First Lieutenant William Deane Hawkins

Medal of Honor Recipient – U.S. Marine Corps Reserve

Born: April 18, 1914 – Fort Scott, Kansas

Died: November 21, 1943 – Betio Island, Tarawa, Gilbert Islands

William Deane Hawkins’ life began with challenges. As an infant, he suffered severe burns in an accident that left lasting scars and required a year of care before he could walk again. When he was five, his family moved to El Paso, Texas. Just three years later, his father passed away, and his mother supported the family by working as a school secretary and later as a teacher at the El Paso Technical Institute.

A gifted and determined student, Hawkins skipped the fifth grade at Lamar and Alta Vista Schools. He excelled in academics, winning the state chemistry essay contest, and graduated from El Paso High School at just sixteen years old. His hard work earned him a scholarship to the Texas College of Mines (now UTEP), where he studied engineering.

While attending school, Hawkins worked many jobs—delivering newspapers, selling magazines, working as a bellhop, ranch hand, and railroad laborer. These jobs built his strength, endurance, and work ethic.

When the United States entered World War II after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawkins attempted to join both the Army and the Navy Air Corps but was rejected because of his burn scars. Determined to serve, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve on January 5, 1942. He trained as a scout-sniper with the 2nd Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, and quickly rose through the ranks. While fighting on Guadalcanal in November 1942, he received a battlefield commission to Second Lieutenant and was promoted to First Lieutenant in June 1943.



Hawkins became a legend during the Battle of Tarawa in the Gilbert Islands on November 20–21, 1943. Leading his scout-sniper platoon, he repeatedly attacked enemy positions under heavy fire, personally destroying multiple machine-gun nests and pillboxes. Even after being seriously wounded in the chest, he refused to withdraw and pressed on, eliminating more enemy strongholds before being fatally wounded.

For his extraordinary courage and leadership, First Lieutenant Hawkins was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor, the United States’ highest military decoration, presented to his mother by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in a White House ceremony in September 1944.

His legacy lives on. In El Paso, Hawkins Road and Hawkins Elementary School bear his name. In the Pacific, the airstrip on Betio Island was named Hawkins Field in his honor. His remains rest at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Robert Sherrod, editor of The Saturday Evening Post, described Hawkins as a man whose bravery went far beyond the call of duty, comparing understatement about his heroism to saying “the Empire State Building is moderately high.”

First Lieutenant William Deane Hawkins is remembered as a brilliant student, a determined Marine, and a hero who gave his life for his country.