--- title: Humayun Khan and the History of Muslims in the U.S. Military description: One very specific reason why it's hard to tell how many Muslim service members served the U.S. in its early wars canonical: https://time.com/4432865/khan-muslim-american-soldiers-history/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-08-03T20:20:33.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T23:41:05.260Z article:section: History og:title: Humayun Khan and the History of Muslims in the U.S. Military og:description: Why it's hard to tell how many Muslim service members served the U.S. in its early wars og:url: https://time.com/4432865/khan-muslim-american-soldiers-history/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb28e3fc91b98c269/6988a0fde20a874e92a91ea0/khan.jpeg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Khan Family og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Humayun Khan and the History of Muslims in the U.S. Military twitter:description: Why it's hard to tell how many Muslim service members served the U.S. in its early wars twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb28e3fc91b98c269/6988a0fde20a874e92a91ea0/khan.jpeg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The Khan Family and American History's Hidden Muslim Soldiers  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Aug 3, 2016 8:20 PM UTC  Khizr Khan, whose son Humayun S. M. Khan was one of 14 US Muslims who died serving the United States in the ten years after 9/11, speaks during the final day of the 2016 Democratic National Convention on July 28, 2016, at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia. Khizr Khan, whose son Humayun S. M. Khan was one of 14 US Muslims who died serving the United States in the ten years after 9/11, speaks during the final day of the 2016 Democratic National Convention on July 28, 2016, at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia.Robyn Beck—AFP/Getty Images  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Aug 3, 2016 8:20 PM UTC When Khizr and Ghazala Khan, the parents of fallen U.S. Army Captain Humayun Khan, took the stage last week at the Democratic National Convention, they started a[ national conversation](http://time.com/4435544/kareem-abdul-jabbar-khizr-khan/?xid=homepage) that has [drawn attention](http://time.com/4432816/donald-trump-khizr-ghazala-khan/) to the [role of Muslims in the U.S. military](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/03/us/muslims-us-military.html). However, while Muslim-Americans have been a part of the national fabric for [centuries](http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/feature/islam-in-america/), that conversation has tended to focus on those who served and fought in the last few decades. Perhaps that’s because the early history of Muslims in the U.S. military was, for a long time, particularly murky. Though some sources identify Muslim men who fought for America as early as the Revolutionary War, the evidence there is usually based on guesswork. Though men like Bampett Muhamed, a corporal who served in Virginia beginning in 1775, are often seen as the nation’s earliest Muslim soldiers, little is known about them beyond the fact that their names sound Muslim. As Edward E. Curtis’ _Encyclopedia of Muslim-American History_ [points out,](https://books.google.com/books?id=owZCMZpYamMC&pg=PA214&lpg=PA214&dq=first+%22crescent+and+star%22+in+arlington+cemetery&source=bl&ots=%5FENVKCbCok&sig=SEjsV2PzWbe1WLHZk%5F2PzN9BzCk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjOm53dpaHOAhWH9x4KHUyGDsQ4ChDoAQgpMAI#v=onepage&q=bampett&f=false) such a name is no guarantee of the person’s religious background or identity. And yet, even into the 20th century, there are few other tools available for historians to identify a soldier or sailor’s religion. One reason for that lack of data is simple. Even into the 1950s, while a service member’s dog tag typically included religious information, so that they might receive the correct religious burials if needed, the only options available were Christian or Jewish. Those faiths could be indicated with a letter: C for Catholic, P for Protestant, H for Hebrew. The U.S. military did not recognize Islam as a possible religion for a service member. [_Get your history fix in one place: sign up for the weekly TIME History newsletter_](http://time.com/newsletter) The man who led the charge to change this situation was Abdullah (sometimes spelled Abdallah) Igram, a World War II veteran and [community leader](http://www.cair-iowa.org/american-muslims/islam-in-america) from Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Igram’s story, [as passed down to his children](http://america.aljazeera.com/features/2014/2/in-iowa-a-lastingsymbolofamericanislam.html), was that he had specifically requested that his dog tag indicate that he was Muslim, and that he had been told that was not possible. As TIME [reported](http://time.com/vault/issue/1953-07-13/page/78/) in 1953, Igram returned from his service determined to help their fellow Americans learn more about the Islamic faith—and to address the dog tag problem: --- > “” --- That year, he had written to the Secretary of the Army and had received the O.K. for Muslim soldiers to wear that additional religious-identification tag. “I am fighting for my right, and the right of my people, to be recognized as a religious faith,” he [told](https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1350&dat=19530705&id=k-lOAAAAIBAJ&sjid=eQAEAAAAIBAJ&pg=3313,1249067) the Toledo _Blade._ In that early-1950s period, the military also [allowed](https://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/transcripts/2012/120126afc1200.txt) service members to choose X (other) or Y (preferring not to say) on their tags. Igram further wrote to President Eisenhower (who would also be the first man to make a [presidential visit to a mosque) ](http://time.com/4205979/obama-mosque-visit-history/)requesting that the military formally recognize Islam and allow service members to print I or M on their official dog tags. His widow told the _Daily Iowan_ in 2007 that the specific request was not granted—but [by the time the Vietnam War began](https://books.google.com/books?id=fmGGBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA11&dq=dog+tag+spell+out+religion&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiLh8vR4qXOAhUCJiYKHWWaAbUQ6AEIHDAA#v=onepage&q=dog%20tag%20spell%20out%20religion&f=false), those one-letter indications had been phased out in favor of spelling out the entire name of a religious affiliation, with a wide range to choose from. Today, those who serve in the U.S. military can “generally put whatever religious preference they want on their tags,” [according](https://www.army.mil/article/123034) to the Army. Dog tags aren’t the only area in which Muslim military service has achieved recognition over the last half-century. For example, [after World War I](http://www.cem.va.gov/history/hmhist.asp), when religious symbolism was first added to the military gravestones approved by the War Department, a cross and a Star of David were the only options available. Today, a wide range of symbols are [available](http://www.cem.va.gov/hmm/emblems.asp), including two options to indicate Islamic faith. And as recently as 1990, an Army spokesman [told](https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1350&dat=19900825&id=oFpPAAAAIBAJ&sjid=EwMEAAAAIBAJ&pg=2638,7866157) the Toledo _Blade_ that there were no Muslim chaplains in the U.S. armed forces. The New York _Times_ reports this week that there are [currently](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/03/us/muslims-us-military.html) five. Guessing based on names is no longer necessary when it comes to Muslims in the U.S. military: the military keeps track of the religions that service members choose to report. In 2015, the Pentagon [reported](http://abcnews.go.com/US/5000-muslims-serving-us-military-pentagon/story?id=35654904) that 5,896 people serving at the time self-identified as Muslim. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4432865/khan-muslim-american-soldiers-history/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4432865/khan-muslim-american-soldiers-history/"},"headline":"The Khan Family and American History's Hidden Muslim Soldiers","datePublished":"2016-08-03T20:20:33.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T23:41:05.260Z","description":"One very specific reason why it's hard to tell how many Muslim service members served the U.S. in its early wars","url":"https://time.com/4432865/khan-muslim-american-soldiers-history/","keywords":["faith","Military"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb28e3fc91b98c269/6988a0fde20a874e92a91ea0/khan.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb28e3fc91b98c269/6988a0fde20a874e92a91ea0/khan.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Khan Family","caption":"US-VOTE-DEMOCRATS-CONVENTION","creditText":"Robyn Beck—AFP/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/faith/","name":"faith"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4432865/khan-muslim-american-soldiers-history/","name":"The Khan Family and American History's Hidden Muslim Soldiers"}}]}] ```