History Creator / AudieMurphy

In TheSixties, he starred in a short-lived TV series called ''Whispering Smith'', about a forensics-minded lawman in 1870s Denver. Murphy usually described it as "''[[PoliceProcedural Dragnet]]'' [[RecycledInSpace on horseback]]," but it ran into controversy over its slightly DarkerAndEdgier treatment of frontier-era Denver and over a disturbing episode involving a widow who abuses her adult son (a very young Creator/RobertRedford) with a whip. Murphy's film westerns of this period were also somewhat DarkerAndEdgier, although they were still pretty idealistic compared to the rising tide of [[SpaghettiWestern]]s and revisionist Westerns bent on {{Deconstruction}} or just violence and [[CrapsackWorld grimdarkness]] for their own sake. He appeared in an Israeli Franchise/JamesBond knockoff, where his folksy, low-key attitude sort of accidentally deconstructs the TuxedoAndMartini school of spy movie without quite pushing things into [[SpyFiction Stale Beer]] territory. He co-wrote some moderately well-known CountryMusic songs, including ''Shutters and Boards'', ''When the Wind Blows in Chicago'', and ''Was It All Worth Losing You?'' [[HeAlsoDid He also advocated for]] [[ShellshockedVeteran sufferers of PTSD]]. He too suffered from PTSD, and his doctor prescribed Placidyl to help him sleep. He discovered that he had become addicted to the drug. Instead of any orthodox treatment, such as weaning off or therapy, he went another route: he rented out a hotel room, locked the door, and went cold-turkey for an entire week to get off the addiction.

In TheSixties, he starred in a short-lived TV series called ''Whispering Smith'', about a forensics-minded lawman in 1870s Denver. Murphy usually described it as "''[[PoliceProcedural Dragnet]]'' [[RecycledInSpace on horseback]]," but it ran into controversy over its slightly DarkerAndEdgier treatment of frontier-era Denver and over a disturbing episode involving a widow who abuses her adult son (a very young Creator/RobertRedford) with a whip. Murphy's film westerns of this period were also somewhat DarkerAndEdgier, although they were still pretty idealistic compared to the rising tide of SpaghettiWesterns and revisionist Westerns bent on {{Deconstruction}} or just violence and [[CrapsackWorld grimdarkness]] for their own sake. He appeared in an Israeli Franchise/JamesBond knockoff, where his folksy, low-key attitude sort of accidentally deconstructs the TuxedoAndMartini school of spy movie without quite pushing things into [[SpyFiction Stale Beer]] territory. He co-wrote some moderately well-known CountryMusic songs, including ''Shutters and Boards'', ''When the Wind Blows in Chicago'', and ''Was It All Worth Losing You?'' [[HeAlsoDid He also advocated for]] [[ShellshockedVeteran sufferers of PTSD]]. He too suffered from PTSD, and his doctor prescribed Placidyl to help him sleep. He discovered that he had become addicted to the drug. Instead of any orthodox treatment, such as weaning off or therapy, he went another route: he rented out a hotel room, locked the door, and went cold-turkey for an entire week to get off the addiction.

In TheSixties, he starred in a short-lived TV series called ''Whispering Smith'', about a forensics-minded lawman in 1870s Denver. Murphy usually described it as "''[[PoliceProcedural Dragnet]]'' [[RecycledInSpace on horseback]]," but it ran into controversy over its slightly DarkerAndEdgier treatment of frontier-era Denver and over a disturbing episode involving a widow who abuses her adult son (a very young Creator/RobertRedford) with a whip. Murphy's film westerns of this period were also somewhat DarkerAndEdgier, although they were still pretty idealistic compared to the rising tide of {{SpaghettiWestern}}s and revisionist Westerns bent on {{Deconstruction}} or just violence and [[CrapsackWorld grimdarkness]] for their own sake. He appeared in an Israeli Franchise/JamesBond knockoff, where his folksy, low-key attitude sort of accidentally deconstructs the TuxedoAndMartini school of spy movie without quite pushing things into [[SpyFiction Stale Beer]] territory. He co-wrote some moderately well-known CountryMusic songs, including ''Shutters and Boards'', ''When the Wind Blows in Chicago'', and ''Was It All Worth Losing You?'' [[HeAlsoDid He also advocated for]] [[ShellshockedVeteran sufferers of PTSD]]. He too suffered from PTSD, and his doctor prescribed Placidyl to help him sleep. He discovered that he had become addicted to the drug. Instead of any orthodox treatment, such as weaning off or therapy, he went another route: he rented out a hotel room, locked the door, and went cold-turkey for an entire week to get off the addiction.

