Moses Hardy
Encyclopedia
Moses Hardy was, at age 112 or 113, the last black
veteran of World War I
and one of the last surviving American veterans of that war. The son of former slaves
, Hardy was born in either 1893 or 1894 and lived a religious and farming life until he signed up to serve overseas in World War I in July 1918. He served in the segregated 805th infantry, which was assigned a variety of manual labor and support tasks. Hardy himself served as a scout, supplying the front line troops when necessary. Though Hardy did experience combat, he was never seriously injured and rarely discussed his experiences concerning the fighting. Instead, he preferred to recount stories about the food, the bravery of the soldiers and the weather in France.
After the war, he took on a variety of jobs including school bus driver, farmer, deacon
and cosmetics salesman, the latter of which he performed well past his 100th birthday. He received the Victory Medal, a special medal from the Mississippi National Guard
and the French Légion d'honneur
. In 1999, the Mississippi Legislature
adopted a resolution recognizing him as an outstanding citizen of Mississippi
. At the time of his death, at the age of either 112 or 113, he was recognized as the oldest combat veteran ever, the oldest male ever recorded in Mississippi and the second-oldest man and World War I veteran in the world.
in either 1893 or 1894. Hardy's parents, Morris Hardy—born in the 1840s—and Nancy Hardy, were former slaves who after the Civil War
had purchased 265 acres (1.1 km²) of land in Mississippi from a Chickasaw
Native American
for a dollar. The Hardy family was a deeply religious one, and Moses would later recount that Exodus 20:12, which instructed one to honor their parents, was his favorite Bible
passage and one which he lived by. Hardy was married once, to a woman by the name of Fannie Marshall, with whom he would end up having eight children.
, which was commanded by white officers. Although the unit's purpose was to provide support for engineer
regiments, it was also an infantry
unit that was equipped to fight if necessary. The unit focused mainly of the tasks of stevedore
s, such as unloading cargo from ships, but also performed other manual labor tasks, such as cooking and organizing burials. Hardy's outfit was armed solely with rifle
s, instead of standard-issue machine gun
s. After the war, Hardy's division was responsible for cleaning up the battlefields and removing the dead.
Hardy himself admitted to his family that he was "scared to death" when he first arrived overseas, but believed that the soldiers were fed something to make them brave, which he referred to as "brave pills". After a short time in the military, he claimed that he was not afraid of anything that he experienced from then on. Even in the heat of battle, Hardy professed that he would get "wound up" at times, but never frightened. He recalled many strange experiences with food and drink, such as getting used to drinking green water from canteens and eating hardtack
s, which he found to be surprisingly filling. To go with this, there was often little more than small tins of ham or chicken and occasionally coffee to drink and pudding or pie for dessert. Hardy also witnessed many of his friends get killed in action, and relied on his faith in God to get him through the toughest times.
Hardy often acted as a scout who would help bring supplies to troops on the front line. On September 25, 1918, he was present at the Meuse River
during a mustard gas attack and, at some point during the war, he received an injury to his knee. Hardy rarely spoke about the fighting itself, and preferred to talk about France's weather when asked about his experiences overseas.
, an honourable discharge (which he had not received upon leaving the army) and the French Légion d'honneur
. In 1999, when he was 106 years old, the Mississippi Legislature adopted a resolution recognizing him as an outstanding citizen of Mississippi. At the time, he was known as the oldest living World War I veteran, as Emiliano Mercado del Toro
had not yet been discovered. He was interviewed by Treehouse Productions in 2006 as part of their Living History Project, a radio tribute to the last surviving World War I veterans that was hosted by Walter Cronkite
. Though he could not speak coherently, his son Haywood Hardy, himself 80 years old at the time, recalled some of the stories that his father had told him.
