175 articles
Sergeant Stubby
Sergeant Stubby, brindle stray Boston terrier-type dog and mascot of the 102nd Infantry, 26th Yankee Division in World War I; served 17 battles, wounded by gas and shrapnel, honorary sergeant, Smithsonian mount AF.58280M.
Sergei Korotkikh
Sergei Korotkikh (Malyuta, Botsman), born 1974 in Tolyatti, is a Belarusian-born neo-Nazi militant: RNE Belarus member, NSO co-founder in Russia, Azov Battalion head of reconnaissance, Ukrainian citizen from 2014.
Shoichi Yokoi (横井庄一)
Shoichi Yokoi (横井庄一, 1915–1997), Imperial Japanese Army sergeant, hid in Guam's jungles for 28 years after the 1944 US recapture, was found in January 1972 near Talo'fo'fo, returned to Japan saying he returned with embarrassment, and became a national figure.
Simo Häyhä
Simo Häyhä (Valkoinen kuolema, White Death), Finnish Winter War sniper at Kollaa with 6/JR 34; credited with 542 kills in 98 days using an iron-sighted M/28-30 rifle, a figure his own memoir puts at about 500.
Simon Mann
Simon Mann (1952-2025), British ex-SAS officer and mercenary, co-founder of Executive Outcomes and Sandline, led the failed 2004 Wonga Coup against Equatorial Guinea's President Obiang, was jailed in Zimbabwe and Malabo, pardoned in 2009.
Simon Weston
Simon Weston (born 1961, Caerphilly) is a Welsh Falklands War veteran, Welsh Guardsman, and CBE who survived the 1982 bombing of RFA Sir Galahad with 46% burns, later becoming a charity founder, author, and motivational speaker.
Sławomir Rawicz
Sławomir Rawicz (1915–2004), Polish officer and author of The Long Walk (Długi marsz, 1956), claimed a 1941 gulag escape and 4,000-mile walk to India; Soviet records show he left via Persia in 1942.
Solomon Mahlangu
Solomon Kalushi Mahlangu (1956-1979), South African Umkhonto we Sizwe cadre; convicted of murder under common purpose for the 1977 Goch Street shootout and hanged 6 April 1979; ANC martyr honored by SOMAFCO, Order of Mendi, and scholarship fund.
Surya Sen (সূর্য সেন)
Surya Sen (সূর্য সেন), Masterda, Bengali revolutionary and schoolteacher who led the 1930 Chittagong Armoury Raid with the Indian Republican Army; arrested 1933, hanged 12 January 1934.
Sybil Ludington
Sybil Ludington (1761-1839), daughter of New York militia colonel Henry Ludington, is the legendary "female Paul Revere": a 16-year-old said to have ridden 40 miles on April 26, 1777 to rally militia against the British raid on Danbury, Connecticut. No contemporary evidence supports the ride, which first appeared in print in 1880.
T. E. Lawrence
T. E. Lawrence, Lawrence of Arabia (1888–1935), British archaeologist and liaison officer to the Arab Revolt of 1916–1918 against the Ottomans; author of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, later RAF enlistee under aliases, subject of the 1962 film.
Tadeusz Lutak
Tadeusz Władysław Lutak ps. "Pancerz" (1917–2026), Polish tankman of the 10th Cavalry Brigade in the September 1939 campaign, Home Army saboteur in Rzeszów inspectorate, oldest man and oldest soldier in Poland; posthumously promoted to lieutenant colonel.
Teruo Nakamura (中村輝夫)
Teruo Nakamura (中村輝夫) was a Taiwanese soldier in the Imperial Japanese Army found on Morotai in November 1974, the last known Japanese holdout of World War II.
Thero Wheeler
Thero Wheeler (Thero Lavon Wheeler, 1945–2009) was an American prison militant who helped found the Symbionese Liberation Army in 1973, leaving it months later over its violent plans.
Tom Burnett (Flight 93 passenger)
Thomas E. Burnett Jr. (1963-2001), Thoratec Corporation COO from San Ramon, California, was a Flight 93 passenger whose calls to his wife Deena helped spur the passenger revolt that downed the plane near Shanksville.
Tuvia Bielski (טוביה ביילסקי)
Tuvia Bielski (טוביה ביילסקי), 1906–1987, led the Bielski otriad, an all-Jewish partisan detachment in western Belorussia that rescued over 1,200 Jews, the largest Jewish partisan group of World War II.
Ty Carter
Ty Michael Carter, born 1980 in Spokane, Washington, is a retired U.S. Army staff sergeant and Medal of Honor recipient for the Battle of Kamdesh at COP Keating on October 3, 2009; a former Marine, he became a PTSD advocate after leaving the Army in 2014.
Vasily Zaitsev (sniper)
Vasily Grigoryevich Zaitsev (Василий Григорьевич Зайцев), Soviet sniper of the 284th Rifle Division at Stalingrad, credited with 242 kills, Hero of the Soviet Union; the Major Erwin König duel is unconfirmed in German records.
Vern Stokes
Andrew "Vern" Stokes OBE MVO DL, Coldstream Guards warrant officer and Garrison Sergeant Major of London District since 2015, planned the Queen's state funeral, King Charles III's coronation, Platinum Jubilee, and VE Day 80 ceremonies.
Volodymyr Pravyk
Volodymyr Pravyk (Володимир Правик), 1962–1986, Soviet lieutenant and guard chief of the Chernobyl NPP fire brigade who led the first response on 26 April 1986, called signal number three, and died of acute radiation sickness on 11 May 1986.
William Calley
William Calley was a US Army lieutenant who led the killing of hundreds of Vietnamese civilians at My Lai in 1968 and became the only person convicted.
William Guarnere
William "Wild Bill" Guarnere (1923-2014), South Philadelphia staff sergeant in Easy Company, 506th PIR, 101st Airborne; D-Day, Market Garden, Bastogne leg loss; Silver Star; Band of Brothers.
Yakov Dzhugashvili (იაკობ ჯუღაშვილი)
Yakov Dzhugashvili (იაკობ ჯუღაშვილი), Stalin's eldest son, was a Red Army senior lieutenant captured near Vitebsk in July 1941, held at Oflag camps and Sachsenhausen, and died there 14 April 1943.
Yang Kyoungjong (양경종)
Yang Kyoungjong (양경종) is the name attached to a Korean allegedly conscripted into the Japanese, Soviet, and German armies and captured at Utah Beach on D-Day; historians and a 2005 SBS documentary found no evidence he existed.
Zemene Kassie (ዘመነ ካሴ)
Zemene Kassie (ዘመነ ካሴ), born in Merawi, North Gojjam, leads Amhara Fano in Gojjam and chairs the Amhara Fano National Movement (2026); former Ginbot 7 member and Amhara Popular Force founder, now head of the anti-Abiy alliance declared on Tigrai TV.