[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audie_Murphy Audie Murphy]] (June 20, 1924 – May 28, 1971) was the single most decorated US soldier of all time. Born in rural [[EverythingIsBigInTexas Texas]] during the Depression, he was the sixth out of twelve children in a poor Scots-Irish family reputed to have Cherokee ancestry. Two of his siblings died before reaching adulthood. As the eldest boy still living at home when his father deserted the family, he was forced to support his mother and younger siblings, by various odd jobs and sustenance hunting. He could kill small, fast-moving targets like rabbits and squirrels with a slingshot, which already says a lot about his marksmanship skills, but he proved even better with a light .22 rifle. Due to the poverty of his family and the fact that the people who tried to help them out were not much better off, he often had to go out hunting with only a single cartridge in his gun. If he didn't kill something edible with his first shot, his family would go hungry. When his mother died, he was obliged to put his youngest siblings in an orphanage, but he dreamed of earning enough money to reunite the family and provide for them.

* BewareTheNiceOnes: Soft spoken, excruciatingly polite, [[FriendToAllChildren fond of children]], horses and dogs. But absolutely the last person you wanted to tangle with. Murphy reputedly once frightened a drunken, misbehaving [[Film/ReservoirDogs Lawrence Tierney]], one of the more notorious brawlers in Hollywood, into leaving a party without raising his voice or physically harming Tierney.

[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audie_Murphy Audie Murphy]] (June 20, 1924 – May 28, 1971) was the single most decorated US soldier of all time. Born in rural [[EverythingIsBigInTexas Texas]] during the Depression. He was the sixth out of twelve children in a poor Scots-Irish family reputed to have Cherokee ancestry. Two of his siblings died before reaching adulthood. As the eldest boy still living at home when his father deserted the family, he was forced to support his mother and younger siblings, by various odd jobs and sustenance hunting. He could kill small, fast-moving targets like rabbits and squirrels with a slingshot, which already says a lot about his marksmanship skills, but he proved even better with a light .22 rifle. Due to the poverty of his family and the fact that the people who tried to help them out were not much better off, he often had to go out hunting with only a single cartridge in his gun. If he didn't kill something edible with his first shot, his family would go hungry. When his mother died, he was obliged to put his youngest siblings in an orphanage, but he dreamed of earning enough money to reunite the family and provide for them.

* AutobiographicalRole: As a thirty-something movie star, he played the teenaged/young adult versions of himself in the [[FilmOfTheBook Film of the War Memoir]] ''To Hell and Back''

* ObligatoryWarCrimeScene: Possibly the TropeMaker if not UrExample. In his movie, he shows himself [[InTheBack gunning down retreating German soldiers]]. He left that part in to show WarIsHell.

[[caption-width-right:200:The most decorated soldier in the Army. [[{{Series/Mash}} Good. We can put our Christmas presents under him.]] ]]

* ''Tumbleweed'': Murphy gets accused of a crime he didn't commit, breaks out of jail, and sets out to clear his name, with sheriff [[Film/DrStrangelove Slim Pickens]], deputy LeeVanCleef and sleazy romantic rival [[Series/GilligansIsland Russell Johnson]] hot on his trail. Murphy has help in the shape of the title character-a scruffy little white horse who subverts TheAllegedSteed trope by being [[CoolHorse superfast, supersmart, and super-sure-footed.]] Turns up on TV occasionally.

* WorldWarII

After the war, he helped his family get back on their feet, became a training instructor with the Texas National Guard during the Korean War, wrote an autobiography, ''[[http://www.commandposts.com/2011/01/to-hell-and-back/ To Hell and Back]]'', and started a movie career, eventually making his autobiography into a movie in 1955. It became the highest-grossing film Universal Studios had made up to that point, and remained so until the release of ''Jaws'' nearly twenty years later. ''To Hell snd Back'' proved surprisingly popular in Japan, perhaps due to the main character's warrior ethos and family loyalty. He appeared in a total of 44 films, mostly SoAverageItsOkay [[TheWestern b-westerns]] that traded on the MemeticBadass status he held in the minds of his own generation, and their children, the baby boomers.

