"A shepherd in combat boots."

That is the legacy of Fr. Emil Kapaun, a POW of the Korean War who died at the young age of 35. His heroic efforts on the battlefield and in the prison camp earned him the Medal of Honor, which he was awarded posthumously in 2013. Furthermore, his selfless actions and devotion to his regiment, and eventually prisoners, have led to the cause for his canonization in the Catholic Church.

Heartland values of honesty and hard work
Emil Joseph Kapaun was born on April 20, 1916, outside the small town of Pilsen, Kansas.

He attended Conception Abbey in northwest Missouri for high school and college, and then to the other side of the Show-Me State at Kenrick Seminary in St. Louis for his priestly formation. He was ordained in the diocese of Wichita in 1940, celebrating his first Mass at the church he grew up attending, St. John Nepomucene.

Four years into his priesthood, Fr. Kapaun entered the Chaplain Corps. After serving in the China-India-Burma Theater, ministering to soldiers and refugees thousands of miles apart. In 1946, he began his studies at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. He earned a master’s degree in education, but then re-entered the Chaplain Corps in 1948. By 1950, he was assigned to the 8th Cavalry Regimen, 1st Cavalry Division in Japan.

He chose to stay
As a military chaplain, he ministered to the dead, heard confessions and even celebrated Mass using the hood of his Jeep as an altar. His division was among the first to help South Korea and its retaliation for an invasion by North Korea.

On Nov. 1-2, 1950, Fr. Kapaun's regiment was involved in the Battle of Unsan, in which an estimated 20,000 Communist Chinese forces encircled his battalion. His fellow soldiers told of Kapaun's unselfishness with moving from ditch and foxhole to the next over the course of several days, attending to the wounded and dragging them back to safety. While estimates differ, Kapaun is credited with saving more than a dozen soldiers.

https://wjla.com/news/local/war-hero-remains-identified