Trial

Audie Murphy walked a long, hard road.

He was born in 1924, the oldest of nine children in a family of dirt-poor Texas sharecroppers. His father deserted the brood in 1939, leaving 15-year-old Audie to try and provide for the family by hunting wild game. Then his mother died in 1941. After the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor that December, he wound up enlisting in the Army. He’d already been rejected by both the paratroopers and the Marines.

It’s the nature of war—and the luck of the assignment—that some soldiers see little combat and some see a lot. As a member of the Third Infantry, Audie Murphy saw a lot of combat.

He started out as a private and by the time the war ended in 1945, he was a field-commissioned second lieutenant. During his three years of service, he fought in nine major campaigns across Europe. He was wounded three times. And he was credited with killing some 240 enemy combatants and capturing or wounding many more. In one incident, he risked his life to man a machine gun on a burning tank destroyer, single-handedly killing 100 approaching Nazi soldiers in the process.

Audie Murphy became the most decorated American soldier of World War II, earning every award for valor the United States bestows. He received five medals from France and Belgium and 33 from his own country, including the Congressional Medal of Honor. He still is considered one of the best combat soldiers in U.S. history.

Error

Given the scope of his life experience, it’s hard to believe Murphy was only 21 when he returned to the United States after the war. But it’s not hard to believe Hollywood saw silver-screen potential in a highly publicized war hero. Though he modestly downplayed his hero status, Murphy was intrigued by the idea of making movies. After a slow start, he seemed to find his niche in Westerns—and that’s how he met fellow vet and actor Hugh O’Brian.

O’Brian was only a year older than Murphy, but his background couldn’t have been more different. While the orphaned Murphy was trying to scratch out a living for himself and eight siblings in Texas, O’Brian (whose given name was Hugh Krampe) was busy attending high school in the Midwest where he lettered in football, basketball, wrestling, and track. After a semester at the University of Cincinnati, he enlisted in the Marines, becoming at 17 the youngest drill instructor in Marine Corps history. After the war, he headed for L.A. where, like Murphy, he soon wound up riding the celluloid trails.

Westerns were the rage during the ’50s and ’60s, and as Time magazine noted in the 1959 article “The Six-Gun Galahad,” actors often became “prima donnas of horse opera” who “wiggled through more walking lessons than Brigitte Bardot, and rasped themselves raw-handed to perfect the fast draw.” Reportedly, O’Brian, in particular, was cocky about his gun skills—and anxious to prove himself against the fabled war hero. It’s said he frequently bragged that he could beat anyone in Hollywood to the draw, and when the opportunity came, he couldn’t wait to challenge Murphy.

The pair made two films together—The Cimarron Kid in 1952 and Drums Across the River in 1954—and when they weren’t shooting, the story goes that O’Brian repeatedly pressed Murphy for a mock duel, betting $500 that he could outdraw the Medal of Honor recipient.

Finally, Murphy tired of O’Brian trying to push his buttons. The soft-spoken war hero said he’d accept the bet and even increase the wager to $2,500—on one condition: that they use live ammunition.

O’Brian never brought up the subject again.