Veterans’ families get Congressional Gold Medals at Annual Montford Point Marines Day

JACKSONVILLE, N.C. (WNCT) — Friday was the 15th-annual Montford Point Marines Day in Jacksonville.

The day is to remember the service of the first Black Marines who trained in Jacksonville during World War II.

Thirty of those Marines and their families were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.

“For this is not just Black history or Marine Corps history, this is American history, and the world should know about the Montford Point Marines,” Dr. James T. Averhart Jr. said.

Families, Marines and the community all gathered at the Montford Point Memorial in the Lejeune Memorial Gardens Friday. Saundra Howard-McGee received a medal on behalf of her father, Sergeant Edward Lonny Howard.

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“I was talking to my father. I said Daddy, we did it. I was talking to him,” she said. “I’m getting full again, but it was just great. And I also was talking to my mother. My mother was in the Army. My mother retired as an Army civilian when she met my father. And the both of them just, it just filled me up.”

Some original Montford Point Marines were also in attendance. George McIvory joined the Corps in 1944 and said he remembers the first day he got to Montford Point like it was yesterday.

“I said, well I wonder what I got myself into. Well, I soon found out,” he said. McIvory stayed in the Corps until the war ended. “I could see that, in other words, I don’t think they want us here,” he said. “But, I was determined. I wasn’t going to let them push me over or run me out.”

So far, the Montford Point Marines Association has identified about 3,000 of the Marines and they are constantly searching for the rest. “We want to identify the 20,000 and we’re not there yet,” Dr. Averhart said.

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