Hugh Thompson Jr. died today. We are all poorer for the loss.

In 1998, he received the Soldier’s Medal, the army’s highest award for heroism not involving actual conflict with an enemy.

But in 1968, he was shunned. His patriotism was questioned. He received death threats. Thompson, a military helicopter pilot during the Vietnam War, had protected unarmed Vietnamese civilians at My Lai from a massacre by American soldiers.

Tempers ran high in those days, just like today. Plenty of American hot-heads called Lt. William Calley, who led the massacre, an American hero, and vilified Thompson and the other men who stopped it. Calley was court-martialed and sentenced to life in prison, but Richard Nixon commuted his sentence.

From BBC News:

Mr Thompson and his crew came upon US troops killing civilians at the village of My Lai on 16 March 1968.

He put his helicopter down between the soldiers and villagers, ordering his men to shoot their fellow Americans if they attacked the civilians.

“There was no way I could turn my back on them,” he later said of the victims.

Mr Thompson, a warrant officer at the time, called in support from other US helicopters, and together they airlifted at least nine Vietnamese civilians — including a wounded boy — to safety.

He returned to headquarters, angrily telling his commanders what he had seen. They ordered soldiers in the area to stop shooting.

But Mr Thompson was shunned for years by fellow soldiers, received death threats, and was once told by a congressman that he was the only American who should be punished over My Lai.

…

Mr Thompson died of cancer. He had been ill for some time and was removed from life support earlier in the week.

Even Fox News, whose commentators are quick to question the patriotism of anyone who stands up against the Bush Administration, today called Hugh Thompson Jr. a hero.

The wheel of history turns. Time sifts right and wrong.

Hugh Thompson Jr. was a hero. I hope there will always be Americans like him.