Hardy did not serve in World War II
and instead drove a school bus, farmed and sold linaments and wigs for "Lucky Heart" cosmetics until his retirement. He reportedly continued to go door-to-door for several years past his centenary
, even resorting to phone sales when his children hid the keys of his 1972 Chevrolet Caprice
. The youngest of his eight children, Jean Dukes, was born in the late 1940s. He also served as a deacon and superintendent of a Sunday School class at Mount Olive Church for over 75 years. His son claimed that, until about four years before he died, his father was healthy enough to drive his car into town every day. Hardy's longevity was also credited to a daily meal that consisted of cabbage, corn bread, butter milk, potatoes and Dr Pepper
, and the fact that he never drank alcohol or smoked in his life. Until a few years before his death, it was claimed that Hardy had never had a seriously ill day in his life and that he never took medicine, as it only made him sick. Hardy lived on his own until 2004 when his legs weakened and he found it almost impossible to walk. He was placed in a rest home, but was still able to feed himself and pass the days watching The Oprah Winfrey Show
and The Price Is Right
.
At the time of his death, he was the oldest United States combat veteran ever, the oldest male ever recorded in Mississippi and had outlived at least three of his eight children. It was reported that he had several dozen grandchildren and great-grandchildren. He was also ranked as the sixth-oldest living verified person in the world, the second-oldest man and World War I veteran behind only del Toro and the last African American one. Although he suffered from mild dementia
in his later years, he was reported to have been completely lucid through his final days and his death was attributed to natural causes.
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
veteran of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
and one of the last surviving American veterans of that war. The son of former slaves
History of slavery in the United States
Slavery in the United States was a form of slave labor which existed as a legal institution in North America for more than a century before the founding of the United States in 1776, and continued mostly in the South until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in...
, Hardy was born in either 1893 or 1894 and lived a religious and farming life until he signed up to serve overseas in World War I in July 1918. He served in the segregated 805th infantry, which was assigned a variety of manual labor and support tasks. Hardy himself served as a scout, supplying the front line troops when necessary. Though Hardy did experience combat, he was never seriously injured and rarely discussed his experiences concerning the fighting. Instead, he preferred to recount stories about the food, the bravery of the soldiers and the weather in France.
After the war, he took on a variety of jobs including school bus driver, farmer, deacon
Deacon
Deacon is a ministry in the Christian Church that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions...
and cosmetics salesman, the latter of which he performed well past his 100th birthday. He received the Victory Medal, a special medal from the Mississippi National Guard
Mississippi Army National Guard
The Mississippi Army National Guard is the Army National Guard component of the Mississippi National Guard. It was originally formed in 1798. It is a component of the United States Army and the United States National Guard...
and the French Légion d'honneur
Légion d'honneur
The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
. In 1999, the Mississippi Legislature
Mississippi Legislature
The Mississippi Legislature is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Mississippi. The bicameral Legislature is composed of the lower Mississippi House of Representatives, with 122 members, and the upper Mississippi Senate, with 52 members. Both Representatives and Senators serve four-year...
adopted a resolution recognizing him as an outstanding citizen of Mississippi
Mississippi
Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...
. At the time of his death, at the age of either 112 or 113, he was recognized as the oldest combat veteran ever, the oldest male ever recorded in Mississippi and the second-oldest man and World War I veteran in the world.
Early life
Hardy was born in Aberdeen, MississippiAberdeen, Mississippi
Aberdeen is a city in Monroe County in the U.S. state of Mississippi. The population was 6,415 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Monroe County....
in either 1893 or 1894. Hardy's parents, Morris Hardy—born in the 1840s—and Nancy Hardy, were former slaves who after the Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
had purchased 265 acres (1.1 km²) of land in Mississippi from a Chickasaw
Chickasaw
The Chickasaw are Native American people originally from the region that would become the Southeastern United States...
Native American
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
for a dollar. The Hardy family was a deeply religious one, and Moses would later recount that Exodus 20:12, which instructed one to honor their parents, was his favorite Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
passage and one which he lived by. Hardy was married once, to a woman by the name of Fannie Marshall, with whom he would end up having eight children.
