Thomas C . Neibaur Thomas Croft Neibaur ( May 17 , 1898 – December 23 , 1942 ) was the first Latter - day Saint ( Mormon ) to receive the Medal of Honor . He as also the first soldier from Idaho to be awarded America ' s highest decoration , which occurred during World War I . Mormon heritage and early life . Thomas Neibaur had a very strong family heritage and connection in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter - day Saints beginning with his great - grandfather , Alexander Neibaur ( 1808 – 1883 ) . ( link to " notes " on Alexander ) Alexander was from Alsace - Lorraine , a graduate of medical and dental university training in Berlin , and was fluent in several languages . Thomas ' grandfather , Joseph Neibaur , settled in Paris , Idaho in the 1880s . Thomas ' parents were James C . Neibaur ( 1862 – 1938 ) and Elizabeth Croft Neibaur ( 1863 – 1938 ) . Thomas was the ninth of ten children and when he was nine years old the family moved to Teton , near Sugar City , Idaho . Thomas and his father worked in the large sugar beet factory built in 1903 , the namesake of Sugar City . Though his parents and family remained faithful members of the LDS Church , Neibaur drifted from active participation . He always considered himself a believer in God , though he maintained he was not religious . But he never denied his Mormon roots and was very proud of his Mormon heritage . Military service . Neibaur enlisted into the Idaho National Guard on March 30 , 1917 , a week before the United States declaration of war against Germany on April 6 , 1917 . The Army inducted him into federal service on April 8 , and he then served in the Rocky Mountain northwest , guarding tunnels and railroad bridges until October 1917 when he and his 2nd Idaho Infantry Regiment was ordered to Camp Mills , Long Island . There he became an automatic rifleman in newly organized 41st Division of western states guardsman . Later moving to Camp Merritt , New Jersey the 41st Division deployed to France where it became a replacement division for the other units of the American Expeditionary Force ( AEF ) . Neibaur and thousands of other western guardsmen were transferred to other divisions already in France , he being assigned to M Company , 167th Infantry Regiment of the 42nd Division . This division was nicknamed the " Rainbow " division from a comment that Maj . Douglas MacArthur said while serving on the army staff that it had soldiers from many states like a " rainbow " across the land from end to end . The 167th was a regiment of the Alabama National Guard , but as all units its 4 , 000 men were from the regular army , national guard and draftees . The regiment has its origin from the 4th Alabama with lineage and honors from when it was a regiment in the Confederate States army . Campaigns and battles . Private Neibaur served as an automatic rifleman using the French manufactured Chauchat 9mm automatic rifle using a " banana clip " of 20 rounds . In February he went into the lines on the Lunéville sector , and then later in March at the Barracat sector . He did not see any real combat except for artillery fire until March 1918 , once the German " Ludendorff Offensive " commenced on March 21 , 1918 . He served on the Somme River where the 42nd Division was part of the French 7th Army . In June , more American divisions entered the front lines and Neibaur fought in several campaigns , the Aisne , the Aisen - Marne , and the Champagne - Marne through August 1918 . As with any infantry regiment , brigade or division , the units rotated and relieved one another on a routine basis . During this time , Neibaur was wounded or incapacitated temporarily by German mustard gas . In August , Brig . Gen . Douglas MacArthur assumed command of the 84th Infantry Brigade which consisted of Neibaur ' s 167th Infantry Regiment and the Iowa National Guard 168th Infantry Regiment . In early September General John Pershing , commander of the AEF , received permission to " reduce " the salient that had developed for several years at St . Mihiel , southeast of Verdun . Beginning on September 12 , 1918 , the American 1st Army under Pershing commenced an offensive , the first independent American offensive in its own sector of the Western Front . Within days , the crumbling German army was thrown back and the salient was reduced causing a " straightening " of the front line . On September 26 , the Americans launched their second offensive between the Argonne Forest on the left and Meuse River on the right . By October 14 , the 42nd Division was stalled along the strongly defended Kreimehilde " stellung " ( German for position or line ) . Unlike the St . Mihiel , the Germans conducted an aggressive and spirited defense . The two main terrain features holding up the Rainbow division ' s advance were hills : Hill 288 and the Còte de Châtillon . The 167th , specifically the Neibaur ' s 3rd Battalion , received the order on the 15th to attack and capture Còte de Châtillon . On October 16 , 1918 , the American attacks captured Còte de Châtillon , though there remained several pockets of German units and many isolated machine gun positions . Neibaur along with two other soldiers , an observer and a loader , volunteered to flank and remove a network of machine guns just over a hundred yards from " M " Company and 3rd Battalion ' s hastily occupied positions . Crawling up a draw between two spur s , Neibaur ' s automatic rifle team encountered a wire obstacle and was then fired upon . Neibaur ' s two team members were killed and he received three wounds in the right thigh . Passing through the wire entanglements he positioned his automatic rifle behind a dirt berm . Some Germans