Tibor Rubin Tibor " Ted " Rubin ( born June 18 , 1929 ) is a Hungarian - born Holocaust survivor who emigrated to the United States in 1948 and received the Medal of Honor for his valorous actions during the Korean War as a U . S . Infantry soldier and POW from President George W . Bush on September 23 , 2005 . Rubin is a resident of Garden Grove , California . Rubin was repeatedly nominated for various military decorations , but was overlooked because of antisemitism by a superior : according to the " Washington Post " , " in affidavits filed in support of Rubin ' s nomination for the Medal of Honor , fellow soldiers said Rubin ' s sergeant was an anti - Semite who gave Rubin dangerous assignments in the hope of getting him killed " . Childhood in Hungary . Rubin was born in Pásztó , a Hungarian town with a Jewish population of 120 families , the son of a shoemaker and one of six children . At age 13 , he was transported to the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria and liberated two years later by American combat troops . Both his parents and two of his sisters perished in the Holocaust . Emigration to the United States . Rubin came to the United States in 1948 , settled in New York and worked first as a shoemaker and then as a butcher . In 1949 , he tried to enlist in the U . S . Army , for him a shortcut to citizenship and the chance to attend the U . S . Army ’ s butcher school in Chicago . Knowing little English , he failed the English language test , but tried again in 1950 and passed with some judicious help from two fellow test - takers . Antisemitism in the army . By July 1950 , Private First Class Rubin found himself fighting in South Korea with I Company , Eighth Cavalry Regiment , First Cavalry Division . According to lengthy affidavits submitted by nearly a dozen men who served with Rubin in South and North Korea , mostly self - described " country boys " from the South and Midwest , an antisemitic army sergeant consistently " volunteered " Rubin for the most dangerous patrols and missions . During one mission , according to the testimonies of his comrades , Rubin secured a needed route of retreat for his rifle company by single - handedly defending a hill for 24 hours against waves of North Korean soldiers . For this and other acts of bravery , Rubin was recommended four times for the Medal of Honor by two of his commanding officers . Both of these officers were killed in action shortly afterwards , but not before ordering Rubin ' s sergeant to begin the necessary paperwork recommending Rubin for the Medal of Honor . Some of Rubin ’ s fellow GIs were present and witnessed when the order was issued to the sergeant , and all are convinced that the sergeant deliberately ignored the orders . " I really believe , in my heart , that [ the sergeant ] would have jeopardized his own safety rather than assist in any way whatsoever in the awarding of the Medal of Honor to a person of Jewish descent " , wrote Corporal Harold Speakman in a notarized affidavit . Chinese POW camp . Toward the end of October 1950 , massive Chinese troop concentrations had crossed the border into North Korea attacked and were attacking the unprepared American troops now trapped way inside North Korea . Most of Rubin ' s regiment had been killed or captured . Rubin , severely wounded , was captured and spent the next 30 months in a prisoner of war camp . Faced with constant hunger , filth , and disease , most of the GIs simply gave up . " No one wanted to help anyone . Everybody was for himself " , wrote Leo A . Cormier Jr . , a former sergeant and POW . The exception was Rubin . Almost every evening , Rubin would sneak out of the prison camp to steal food from the Chinese and North Korean supply depots , knowing that he would be shot if caught . " He shared the food evenly among the GIs , " Cormier wrote . He also took care of us , nursed us , carried us to the latrine . . . , he did many good deeds , which he told us were mitzvah s in the Jewish tradition . . . he was a very religious Jew and helping his fellow men was the most important thing to him " . The survivors of the prison war camp credited Rubin with keeping them alive and saving at least 40 American soldiers . Rubin refused his captors ' repeated offers of repatriation to Hungary , by then behind the Iron Curtain . Jewish veterans . The Jewish War Veterans Act ( officially the Leonard Kravitz Jewish War Veterans Act of 2001 , after another Jewish Army veteran in the Korean War , and uncle and namesake of Lenny Kravitz ) established a review of Medal of Honor nominations for servicemen of the Jewish faith or extraction whose nominations may have been derailed because of antisemitism . Notes . Tibor Rubin . Great Americans . http : / / www . greatamericans . com / video / Portraits - of - Valor - Tibor - Rubin