Macario Garcia

García was working on the Paul Schumann Ranch near Sugar Land when he was drafted on November 11, 1942. At Grosshau on November 27, 1944, wounded in the shoulder and foot, he crawled alone toward the machine-gun nests, killed six German soldiers and captured four. He was one of twenty-eight men given the Medal of Honor by Truman that day. After the Richmond restaurant fight, LULAC Council No. 60 and the Comité Patriótico Mexicano raised money for his defense, led by John J. Herrera and then James V. Allred, and the charges were finally dropped.

What the plaque says

Macario Garcia Macario García was born on January 2, 1920, in Villa de Castaño, Mexico, to Luciano and Josefa García. The family moved to Fort Bend County, Texas, in 1923 to pick crops in Sugar Land. In 1942, Macario García was drafted into the U.S. Army to fight in World War II. He was wounded in action at Normandy in June 1944 but recovered and rejoined his unit, Company B, 1st Batallion, 22nd Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division. In November 1944 at Grosshau, Germany, García destroyed two German machine-gun emplacements; although wounded, he secured his company's position. For his actions, García received the Congressional Medal of Honor from President Harry S. Truman in a White House ceremony on August 23, 1945. He also received other commendations, including the Bronze Star with Oak Leaf Clusters, the Purple Heart and the Medal Mérito Militar, the Mexican equivalent of the U.S. Medal of Honor. In Texas in September 1945, García was denied service at a local restaurant because he was Hispanic. He was ultimately arrested. Indicative of the treatment many minority veterans received following military service, García's case became highly visible in the early years of the American Civil Rights movement, and several groups including LULAC (League of United Latin American Citizens) came to his aid. On June 25, 1947, García became a U.S. citizen. He worked for the Veterans Administration for 25 years and served in the U.S. Army Reserves, attaining the rank of Command Sergeant Major. He died in a car accident in 1972 and is buried in the Houston National Cemetery. A Houston Army Reserve Center and a school is Sugar Land are also named in his honor. (2006)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Brazos Bend State Park — 18 mi
  Oak and pecan bottomland, lakes and alligators on the Brazos River 45 miles from downtown Houston, with the museum's George Observatory in the woods.
• The Menil Collection — 29 mi
  John and Dominique de Menil's free museum in Montrose: a grey-sided Renzo Piano building among bungalows, holding antiquities, Surrealism and art of Oceania under natural light.
• Museum of Fine Arts, Houston — 29 mi
  The oldest art museum in Texas, grown from a 1900 schoolroom art league into a campus of Watkin, Mies van der Rohe and later buildings, with Ima Hogg's Bayou Bend up the bayou.
• Rothko Chapel — 29 mi
  An octagonal chapel open to all faiths, built by the de Menils around fourteen dark canvases by Mark Rothko, with Barnett Newman's Broken Obelisk standing in the pool outside.

More markers nearby

• Holy Rosary Catholic Parish — 0.8 mi
• Rosenberg — 1.3 mi
• First Baptist Church of Rosenberg — 1.4 mi
• Trone-Ray-Lane House — 1.4 mi