John Bligh
- Retired Teacher
Over a 70-year career in public service, Osceola Louis Fletcher — commonly known as Ozzy — spent just 18 years as a teacher, working from 1972 to 1990 at Boys and Girls HS in Brooklyn, where he taught English.
But he provided a powerful lesson in perseverance with his battle to be awarded a Purple Heart 77 years after being wounded in France during World War II, gaining recognition that resonated far beyond the classroom.
Ozzy, who died on Nov. 3, 2022, at age 100, had left City College in 1943 when he was drafted into the Army. He was severely wounded by enemy fire twice in France shortly after the June 6, 1944, D-Day landings. The first time was while transporting supplies to Normandy, and the second time was near Cherbourg in a missile attack that killed the soldiers in the cab of his truck and caused it to flip over. He suffered a large gash to his head as well as leg wounds and was brought to safety by French citizens.
The nature of his wounds from an enemy attack should have earned him a Purple Heart. But Ozzy’s daughter, Jacqueline Streets, told CNN in 2021 that the lack of medical documentation because he was never hospitalized allowed the military to deny him the medal. “The problem was that the Black soldiers were considered injured, and an injury wasn’t considered an incidence of Purple Heart,” she said. “The white soldiers were considered wounded.”
For decades, Streets said, Ozzy did not speak about his wartime experiences as he moved ahead with his life. He joined the NYPD in 1949, spending 23 years as a police officer and detective. In 1954, while on the force, he earned master’s degrees from NYU in both Secondary Education and American Literature.
At age 50, Ozzy began teaching at Boys and Girls HS, where he also served as a student government coordinator and the school newspaper’s adviser. “He always wanted to make a difference,” Streets said recently in explaining her father’s decision to work in what was then a troubled school. “And he really liked young people. He put a lot of effort into those kids.”
After leaving teaching in 1990, Ozzy worked for more than 23 years as a community affairs specialist with the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office. During that time, Mayor Michael Bloomberg presented him with a Sloan Public Service Award, an honor given to career civil servants for outstanding work. His award called Ozzy “a Renaissance man and an American hero. At 87, he continues to work for all the right reasons: to improve the lives of others.”
A trip Ozzy made to Normandy with an NYU delegation in about 2012 left him determined to get the recognition he deserved. “He wanted the truth to be known,” his daughter told CNN. More recently, Streets said anger at his treatment by the Army was a strong motivator. After he was rescued and patched up, she said, “He went back with his head all bandaged and they wanted to charge him with being absent without leave” instead of recognizing him for being wounded.
Father and daughter began a push to gain him the Purple Heart, and their efforts got a big lift when the producers of a documentary about D-Day, “Sixth of June,” took up his cause. Army officials were able to verify his account, aided by historical data and other sources.
On June 18, 2021, at age 99, Ozzy was presented with the long-overdue Purple Heart at a ceremony in Brooklyn’s Fort Hamilton. The accolades continued on Feb. 17, 2022, when at the French Consulate in Manhattan, Ozzy was given the Chevalier of the Order of the French Legion of Honor for his efforts and sacrifice in liberating France.
Ten days after he died, Ozzy’s wife, Pauline, passed away. The couple had a joint funeral service in St. Philip’s Episcopal Church in Ocean Hill, Brooklyn, where they had been married 74 years earlier.
In addition to his daughter Jacqueline, Ozzy is survived by daughters Lorraine Fletcher and Andrea Fletcher; a son, Andrew; seven grandchildren; and four great-grandchildren. He was predeceased by a son, Malcom.