observed his movement and approximately 50 or so attacked him . He opened fire with his Chauchat automatic rifle , killing or wounding most of them until his gun jammed , firing some 50 rounds or two and a half clips . Discarding his automatic rifle , he tried to crawl or run downhill some 100 yards to friendly lines and was wounded a fourth time in the hip and fell unconscious . Awaking , he found himself captured by some fifteen or so Germans who had survived the counterattack against him . The Germans had to take cover due to the supporting fire from Neibaur ' s " M " Company . Neibaur then realized that the Germans had dropped on the ground near him his semi - automatic pistol , the Colt made M1911 . He crawled to it and as he did so , some of the Germans charged him with bayonets , four of whom he killed immediately with his pistol and then within minutes , though wounded four times , he captured eleven Germans and led them to the American lines below . Later tragic life . Private Thomas Neibaur spent several months in field hospital s recovering from his wounds . His last wound by a German machine gun bullet remained in his hip the rest of his life . He was one of the first soldiers in the Army to be nominated for the Medal of Honor . On February 9 , 1919 at the AEF headquarters at Chaumont , France , Gen . John Pershing presented the Medal of Honor to him , along with a dozen other officers and soldiers . Private Neibaur arrived home at Sugar City , Idaho on May 27 , 1919 and was welcomed by a throng of some 10 , 000 people , celebrating a state - wide holiday proclaimed the governor who was in attendance as " Neibaur Day . " He married Sarah " Lois " Shepard in November 1919 , she being six years older than he was and having a son from a previous marriage . Together they had nine children . In 1928 , Neibaur had an accident at the sugar beet factory where his arm was severely mangled in a cutting machine . Workers had to disassemble the machine to free his arm . The Neibaurs had three sons who died from accidents : one ( 18 months old ) drowned in an abandoned cesspool ; another ( two years ) was killed by an automobile ; and one ( six years ) died from burns and infection from a wood - burning stove . By 1939 , in the last dire years of the Depression , Neibaur was destitute . He received a small pension from his Medal of Honor , and was a clerk for Works Progress Administration ( WPA ) . He was unable to feed and care for his family on his low income . US Senator William Borah of Idaho attempted to pass a law in the US Congress promoting Neibaur to the rank of major in the regular army , and then placing him on the retired list . This failed . Discouraged by his misfortune , Neibaur mailed his Medal of Honor and other decorations to Congress in Washington stating that " I cannot eat them . " Local newspapers covered the story . ( Time Magazine reference of Thomas ' death and returning Medal of Honor ) Three days later he secured a position as a night security officer at the state capitol in Boise . His wife Lois died in 1940 , at the age of forty - eight . Neibaur married Lillian Golden in 1941 , and a short time later he entered a veterans ' hospital in Walla Walla , Washington for tuberculosis and died there on December 23 , 1942 , at the age of forty - four . Four young sons were sent to an orphanage in Eaton Rapids , Michigan . He and Lois are buried in Sugar City , Idaho , where the city park is named in his honor . His awards and decorations were returned to Mrs . Lillian Neibaur who donated them to the Idaho State Historical Society . Articles honoring Neibaur . Roses , Roses all the Way " God Armeth the Patriot " Military decorations . United States of America : France : Italy : Montenegro : Belgium : Service Medal ( s ) : Official Campaign Designations and Private Neibaur ' s military records : Below are the official campaign designations of World War I that Private Neibaur served in : Somme Defensive March 21 , - April 6 , 1918 Aisne May 27 , - June 5 , 1918 ( No clasp on Victory Medal ) Champagne - Marne 15 - July 18 , 1918 Aisne - Marne July 18 , - 6 August 1918 St . Mihiel 12 - September 16 , 1918 Meuse - Argonne September 26 , - November 11 , 1918 Medal of Honor citation . Citation : On the afternoon of 16 October 1918 , when the Cote - de - Chatillion had just been gained after bitter fighting and the summit of that strong bulwark in the Kriemhilde Stellung was being organized , Pvt . Neibaur was sent out on patrol with his automatic rifle squad to enfilade enemy machinegun nests . As he gained the ridge he set up his automatic rifle and was directly thereafter wounded in both legs by fire from a hostile machinegun on his flank . The advance wave of the enemy troops , counterattacking , had about gained the ridge , and although practically cut off and surrounded , the remainder of his detachment being killed or wounded , this gallant soldier kept his automatic rifle in operation to such effect that by his own efforts and by fire from the skirmish line of his company , at least 100 yards in his rear , the attack was checked . The enemy wave being halted and Iying prone , 4 of the enemy attacked Pvt . Neibaur at close quarters . These he killed . He then moved alone among the enemy Iying on the ground about him , in the midst of the fire from his own lines , and by coolness and gallantry captured 11 prisoners at the point of his pistol and , although painfully wounded , brought them back to our lines . The counterattack in full force was arrested to a large extent by the single efforts of this soldier , whose heroic exploits took place against the skyline in full view of his entire battalion .