Interview with Thomas Moran - Vietnam War Veteran

which were dessert served in Vietnam the Army Specialist fourth-class know I was drafted I was living in Bloomfield Connecticut I believe it was June 68 yeah no no I graduated in 66 I try try to go well I was going to a branch at University of Hartford and I didn't have the right courses a second semester so I decided to take that semester off get my courses together and you know but but that goes after that one semester and didn't work oh yes 30 days about 30 days later I was getting a physical notice and fund another 30 days I was drafted along with about nine others from full field at the same time Fort Dix New Jersey basically trying to get us mentally ready to go in the war a battle or any job that we were gonna have and get a physically fit and it was a lot of running a lot of you know training mostly physically not by name but I do remember a couple of them but I wish you know I don't remember their names now but yeah too much oh no no there was what they say probably five or six of us from well the same day same drug squad same basic training class y'all after we finished basic they started putting us off the different directions I myself and three or four others from Bloomfield wound up in Fort Polk Louisiana for advanced infantry training it was after going to Vietnam er was close to it we were training in the mud we were sleeping in the water we were forced marching crawling underneath Bob wire fences fences as they're shooting over our head some clean slates you know the training was really to gear us up to be in Vietnam and I think they were saying that's probably close this they had in the United States climate wise and everything else as far as what we were going to see him Vietnam had a good idea but now I wake up hoping this wasn't going to happen they even asked us at one point what world would join to be a station everybody's saying you know Europe and in places like that I put a Laska doffing and nobody else wanted to go so that didn't work either that was to once again went home for a month we had a month off no we had orders from Vietnam so we try to enjoy as much you could oh yeah we have parties we had you know well phil was a small town at that point in everybody know each other we all hung around together so it was a nice to get home and be be with your friends yeah after that no we went to uh he's trying to think out in Seattle I guess it was yeah Seattle Washington where he sat there for maybe two weeks waiting for our orders to go and it was another friend of ours that was stationed in Seattle at that time from home field so he took us sightseeing fishing you know watching this thing I want you open up the fair reverse things so yeah we had a pretty good time but yet you were nervous you couldn't young no one was coming you didn't want it to come yeah well they told us if we can go on on ship our time would start the middle of our feet hit the ship there also fly over we wound up flying over so we were full from Seattle to that Japan how commercial airlines Japan they refueled they had stories and papayas they had a sign in if they were going to go to Vietnam from there we fooled Cam Ranh Bay yes looked like a resort cake it was but yet we had no idea where we were going at that point in in Vietnam and slowly they started spreading us you know the guys from bone field wasn't others two different areas and there's Jimmy Oliver I graduate high school with him and I were still standing here wondering where we're going so they flew us up to uh we're off to camp Sharon up near the DMZ yep you know everybody else went in different directions different jobs what were your duties we didn't happen if we didn't have a rifle in our hand we stood enough nope nope we stood there for in an attack or once in a while somebody come by you know that's what most of all time and things like that or don't worry we can forget you and probably two or three days later they finally set us over to kasher so our squad cam Sharon and that's found out we're going into a mechanized infantry never saw armored personnel carrier before in my life but that's what they clutters him didn't even know it existed well it's it's tanks artillery that moves around armored personnel carriers I switch where I wound up in fact I was there maybe a month and the driver my squad went on R&R and they told me I was a driver so I learned bright climbing in and taking off but I guess guess they like the way I drove because they can't be lead the company every every place we went no no hay road on it sat on top of what the rest of the guys for maybe a month and a half two months at the most we were we were just my squad in my unit was just the armored personnel carriers yeah I mean there was tanks that we mix in with the times but then we can go months or not seeing them artillery sometimes you know would write in with us but that was very seldom it was just basically us on our squad and our company and you know in the armored personnel carriers [Music] yeah I'm gonna say maybe six or eight I don't really remember it looks something like a tank there's a hatch on the top it drives with your controls you sit inside with your head sticking out and there's controls to drive it it's it's a track and not tires may not a heavy steel and we told you don't write in there in case you hit a mind or anything which I did hit a mind with it one time yeah according to everybody from the other squads I said this 5-ton 10-ton whatever it is our personnel carry went up in the air about eight feet and came back down basically wanders well no we'd always leave if we have to stop and go in an area I would stay with your personnel carry we'd always cam one guy with us gunner with us there is an m16 m60 machine gun on the top the armored personnel carrier till one person one man that then at night we take that down with us you know I may be strange fella but yeah when we left when we left uh Bradley Airport and my parents were there and a couple of guys are saying don't turn around and look out I'm just gonna make it harder to go I turned around said I'll see a year I knew I was coming home for some reason that's the way I felt but you know to get back to your question again uh you didn't know what to expect you're sitting there you know like I say at that point I wasn't driving they're sitting on top with the rest of the guys and you'd stop and go out different areas to check out of enemies there or bring back let's say reconnaissance I guess is what you'd say any times we we've run into a small battle but you just that was one of the things that