Unknown Hero: Leslie Coffelt

This is the story of a man named Leslie Coffelt. Coffelt was a police officer in Washington, D.C. in the 1920’s-30’s. In 1936 he resigned to become a building technician but returned to the force in 1941. A year later he requested, and was granted, a transfer to the White House Police Force. The same year Coffelt was drafted into the United States Army, but returned stateside after about two years because of a medical release. He returned to the White House Police Force and stayed there into the second (and first full) term of President Harry S. Truman. In 1950, the White House was deemed unsafe and the First Family was relocated across the street to the Blair House during renovations. 

On November 1, two Puerto Rican Nationalists, Griselio Torresola and Oscar Collazo, made an attempt on the President’s life. Collazo engaged Secret Service agents and White House policemen to draw attention while Torresola made an approach from behind the guards and fired into Coffelt from close range. Coffelt was hit three times in the chest and abdomen while a fourth shot nearly missed him and even cut through his tunic. Two other officers were also struck by gunfire. Torresola and Collazo now tried to make their approach on the President’s residence. (The President was abruptly awoken from his nap in time to look out his window and see the assassins and the wounded officers.) Torresola took cover behind the Blair House steps to reload. A mortally wounded Coffelt staggered out of his guard booth and fired into Torresola from thirty-one feet, striking him right behind the ear and killing him instantly. Coffelt would stagger back to the booth and black out, eventually passing away in the hospital from his wounds. Collazo was subdued and Truman’s life most-likely saved. Collazo was sentenced to death, which was changed by the man he intended to kill, Harry Truman, to life in prison, and later shortened by Jimmy Carter which allowed him freedom. Private Coffelt saved the president’s life in giving his own in the line of duty and protected his nation’s most powerful man to his last breath. Leslie Coffelt was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. His sacrifices are also marked by a plaque on the Blair House fence and the day room for the Secret Service Uniformed Division in the Blair House is named after him. Leslie Coffelt, an American Hero