The action that earned him the Medal of Honor occurred January 26, 1945, in Holtzwihr, France. Murphy's company was reduced from 128 to 19. The Germans had also knocked out all but six of the M10 Tank Destroyers supporting his company. Murphy sent his remaining men to the rear while he [[{{Determinator}} kept firing at the Germans with his M1 Carbine until he ran out of ammunition]], then climbed aboard an abandoned and burning M10 (with a full fuel tank, and presumably about to explode), [[MoreDakka using its .50 calibre to gun down an entire German company]], [[KindaBusyHere using a land phone to direct artillery fire]], falling back only when his communications line was cut. He then led his men in a counter attack, driving the Germans from Holtzwihr. He was promoted again to First Lieutenant a month later.

After the war, he helped his family get back on their feet, became a training instructor with the Texas National Guard during the Korean War, wrote an autobiography, [[http://www.commandposts.com/2011/01/to-hell-and-back/ To Hell and Back]], and started a movie career, eventually making his autobiography into a movie in 1955. It became the highest-grossing film Universal Studios had made up to that point, and remained so until the release of ''Jaws'' nearly twenty years later. ''To Hell And Back'' proved surprisingly popular in Japan, perhaps due to the main character's warrior ethos and family loyalty. He appeared in a total of 44 films, mostly SoAverageItsOkay [[TheWestern b-westerns]] that traded on the MemeticBadass status he held in the minds of his own generation, and their children, the baby boomers.

In TheSixties, he starred in a short-lived TV series called ''Whispering Smith'', about a [[AwesomeByAnalysis forensics-minded]] lawman in 1870s Denver. Murphy usually described it as "''[[PoliceProcedural Dragnet]]'' [[RecycledInSpace on horseback]]," but it ran into controversy over its slightly DarkerAndEdgier treatment of frontier-era Denver and over a disturbing episode involving a widow who abuses her adult son (a very young RobertRedford) with a whip. Murphy's film westerns of this period were also somewhat DarkerAndEdgier, although they were still pretty idealistic compared to the rising tide of {{SpaghettiWestern}}s and revisionist Westerns bent on {{Deconstruction}} or just violence and [[CrapsackWorld grimdarkness]] for their own sake. He appeared in an Israeli James Bond knockoff, where his folksy, low-key attitude sort of accidentally deconstructs the TuxedoAndMartini school of spy movie without quite pushing things into [[SpyFiction Stale Beer]] territory. He co-wrote some moderately well-known CountryMusic songs, including ''Shutters and Boards'', ''When The Wind Blows in Chicago'', and ''Was It All Worth Losing You?'' [[HeAlsoDid He also advocated for]] [[ShellshockedVeteran sufferers of PTSD]]. He too suffered from PTSD, and his doctor prescribed Placidyl to help him sleep. He discovered that he had become addicted to the drug. Instead of any orthodox treatment, such as weaning off or therapy, he went another route: he rented out a hotel room, locked the door, and went cold-turkey for an entire week to get off the addiction.

He died May 28, 1971, when the private plane he was riding in crashed in Virginia, [[UnfortunateImplications shortly after word got out that he was advocating for Jimmy Hoffa's release.]] It seems strangely fitting, given his patriotism and war record, that his body was recovered from the wreckage on Memorial Day of that year. According to an obituary in TIME magazine, [[UndercoverCopReveal he was relaying information about the mafia]] to the Los Angeles DA's office in the last months of his life. He was buried with all honors at Arlington, and his gravesite is the second most visited grave, after JFK's, of a named individual at Arlington. He is the namesake to the [[http://www.southtexas.va.gov/ VA (Veterans' Administration) Hospital located in San Antonio, Texas]], which opened to veterans in November 1973. There is a petition under way, campaigning to have the Presidential Medal of Freedom awarded to him posthumously...and no, he didn't already have one of those. The petition can be found online at: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/audiemurphy/

* AutobiographicalRole: As a thirty-something movie star, he played the teenaged/young adult versions of himself in the [[FilmOfTheBook Film of the War Memoir]] ''To Hell And Back''