Military career
Hardy's service in France lasted from July 1918 to July 1919, and included thirty-nine combat days. As an African American, he served in a segregated army unit, the 805th Pioneer Infantry805th Pioneer Infantry
805th Pioneer Infantry was an all Black infantry Regiment during World War I. The 805th contained black soldiers from the state of Mississippi. The Regiment landed in France in July, 1918 and served in Europe until July 1919; the division saw 39 days of action.Supercentenarian Moses Hardy served in...
, which was commanded by white officers. Although the unit's purpose was to provide support for engineer
Engineer
An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...
regiments, it was also an infantry
Infantry
Infantrymen are soldiers who are specifically trained for the role of fighting on foot to engage the enemy face to face and have historically borne the brunt of the casualties of combat in wars. As the oldest branch of combat arms, they are the backbone of armies...
unit that was equipped to fight if necessary. The unit focused mainly of the tasks of stevedore
Stevedore
Stevedore, dockworker, docker, dock labourer, wharfie and longshoreman can have various waterfront-related meanings concerning loading and unloading ships, according to place and country....
s, such as unloading cargo from ships, but also performed other manual labor tasks, such as cooking and organizing burials. Hardy's outfit was armed solely with rifle
Rifle
A rifle is a firearm designed to be fired from the shoulder, with a barrel that has a helical groove or pattern of grooves cut into the barrel walls. The raised areas of the rifling are called "lands," which make contact with the projectile , imparting spin around an axis corresponding to the...
s, instead of standard-issue machine gun
Machine gun
A machine gun is a fully automatic mounted or portable firearm, usually designed to fire rounds in quick succession from an ammunition belt or large-capacity magazine, typically at a rate of several hundred rounds per minute....
s. After the war, Hardy's division was responsible for cleaning up the battlefields and removing the dead.
Hardy himself admitted to his family that he was "scared to death" when he first arrived overseas, but believed that the soldiers were fed something to make them brave, which he referred to as "brave pills". After a short time in the military, he claimed that he was not afraid of anything that he experienced from then on. Even in the heat of battle, Hardy professed that he would get "wound up" at times, but never frightened. He recalled many strange experiences with food and drink, such as getting used to drinking green water from canteens and eating hardtack
Hardtack
Hardtack is a simple type of cracker or biscuit, made from flour, water, and sometimes salt. Inexpensive and long-lasting, it was and is used for sustenance in the absence of perishable foods, commonly during long sea voyages and military campaigns. The name derives from the British sailor slang...
s, which he found to be surprisingly filling. To go with this, there was often little more than small tins of ham or chicken and occasionally coffee to drink and pudding or pie for dessert. Hardy also witnessed many of his friends get killed in action, and relied on his faith in God to get him through the toughest times.
Hardy often acted as a scout who would help bring supplies to troops on the front line. On September 25, 1918, he was present at the Meuse River
Meuse River
The Maas or Meuse is a major European river, rising in France and flowing through Belgium and the Netherlands before draining into the North Sea...
during a mustard gas attack and, at some point during the war, he received an injury to his knee. Hardy rarely spoke about the fighting itself, and preferred to talk about France's weather when asked about his experiences overseas.
Post-World War I
Throughout the years, he received the Victory Medal, the Occupational Medal from the Mississippi Army National GuardMississippi Army National Guard
The Mississippi Army National Guard is the Army National Guard component of the Mississippi National Guard. It was originally formed in 1798. It is a component of the United States Army and the United States National Guard...
, an honourable discharge (which he had not received upon leaving the army) and the French Légion d'honneur
Légion d'honneur
The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
. In 1999, when he was 106 years old, the Mississippi Legislature adopted a resolution recognizing him as an outstanding citizen of Mississippi. At the time, he was known as the oldest living World War I veteran, as Emiliano Mercado del Toro
Emiliano Mercado del Toro
Emiliano Mercado del Toro was, at age 115, the world's oldest person for six weeks, and the world's oldest man from November 19, 2004 until his own death on January 24, 2007. He is the oldest verified military veteran ever...
had not yet been discovered. He was interviewed by Treehouse Productions in 2006 as part of their Living History Project, a radio tribute to the last surviving World War I veterans that was hosted by Walter Cronkite
Walter Cronkite
Walter Leland Cronkite, Jr. was an American broadcast journalist, best known as anchorman for the CBS Evening News for 19 years . During the heyday of CBS News in the 1960s and 1970s, he was often cited as "the most trusted man in America" after being so named in an opinion poll...
