On Oct. 5, 1945, President Harry S. Truman placed the Medal of Honor around Jacklyn Harrell Lucas’ neck. According to Lucas , Truman told the Marine, “I’d rather have [your] medal than be president of the United States.”

“Sir, I’ll swap you,” quipped Lucas.

But the ceremony to honor the Marine with the nation’s highest medal for valor was unique in more ways than one. At the age of just 14, the teen had forged his mother’s signature to join the Marine Corps. By the age of 17, Lucas had stowed away aboard the USS Deuel, bound for Iwo Jima.

It was there that he would become the youngest Medal of Honor recipient since the Civil War.

Jack Lucas (USMC)

Born on Feb. 14, 1928, the North Carolina native recalled that after his father died when he was 11 years old, Lucas became “kind of a

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