[1] Rising up through the ranks from private to sergeant while fighting for the federal government of the United States (Union) during the American Civil War, he displayed conspicuous bravery on August 5, 1864, while serving aboard the USS Richmond.

Reassigned to duties at the Philadelphia Naval Barracks on October 30, 1852, he then continued to serve on land in Washington, D.C. and Norfolk, Virginia until assigned to the USS Mississippi on November 22 of that year.

Stationed aboard ship until November of that year, he then moved back and forth between the naval barracks in Brooklyn and Washington, D.C., until reassigned to the USS Niagara on April 2, 1857.

[8][9] Still attached to Farragut's squadron in 1864, which had been engaged in a blockade of Mobile, Alabama since November 1, 1863, and serving as a sergeant stationed aboard the USS Richmond, he performed the actions for which he would later be awarded the U.S. Medal of Honor.

After being transferred to the USS Idaho, he continued to alternate between life aboard ship and on land, punctuated by re-enlistments, for the remainder of his military career.

[16] Records from the U.S. Navy Department's Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, which were compiled for Martin's Navy Survivors' Certificate file, documented that Martin sustained multiple service-related injuries and ailments during his naval career, including: rheumatism (first documented in the late 1840s); a subluxation of his left ankle (1858); hip pain and rheumatism (1861); a contusion sustained on April 12, 1862, when his "arm was squeezed in working a gun, whilst at quarters", which resulted in a nine-day admission to a U.S. Navy Hospital that year and was linked by a Navy doctor in 1879 to the atrophy of his bicep (via the notation "the result of an injury to the arm while loading a gun on board the 'Richmond', in April, 1862"); a sprained ankle (1874); a severe fall down the stairs while in the line of duty at a naval barracks (1875); and anemia attributed to his "long and continuous service in the Marine Corps" (1879).

Citation:[13] As captain of a gun on board the USS Richmond during action against rebel forts and gunboats and with the ram Tennessee in Mobile Bay, 5 August 1864.

Martin fought his gun with skill and courage throughout the furious 2-hour battle which resulted in the surrender of the rebel ram Tennessee and in the damaging and destruction of batteries at Fort Morgan.