. Though he could not speak coherently, his son Haywood Hardy, himself 80 years old at the time, recalled some of the stories that his father had told him.
Hardy did not serve in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
and instead drove a school bus, farmed and sold linaments and wigs for "Lucky Heart" cosmetics until his retirement. He reportedly continued to go door-to-door for several years past his centenary
Centenarian
A centenarian is a person who is or lives beyond the age of 100 years. Because current average life expectancies across the world are less than 100, the term is invariably associated with longevity. Much rarer, a supercentenarian is a person who has lived to the age of 110 or more, something only...
, even resorting to phone sales when his children hid the keys of his 1972 Chevrolet Caprice
Chevrolet Caprice
The Chevrolet Caprice is a full-sized automobile produced by the Chevrolet Division of General Motors in North America for the 1965 through 1996 model years. Full-size Chevrolet sales peaked in 1965 with over a million sold. It was the most popular American car in the sixties and early seventies....
. The youngest of his eight children, Jean Dukes, was born in the late 1940s. He also served as a deacon and superintendent of a Sunday School class at Mount Olive Church for over 75 years. His son claimed that, until about four years before he died, his father was healthy enough to drive his car into town every day. Hardy's longevity was also credited to a daily meal that consisted of cabbage, corn bread, butter milk, potatoes and Dr Pepper
Dr Pepper
Dr Pepper is a soft drink, marketed as having a unique flavor. The drink was created in the 1880s by Charles Alderton of Waco, Texas and first served around 1885. Dr Pepper was first nationally marketed in the United States in 1904 and is now also sold in Europe, Asia, Canada, Mexico, Australia ...
, and the fact that he never drank alcohol or smoked in his life. Until a few years before his death, it was claimed that Hardy had never had a seriously ill day in his life and that he never took medicine, as it only made him sick. Hardy lived on his own until 2004 when his legs weakened and he found it almost impossible to walk. He was placed in a rest home, but was still able to feed himself and pass the days watching The Oprah Winfrey Show
The Oprah Winfrey Show
The Oprah Winfrey Show is an American syndicated talk show hosted and produced by its namesake Oprah Winfrey. It ran nationally for 25 seasons beginning in 1986, before concluding in 2011. It is the highest-rated talk show in American television history....
and The Price Is Right
The Price Is Right
The Price Is Right is a television game show franchise originally produced by Mark Goodson and Bill Todman, and created by Bob Stewart, and is currently produced and owned by FremantleMedia. The franchise centers on television game shows, but also includes merchandise such as video games, printed...
.
At the time of his death, he was the oldest United States combat veteran ever, the oldest male ever recorded in Mississippi and had outlived at least three of his eight children. It was reported that he had several dozen grandchildren and great-grandchildren. He was also ranked as the sixth-oldest living verified person in the world, the second-oldest man and World War I veteran behind only del Toro and the last African American one. Although he suffered from mild dementia
Dementia
Dementia is a serious loss of cognitive ability in a previously unimpaired person, beyond what might be expected from normal aging...
in his later years, he was reported to have been completely lucid through his final days and his death was attributed to natural causes.
See also
- List of the verified oldest men
- List of the verified oldest people
- LongevityLongevityThe word "longevity" is sometimes used as a synonym for "life expectancy" in demography or known as "long life", especially when it concerns someone or something lasting longer than expected ....
- SupercentenarianSupercentenarianA supercentenarian is someone who has reached the age of 110 years. This age is achieved by about one in a thousand centenarians....
- Veterans of World War I who died in 2006