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Medal of Honor Recipient

Thomas Harcourt

U.S. Navy · U.S. Civil War

MOH-RC-002377Source-based record

The award

Representative medal image: early Navy star design and striped ribbon. Not a portrait or a photograph of this recipient’s own medal.
Navy Medal of HonorAction-era reference: 1865

Portrait not yet available. Representative medal shown.

About this image

Presentation date is not usable for design selection. This is an action-era reference; a later presentation or replacement medal may differ.

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Medal of Honor

January 15, 1865

Fort Fisher, North Carolina, USA

Rank at action
Ordinary Seaman
Service
U.S. Navy
Conflict
U.S. Civil War
Unit or command
U.S.S. Minnesota

The Citation

Sources ↓
On board the U.S.S. Minnesota in action during the assault on Fort Fisher, 15 January 1865. Landing on the beach with the assaulting party from his ship, Harcourt advanced to the top of the sandhill and partly through the breach in the palisades despite enemy fire which killed and wounded many officers and men. When more than two-thirds of the men become seized with panic and retreated on the run, he remained with the party until dark when it came safely away, bringing its wounded, its arms and its colors.

Sources & record notes

General Order comparison: pending. Current-profile review does not mean that the underlying original order has been examined.

  1. Thomas Harcourt — current Society profile ↗Congressional Medal of Honor Society · Checked 2026-08-30

    current identity, service, action metadata, and citation comparison

Transcription, metadata & provenance notes
Award ID
MOH-AW-002388
Transcription status
Legacy full text · current reference profile matched
Last source check
2026-08-30
Recorded order reference (not verified against the original)
59
Accredited to
Massachusetts
Archive transcription SHA-256
a8841e1b9aea48b54cfa50577ac84056dc4643fc81e4431c99ce76bf55b9930f

Legacy transcription retained without substantive editing; rendered current reference profile variants documented in the Phase 10 evidence snapshot.

The inherited rank-1 Society candidate was confirmed by substantive comparison of identity, service, rank, unit or command, action context, and citation; candidate rank or successful rendering alone was not treated as verification. The controlled canonical unit or command is U.S.S. Minnesota; the current structured profile renders U.S.S. Minnesota, and the inherited wording Not documented remains preserved as a separately attributed variant. The current authoritative evidence controls the action date as 1865-01-15 and classifies the action under U.S. Civil War; the inherited unnormalized date and conflict values remain preserved in the audit record. The controlled historical action place is Fort Fisher, North Carolina, USA; the current structured place Fort Fisher, North Carolina, USA and the complete inherited geocoder value Fort Fisher Historic Museum, 1610 South Fort Fisher Boulevard, Kure Beach, NC 28449, USA remain preserved in the audit evidence. The inherited full citation remains canonical and checksum-protected; current rendered wording is preserved separately where transcribed. No underlying General Order was examined, so the exact-order gate remains pending and no General Order verification is claimed.