One hundred twenty four people would eventually receive the Medal for their actions during the war. Seven of them were Jewish. One of them was William Sawelson. He received it posthumously when he was killed by a machine gun attempting to assist another injured soldier. Lieutenant Edouard Izac was captured by a German submarine after it sank the ship he was on. He was then taken prisoner and brought aboard where he gathered information about German submarine movements. He realized the importance of the information and determined he must escape. For his first escape attempt he jumped from a moving train. He was recaptured and sent to a prison camp. On his second attempt he successfully escaped the prison camp and made his way through the mountains of southwestern Germany. He swam the Rhine River at night with German sentries nearby.