After 39 Years, a Town Honors Its Black Hero : Veterans: A soldier’s remains are moved from a trash-strewn graveyard. The effort is led by a traditionally white American Legion post.

For the first time since he died fighting his way to a Congressional Medal of Honor nearly four decades ago, Army Sgt. Cornelius H. Charlton has a place to rest with dignity this Memorial Day.

As a result of a campaign by American Legion members in the coal mining town of Beckley, W. Va., the Korean War hero has been moved from a trash-strewn graveyard where he had lain for 39 years to a more exclusive cemetery that previously was off-limits to black fighting men.

“Any man who gave his life to this nation should be recognized. I felt I owed him that,” said John Shumate, a Navy veteran of World War II and president of Beckley’s traditionally white American Legion Post No. 32, which took up Charlton’s cause. “His blood flowed the same as mine does.”

On June 2, 1951, Charlton was serving with the 24th Infantry Regiment--the Army’s last all-black unit--near Chipo-Ri, Korea, when his white commanding officer was seriously wounded.

Charlton took command and led his company up a wind-swept Korean ridge past showers of enemy grenades and machine-gun fire, spearheading three separate assaults and clearing out a string of heavily fortified Chinese positions. He eliminated two emplacements single-handedly, killing at least six of the enemy, according to the official Army record.

Although his chest was torn open by a grenade during the second attack, Charlton waved away medics. He could see a group of Chinese troops dug in on a far ridge and raining down fire on his men. So, cradling his chest with one arm and an M-1 carbine with the other, he raced alone into the hostile fire.

The wounded sergeant raked the enemy emplacement with rifle fire, killing some of the defenders and sending the others fleeing.

Charlton later died from his wounds, including those received in a second grenade blast.

As Beckley pays tribute to its war dead today with a parade, 21-gun salute and taps at the base of the American Legion cemetery, Charlton will be remembered at the top of the hill, alongside 251 other soldiers--all white--representing a century of wartime sacrifice.

Charlton had been buried for months when Congress awarded him America’s highest military honor in 1952. The Army says it did not offer to rebury Charlton with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery or another location because of an administrative oversight. When it finally proposed to move Charlton’s remains last year, his relatives rejected the offer.

“They say it was an administrative error,” said the soldier’s 69-year-old brother, Arthur Charlton, a retired coal miner. “But I say it was discrimination.”

Discrimination or no, local white veterans stepped forward last year when they found out what had happened. The March 10 reburial ceremony--attended by an assistant secretary of state, a local congressman, two Army generals and a full honor guard from Ft. Knox, Ky.--has eased some of the past bitterness.

“This guy should have had some kind of hero’s ceremony,” said retired Sgt. Maj. Lindsey Bowers, president of the 24th Infantry Regiment Assn. “If it had been a white soldier who won the Medal of Honor, somebody would have come forward immediately.”

Observed Col. John Cash, the Army’s acting chief of military history and a combat leader in Vietnam: “This dude, Charlton, he was Superman. Charlton showed the stuff that great soldiers are made of.”