* DeathGlare: Although he did occasionally get angry enough to raise his voice, a hostile glare and a few soft-spoken but threatening words from him were enough to get most normal people to back down. The director of ''BigJake'' made one and a half movies with him, then quit after an argument where Murphy leaned forward and glared into his face. The director thought "Holy ****, this guy's killed how many Germans and the only thing I've ever done is run over a cat on the freeway! I'm doomed!" And quit on the spot. They reconciled to some extent, but the director refused to work with Murphy again. "I'm not directing anybody I'm afraid of," he would say. (Nobody really knows what the argument was about. The director claimed it was creative differences about how to handle a piece of dialogue, but a friend of both men claimed that Murphy was angry at the director for threatening to fire a crew member or supporting actor, probably a friend of Murphy's, in the middle of a poker game.)

* {{Expy}}: Pulp western novelist JTEdson created a character named Dusty Fog based on Murphy, and a thinly disguised version of Murphy appears in one of Creator/StephenHunter's novels. Fredrick Zoller in ''Film/InglouriousBasterds'' is sort of a MirrorUniverse Nazi analogue to Murphy. Robert Stack cited Murphy as a partial inspiration for his take on Elliot Ness in ''Series/TheUntouchables''. The author of ''First Blood'' cited Murphy as a partial inspiration for [[Franchise/{{Rambo}} John Rambo]], although even in his more troubled moments Murphy was a lot more functional than Rambo. An expy of Murphy also shows up, along with expies of other influential gunfighters, as part of a BadassCrew Earl Swagger recruits in Stephen Hunter's ''Pale Horse Coming.''

* RealLifeRelative: In one of his early movies, he played the love interest to a female protagonist, played by then-wife Wanda Hendrix. His preschool-aged son Terry played one of his younger siblings in ''To Hell And Back'', and, as a teenager had a small role in Murphy's very last film, ''A Time For Dying''.

* TanksButNoTanks: His autobiographical movie, ''To Hell And Back'', has him jumping into a burning M4 Sherman to return fire at the Germans, not an M10 Wolverine tank destroyer as really happened.

** In the mid-fifties, at the height of his success, Murphy wanted to buy the rights to John Huston's version of ''RedBadgeOfCourage'' (which Murphy had starred in) and restore the large amount of footage that the studio had hacked out of it. He gave up when he was told that the deleted scenes no longer existed.

** Murphy was allegedly offered the lead role in ''Film/AFistfulOfDollars'', but turned it down because of the similarities to ''Yojimbo''. He was also offered a role in ''Sayonara'' opposite MarlonBrando but turned it down on his agent's advice. At the time of his death, he had committed to a comedy western which would eventually be made without him as ''HotLeadAndColdFeet''. He had also been offered the Scorpio Killer role in ''Film/DirtyHarry''. Director Don Siegel felt he was perfect for the role, but Murphy was reportedly planning on turning it down. Most of his westerns had been targeted to pre-teen audiences and children were still watching them on TV. He didn't want to upset his fans by playing such a horrific character.

* ''TheRedBadgeOfCourage'': JohnHuston made the bold move to cast Murphy, ''the'' icon of American heroism in the post-WWII era, as the cowardly main character, and Murphy gives one of his best performances. Somewhat overlooked due to the studio cutting it down to 70 minutes and Huston constantly denigrating the final product, but works well enough on its own terms. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* ''Duel At Silver Creek'': A boneheaded sheriff tries to reform a young drifter (Murphy) by deputizing him. The drifter turns out to be way smarter and more competent than the sheriff, and much more honorable than people are willing to give him credit for. [[ThisIslandEarth Faith Domergue]] costars. Creator/LeeMarvin has a tiny role. Director [[{{DirtyHarry}} Don Siegal]] found the story so silly he treated the film as a StealthParody. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* ''Tumbleweed'': Murphy gets accused of a crime he didn't commit, breaks out of jail, and sets out to clear his name, with sheriff [[DrStrangelove Slim Pickens]], deputy LeeVanCleef and sleazy romantic rival [[GilligansIsland Russell Johnson]] hot on his trail. Murphy has help in the shape of the title character-a scruffy little white horse who subverts TheAllegedSteed trope by being [[CoolHorse superfast, supersmart, and super-sure-footed.]] Turns up on TV occasionally.
* ''Drums Across The River'': Gary Brannon (Murphy) blames the local Indians for his mother's death, in sharp contrast to his dad (Walter Brennan), who is a friend to the tribe. But when Old Man Brannon is injured, and evil whites are trying to start a war, it's up to Gary and the Indian leader ([[TheLoneRanger Jay Silverheels]]) to keep the peace. Available on DVD in the US.
* ''Ride Clear Of Diablo'': Murphy rides into town looking to avenge his family's death, not realizing that the local sheriff is behind it. [[TheUriahGambit The sheriff deputizes him and sends him on dangerous jobs to try and get him killed]], but Murphy keeps getting closer to the truth, with the help of an outlaw (FilmNoir regular Dan Duryea) whose fondness for the kid gets him stuck in a HeelFaceRevolvingDoor, with shades of RedOniBlueOni in his dynamic with Murphy. Probably the quintessential "Audie Murphy as a good guy" western. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* ''To Hell And Back'': TheFilmOfTheBook. His biggest hit at the time, considered SoAverageItsOkay today, except for the performances (he handpicked the supporting cast, choosing people who reminded him of his old squadmates), and some of the combat scenes. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.

