3,500 bullets and pieces of shrapnel. The three crew members who bailed out were never seen again and were presumed lost at sea, but Smith's efforts undoubtedly saved the lives of the six others aboard his aircraft. Journalist Andy Rooney, at the time a reporter for Stars and Stripes, was at the base where Smith's plane landed and wrote a front-page story about it. While reflecting on Smith's award years later on 60 Minutes, Rooney said, "I was proud of my part in that." Smith was assigned to KP duty the week that he was awarded the Medal of Honor as punishment for arriving late to a briefing. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson placed the medal around Smith's neck during a formation. Later life and death Smith flew four more combat missions after earning the Medal of Honor, but was then grounded as a result of combat stress reaction and was reassigned to non-combat clerical work. On December 17, 1944, he was forced to accept a reduction in rank to private for poor job performance, and was shortly thereafter permanently grounded. Smith was sent home to the United States on February 2, 1945, and despite his transgressions, received a hero's welcome and a parade when he returned to his hometown. Smith was discharged from the U.S. Army on May 26, 1945. In his later years, he despised his time in the military and ran into legal troubles, but eventually retired quietly to Florida, dying of heart failure on May 11, 1984, in Saint Petersburg, at the age of 72. Maynard Harrison Smith is buried in Arlington National Cemetery, in Arlington, Virginia. Personal life Smith met his third wife, Mary Rayner (1924-2015), in Bedford, England, while attending a dance put on for servicemen by the USO. They married in 1944, and eventually had four children (three sons, Lawrence, Ronald, and Maynard Jr., and a daughter, Christine). Their daughter Christine was born in England prior to the couple's return to the United States. After Smith's death, his wife remarried to Robert J. O'Brien. Awards Here is the ribbon bar of S/Sgt. Maynard Harrison Smith: Medal of Honor citation Citation text: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action above and beyond the call of duty. The aircraft of which Sgt. Smith was a gunner was subjected to intense enemy antiaircraft fire and determined fighter aircraft attacks while returning from a mission over