Untold Stories: How St. Michael Saved a U.S. Marine from Korean Communists

The unknown “Marine” suddenly shone with light, and the young Marine he rescued woke to find the Communist soldiers had been killed by sword-strokes.

Today’s story is from the Korean War in 1950. In a letter to his mother, a young U.S. Marine named Michael related his extraordinary experience with a “Marine” whom Michael believed was really his patron, St. Michael the Archangel.

“And alongside of me comes another Marine [whom] I never met before, he was bigger than any Marine I’d ever seen…Mom, my heart stopped. There were seven of them. Seven Commies in their padded pants and jackets and funny hats, only there wasn’t anything funny about them now. Seven rifles were aimed at us.

‘Down, Michael!’ I screamed and hit the frozen earth. I heard those rifles fire almost as one. I heard the bullets.”

The young Marine was wounded, but he remembered seeing the other’s face suddenly shining “with a terrible splendor” and “in his hand was a sword that flashed with a million lights.” When the young Marine woke up, the others told him there was no Michael in the outfit but him. And they also wanted to know how the young Marine had done it. What had he done?

”Kid,” the sergeant said gently, “every one of those seven Commies over there is killed by a sword-stroke.”