* ''Ride A Crooked Trail'': Murphy plays a petty criminal who is mistaken for a marshal and drafted by a crazy judge ([[Theatre/TheOddCouple Walter Matthau]]) to keep order in town. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* ''Literature/TheQuietAmerican'': Much criticized for deviating from Graham Greene's vision; since it was shot in Diem-era VietNam, with government permission, the film has a pro-Diem and anti-communist angle totally foreign to the book. Its most interesting trait is its take on the Englishman and the American as NotSoDifferent beneath their superficially opposed beliefs: both are fairly charming and likable men, but blinded by their First World smugness and conviction that they know everything worth knowing about Vietnam and the woman they both love. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* ''Night Passage'': JimmyStewart tries to stop a gang of outlaws and discovers that his kid brother (Murphy) is the gang's DragonWithAnAgenda. Duryea and Murphy do their RedOniBlueOni thing again. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* ''No Name On The Bullet'': John Gant (Murphy) is a gun for hire who always provokes his targets into shooting first, and never gives away who he's gunning for. The town goes nuts and tears itself apart trying to figure out who hired him and who he's coming for, while he sits back and watches with a CatSmile. Written by [[Franchise/StarTrek Gene L. Coon]] and directed by [[Film/CreatureFromTheBlackLagoon Jack Arnold,]] frequently considered the best of Murphy's westerns. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* JohnHuston's ''The Unforgiven'' ([[NamesTheSame no, not Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven]]): The saga of a family of Texans who must come to terms with the fact that the adopted daughter of the family (Creator/AudreyHepburn) is a Kiowa by birth, and her tribe wants her back. Murphy plays the bigoted younger brother who has trouble accepting his sister's heritage but does learn his lesson. Not a sympathetic character, but considered one of his better performances. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.
* ''Seven Ways From Sundown'': Murphy plays a NewMeat Texas Ranger, named [[TitleDrop Seven Ways From Sundown]] Jones, sent to bring in a seedy but dapper outlaw who's rather likable but ultimately proves to be more trouble than he's worth. A pretty good film, overshadowed by Murphy's throwdown with the director (see the entry under DeathGlare) and his RomanceOnTheSet with onscreen love interest Venetia Stevenson. Available as a French Region 2 DVD with English soundtrack.
* ''Posse From Hell'': Murphy plays a gunslinger angered by the death of his lawman friend at the hands of a band of outlaws led by [[Film/TwilightZoneTheMovie Vic Morrow]] and including LeeVanCleef. He agrees to take up the lawman's badge as an excuse for a RoaringRampageOfRevenge against the outlaws, but he is saddled with an unpleasant, mostly useless posse including a blowhard ex-military officer and a wisecracking tenderfoot from New York [[Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet1984 (John Saxon)]] who may just have enough tenacity to survive. Noted for its grim, suspenseful tone, the film is popular overseas, with [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff German, French, Australian and British DVDs available,]] but it has not been released to DVD in the States.

