Drafted in 1942, Doss refused to carry a gun due to his staunch religious beliefs. He had taken medics courses in preparation for his possible conscription as Army medics were not required to carry firearms. Nonetheless he received a good deal of opposition from his fellow soldiers and the military brass while in basic training. One officer even tried to have Doss tossed out as a mental case after he refused to carry a rifle.
However, Doss quickly proved himself on numerous occasions while a part of the Allied campaign in the Pacific. He often accompanied patrols into dangerous territories even when he hadn't been officially assigned. Medics, it should be noted, were popular targets for the Japanese as their loss struck a huge blow to the morale of the companies they'd been attached to.
Despite several instances during which Doss put himself in harms way for the good of his fellow soldiers his most daring deeds came in 1945 on Okinawa. After being mowed down by Japanese machine gunners Doss pulled four comrades from the field, crawling to within yards of the enemy guns. Days later he would spend five straight hours singlehandedly pulling from between 50 and 75 wounded men from an active battlefield and lowering them to safety down a 35 foot cliff on a jerry-rigged pulley system of his own making.
Doss' career in the Army came to end just weeks later when a grenade was thrown into the foxhole he'd been occupying while treating another soldier. The explosion riddled his leg with shrapnel, but he still managed to get the wounded man to safety. When Cpl. Doss, himself injured, went back into the field to continue to administer aid he was hit by a sniper, the bullet shattering all three bones in his left arm. He still managed to get himself to safety under his own power.
He did it all without ever carrying a gun or weapon of any kind.
