Private First Class Daniel D. Bruce of the U.S. Marine Corps, Headquarters and Service Company, 3d Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division, served as a mortar man at Fire Support Base Tomahawk in Quang Nam Province, Republic of Vietnam, on 1 March 1969. Early that morning, while on watch in his night defensive position, he heard movement ahead and an enemy explosive charge was thrown toward him. He instantly caught the device and shouted a warning to his companions. Realizing the danger to the adjacent position and its 2 occupants, he held the device to his body and tried to carry it away from the entrenched Marines. As he moved away, it detonated and he absorbed the full force of the explosion, saving the lives of 3 fellow Marines. Born on 18 May 1950 in Michigan City, Indiana, and entering service at Chicago, Illinois, he was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor by President Richard M. Nixon on February 16, 1971, and was interred in Greenwood Cemetery in Michigan City, Indiana.