* ''Trunk To Cairo'': Low budget Israeli spy movie, where Murphy plays [[MakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext an American hired by Mossad to impersonate a German scientist working for the Egyptian government]]. And no, [[NotEvenBotheringWithTheAccent he doesn't bother with the accent.]] Mostly notable for Murphy doing all his own stunts, and for playing with the TuxedoAndMartini trope. Turns up on TV occasionally.
* ''Forty Guns To Apache Pass'': Another cavalry movie, very low budget. Kind of a Cold War allegory about treacherous soldiers selling advanced weaponry (repeating rifles in this case) to the enemy (Cochise's Apaches as the Soviet analogues). Murphy's last lead role, it is probably also the film he and [[Film/TheThingFromAnotherWorld Kenneth Tobey]] were making when the latter discovered the NoodleImplements in Murphy's car. Available on ITunes and on an Amazon-exclusive DVD in the US.
* ''A Time For Dying'': Murphy's last film, which he produced himself. He had only a small role, as an older Jesse James. [[RealLifeRelative His teenaged son Terry played a young thief executed by a disreputable judge.]] Available as a British Pal Region 0 DVD.

[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audie_Murphy Audie Murphy]] (June 20, 1924 – May 28, 1971) was the single most decorated US soldier of all time. Born in rural [[EverythingIsBigInTexas Texas]] during the Depression. He was the sixth out of twelve children in a poor Scots-Irish family reputed to have Cherokee ancestry. Two of his siblings died before reaching adulthood. As the eldest boy still living at home when his father deserted the family, he was forced to support his mother and younger siblings, by various odd jobs and sustenance hunting. He could kill small, fast-moving targets like rabbits and squirrels with a slingshot, which already says a lot about his marksmanship skills, but he proved even better with a light .22 rifle. Due to the poverty of his family and the fact that the people who tried to help them out were not much better off, he often had to go out hunting with only a single shell in his gun. If he didn't kill something edible with his first shot, his family would go hungry. When his mother died, he was obliged to put his youngest siblings in an orphanage, but he dreamed of earning enough money to reunite the family and provide for them.

His first taste of combat was in Sicily, killing two Italian officers as they tried to escape, [[FieldPromotion gaining him a promotion to Corporal.]] It was in Sicily that he contracted malaria, which would afflict him through the war. He [[RankUp continued to receive promotions]] on the Italian mainland, first to Sergeant after killing three German soldiers and capturing several others when ambushed during a patrol, and again to Staff Sergeant at Anzio when [[HeartbrokenBadass his best friend, Lattie Tipton, was killed]] [[ISurrenderSuckers by a German machine gunner pretending to surrender]], [[HeroicBSOD sending him into a]] [[UnstoppableRage rage]], [[OneManArmy killing the entire machine gun crew that killed his friend, then comandeering their machine gun and grenades, turning them on nearby German positions, and destroying anything not wearing the right uniform.]] Then he went back to Tipton's body to keep watch over it, and [[HeroicBSOD completely shut down]] until the medics came to take the body away. His attack on the Germans earned him the Distinguished Service Cross, second only to the Medal of Honor, and made him Platoon Sergeant. In later years, Murphy often lamented that all his friend Tipton got out of that action was a wooden cross above his grave, and Murphy is reputed to have given his DSC to Tipton's daughter in memory of the event. His division sustained 4500 casualties after entering France, and he was eventually given a field commission to 2nd Lieutenant and [[YouAreInCommandNow made platoon leader,]] during which he received two Silver Stars.

The action that earned him the Medal of Honor occurred January 26, 1945, in Holtzwihr, France. Murphy's company was reduced from 128 to 19. The Germans had also knocked out all but six of the M10 Tank Destroyers supporting his company. Murphy sent his remaining men to the rear while he [[{{Determinator}} kept firing at the Germans with his M1 Carbine until he ran out of ammunition]], then climbed aboard an abandoned and burning M10 (with a full fuel tank, and presumably about to explode), [[MoreDakka using its .50 calibre to gun down and entire German company]], [[KindaBusyHere using a land phone to direct artillery fire]], falling back only when his communications line was cut. He then led his men in a counter attack, driving the Germans from Holtzwihr. He was promoted again to First Lieutenant a month later.

* ''Ride A Crooked Trail'': Murphy plays a petty criminal who is mistaken for a marshal and drafted by a crazy judge ([[TheOddCouple Walter Matthau]]) to keep order in town. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.

