The President of the United States of America, in the name of Congress, takes pleasure in presenting the Medal of Honor to Sergeant Cornelius Minor Hadley, United States Army, for extraordinary heroism on 20 November 1863, while serving with Company F, 9th Michigan Cavalry, in action at Fort Sanders, Knoxville, Tennessee. With one companion, Sergeant Hadley voluntarily carried through the enemy’s lines important dispatches from General Grant to General Burnside, then besieged within Knoxville, and brought back replies, his comrade’s horse being killed and the man taken prisoner.