President Barack Obama is set to award America’s highest military honour to 24 men previously denied the decoration because of discrimination.
Only three veterans receiving the Medal of Honor on Tuesday are still alive, all of whom served in Vietnam. The rest will be decorated posthumously.
The honours follow a 12-year Pentagon review of veterans affected by bias.
The recipients include Hispanic, African-American and Jewish veterans of World War Two, Korea and Vietnam.
On Tuesday afternoon Mr Obama will welcome the living veterans and family and friends of the deceased in a ceremony at the White House.
Retired Sgt First Class Melvin Morris, who was wounded in Vietnam, told the BBC it would be “a nervous moment” standing next to the president.
“I can’t be nothing but proud,” he said. “Even though it may come late, better late than never.”
Sgt Morris, 72, is being honoured for his courage as a strike force commander in combat near Chi Lang, Vietnam, in 1969.
During a fire fight near a minefield, Sgt Morris rallied his comrades to retrieve the body of another commander who had been killed near an enemy bunker.