* ''Duel At Silver Creek'': A boneheaded sheriff tries to reform a young drifter (Murphy) by deputizing him. The drifter turns out to be way smarter and more competent than the sheriff, and much more honorable than people are willing to give him credit for. [[ThisIslandEarth Faith Domergue]] costars. LeeMarvin has a tiny role. Director [[{{DirtyHarry}} Don Siegal]] found the story so silly he treated the film as a StealthParody. Available on DVD in the US and most other places.

The filming of ''Guns of Fort Petticoat'' sums up his post-war life pretty well. He not only produced and starred in this film, about a cavalry officer who goes rogue in order to teach a group of women how to fight off an Indian attack, he also trained the actresses in real life for the task, using his experience in the Army and the Texas National Guard to teach them gun safety and formation drills. On the side, he worked as an [[UndercoverCopReveal undercover narcotics agent]], helping bring about some twenty convictions. He also rescued an abused German Shepard puppy by buying it from its cruel owner.

* BewareTheNiceOnes: Soft spoken, excruciatingly polite, [[FriendToAllChildren fond of children]], horses and dogs. But absolutely the last person you wanted to tangle with. Murphy reputedly once frightened a drunken, misbehaving [[ReservoirDogs Lawrence Tierney]], one of the more notorious brawlers in Hollywood, into leaving a party without raising his voice or physically harming Tierney.

* MuggingTheMonster [=/=] BullyingADragon: A 6-foot-two drifter tried to carjack him in Texas in the late forties. Said drifter got his rear end handed to him. In Hollywood, various macho types took one look at the little man with all the medals and thought they could take him on. According to Murphy's friend Budd Boetticher, they invariably got curb-stomped.
* NiceToTheWaitress: His friends in Hollywood were mostly character actors and film crew members (cameramen, makeup artists, horse wranglers, stunt people both male and female), and he was often protective of them, and tried to help them succeed in their careers. There is also a story of him staying with a wealthy friend in Dallas, and blowing off a party full of bigshots to go hang out with the (African American) kitchen staff and compliment them on their cooking.

The action that earned him the Medal of Honor occurred January 26, 1945, in Holtzwihr, France. Murphy's company was reduced from 128 to 19. The Germans had also knocked out all but six of the M10 Tank Destroyers supporting his company. Murphy sent his remaining men to the rear while he [[{{Determinator}} kept firing at the Germans with his M1 Carbine until he ran out of ammunition]], the climbed aboard an abandoned and burning M10 (with a full fuel tank, and presumably about to explode), [[MoreDakka using its .50 calibre to gun down and entire German company]], [[KindaBusyHere using a land phone to direct artillery fire]], falling back only when his communications line was cut. He then led his men in a counter attack, driving the Germans from Holtzwihr. He was promoted again to First Lieutenant a month later.

The action that earned him the Medal of Honour occurred January 26, 1945, in Holtzwihr, France. Murphy's company was reduced from 128 to 19. The Germans had also knocked out all but six of the M10 Tank Destroyers supporting his company. Murphy sent his remaining men to the rear while he [[{{Determinator}} kept firing at the Germans with his M1 Carbine until he ran out of ammunition]], the climbed aboard an abandoned and burning M10 (with a full fuel tank, and presumably about to explode), [[MoreDakka using its .50 calibre to gun down and entire German company]], [[KindaBusyHere using a land phone to direct artillery fire]], falling back only when his communications line was cut. He then led his men in a counter attack, driving the Germans from Holtzwihr. He was promoted again to First Lieutenant a month later.

* HeroicBSOD: What led to the action that won him the Distinguished Service Cross was seeing his best friend killed by a German machine gun crew pretending to surrender.

The action that earned him the Medal of Honour occurred January 26, 1945, in Holtzwihr, France. Murphy's company was reduced from 128 to 19. The Germans had also knocked out all but six of the M10 Tank Destroyers supporting his company. Murphy sent his remaining men to the rear while he [[{{Determinator}} kept firing at the Germans with his M1 Carbine until he ran out of ammunition]], the climbed aboard an abandoned and burning M10 (with a full fuel tank, and presumably about to explode), [[MoreDakka using its .50 calibre to gun down and entire German company, using a land phone to direct artillery fire]], falling back only when his communications line was cut. He then led his men in a counter attack, driving the Germans from Holtzwihr. He was promoted again to First Lieutenant a month later.