For more than 242 years, the history of America, its presidents and the military have been intertwined.
Just consider this: Every single American president, excluding Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump, served in the nation’s military prior to holding office as commander-in-chief.
That leaves 42 presidents who brought their own unique veteran skill set with them when they ascended to the highest office in the land.
Here are our six favorite presidents who’ve worn America’s colors.
There’s no way the father of the nation isn’t on this list. George Washington decisively defeated the British during the Revolutionary War when he served as commander of the Continental Army and went on to become America’s first president, serving from 1789 to 1797. Fun fact about Washington: He remains the only president to have actually led troops into battle while serving as president. He was at the helm of 13,000 troops in 1794 and put down the Whiskey Rebellion in Pittsburgh.
Ulysses S. Grant was a West Point graduate who saw combat in the Mexican American War before leaving the Army in 1854. He found himself reentering the service when the Civil War broke out in 1861 and led forces in a number of campaigns before being named commander of the Union Army. He accepted Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Courthouse and was elected president in 1868, serving two terms.
Theodore Roosevelt said anchors aweigh to his position as assistant secretary of the Navy when the Spanish-American War broke out in 1898. Forming the nation’s first all-volunteer cavalry regiment, the Rough Riders, he chalked up wins at both Kettle and San Juan Hills. Fact about TR: He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions at San Juan Hill by Clinton in 2001). Roosevelt went on to serve as New York’s governor and later as William McKinley’s vice president before becoming president in 1901 after McKinley’s assassination. Roosevelt was himself elected as president in 1904.
Let’s fast forward to Dwight D. Eisenhower, who was a young first lieutenant and wanna-be combat participant during World War I (he missed going into combat), but got his chance when the country entered World War II in 1941. He was the commanding general in the European Theater of Operations before being promoted to Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force of the North African Theater of Operations from 1942 to 1943. During that single year, he thwarted the Germans in Africa and invaded Sicily. He was named Supreme Allied Commander Europe by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1943, planning and leading the Normandy Invasion that defeated Adolf Hitler. Eisenhower went on to become General of the Army and was elected president in 1952, serving until 1961 when John F. Kennedy succeeded him.
Kennedy joined the Navy in 1941 and was at the helm of the PT-109 when it was struck by a Japanese destroyer while on a routine patrol Aug. 2, 1943, in the Solomon Islands. He got his men together in the water around the wreckage and asked them what they wanted to do. Their response: No surrender. Kennedy led the group to a nearby island, taking the strap of one of the injured into his mouth and towing him to land with it clenched in his teeth. For that, Kennedy received the Navy and Marine Corps Medal. He was medically discharged from the Navy in 1944 due to back injuries and was elected to Congress in 1946,, the Senate in 1952 and the presidency in 1960.
Like his predecessors Eisenhower and Kennedy, George H.W. Bush was a World War II veteran. He put off going to Yale University to accept a commission as an ensign and at the age of 19 became the Navy’s then-youngest aviator. On Sept. 2, 1944, Bush was at the controls of a Grumman TBM Avenger with a two-man crew. Their mission: bomb a communications station on the Japanese island of Chichijima. The aircraft was struck by Japanese fire, but Bush and his crew completed the mission before turning the plane around and heading back to sea, where they ejected. Only Bush survived, becoming the only American service member to be recovered after being shot down over the island.
He went on to live a life of public service, serving in Congress, as special envoy to China, CIA director, vice president under Ronald Reagan and president from 1991 to 1994.
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