. Moreland’s name is engraved on the Wall of Remembrance at the Korean War Veterans Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., on Panel 88.

A monument in Llano, Texas, also commemorates him along with other local service members from the war.

The official Medal of Honor citation records his rank as Private First Class, United States Marine Corps Reserve, Company C, First Battalion, Fifth Marines, First Marine Division (Reinforced), and details the action at Kwagch’i-Dong on May 29, 1951, concluding that he gallantly gave his life for his country.