the training gave us and we didn't realize it until we got there and got into battles it you knew what to do and you just automatically jumped up and did it we had a few guys that were people that were really afraid of it I know they thought they're gonna get killed right away and had no idea what to do there might have been on drugs and made her tougher on the guys that we're trying to fight and keep these guys safe at the same time also we're pretty pretty routine you know at times through even a routine missions will even wind up with a gunfight or something I usually have to call when the helicopters which you know because we're in a big open field we didn't want to walk or drive through it the helicopters would come in and spray like what mo right every four inches to about the size of a football field in about ten seconds then we come back in and you know go through and make sure nothing nothing was there most of time they were going on there they were dead by the time you know helicopters left right up until the probably excuse me probably the last month month and a half we we got wiped out pretty bad at one point just before it's going to be leaving and they put me as a squad leader and at that point yeah I was afraid of yeah I was wounded twice already didn't want to get wounded over the third time so but that at the time we at the time that I got wounded a second time and maybe I'm jumping guns but we went up to Khe Sanh we went up with the whole company probably about 120 men and after three nights of fighting they had to call the Marines back in and we would they went home with 20 healthy guys the rest were either in the hospital or her dead at that point and I had a grenade land basically right in front of my face and chilled me up in the air and I came down where I couldn't see anything and I feeling feeling my eyes yeah like I feel this it's wet I'm thinking damn no grace I'm blind and I started getting my eyesight there and luckily it was just blood water it was raining the whole time and I got my eyesight back my 16 the Crips were blown off at the 50 caliber 60 caliber machine gun was blown over I came down that I next to me but I broke both the eardrums I couldn't hear a thing and the guy with me strapped on his leg and broke money or drum so like I say when I got I spent maybe a week in the hospital ship along with him at the same time and when I got back and they wanted me to be squad leader ice like I said just no way I wanted to even go back out in the field again so I went back to see the doctor and doctor said you're not supposed to be off the field you're not supposed to be near any noises so I spent probably the last month month and a half in base camp you know doing odds and ends there getting things ready to send out to the was 60 68 69 69 yeah you're part of 69 I believe we went there was nobody up there when we came you know we went up there and we're pushing down high grass it's it was a winding mountain we just kept driving up or if you look over the side to go too far you're you're following through I think was the second time we were up there here I was there and we got up there and prayed as white as a football field the grass was just mad at down so we knew we were gonna get it hit pretty bad and once glad that was next to me was smoking marijuana and the thing is not setting up and so we try setting up up wire and flares and any kind of hammer or anything we could at that point but I guess they was just sitting there watching us so this got dark we got hit hard and the squad that was doing a marijuana and everything within 10-15 minutes each one of them were go on paint I don't remember exactly like I say we had one one of the bigger helicopters and I'm trying to think that the losing track of the name of the helicopters the type where you open the back and could drive a jeep or something in it Chinook's yes we had two of them come out when the light came back at daylight came and one of them was filled with seriously wounded I was supposed to get on at night my buddy that you know had a shopping over but was supposed to get out and it wasn't enough room so that just Chinook left and the other one came in right behind it and we had oh there had to be a or more of death died and myself and my buddy went in on that helicopter and we got up in the air course there's no windows in nd earth going through us Pancho's regret buddies up and pull off so here's my my friend my buddy and I we're just standing here staring at these guys you know when they're dead you know you guys we live with for three-quarters of a year or so and that's one thing being near an airport here in East Granby I hear that Chinook every time and I don't have to look up I just pictured those guys cause somebody's never been go away you know way in there I had one of the Gunners from on the helicopter come over try to give me a cigarette and they didn't want it no I couldn't I couldn't hear what he's saying if I'd grabbed me around the shoulders and brought me over next to where he was and so he could be in his station and helped me hold my arm the whole time now the guy went over to my buddy and did the same thing for him we know all the other wounded yeah I mean that helicopter tell y'all went before that yep and seeing our injuries weren't as severe as the others and we waited into the next helicopter this world put all the water now we were in enough foxholes that we dug you know we spent a whole 2 or 3 hours putting Bob wire down grenades everything you could think of down in front of us and Bob wire different places but it's friend of mine I went through high school with it in the same squad he went out on point with two or three others he says soon as a fighting started we're looking face to face thing the enemy was just sitting there watching us the whole time and we didn't notice it we can see him good nail and it right on top of it in fact it wasn't for the guy in a foxhole with me it I see on the reunions now and if it wasn't for him he kicked it away somewhat and that's where he got us trapped I was like but I want like you seen a cop butcher so I went flying up in the air and came back down landed on him somewhat and slowly got my eyesight back but I couldn't hear a thing after that and then I'm trying to fight with the Crips one off of my 16 and you know things like the yeah that was the that was the worst night actually it lasted three nights but I wanted the fighting so as the daylight came they were gone sometimes a doctor the doctors came they were back they felt that we had the upper hand in a day time so we had our Tillery flares coming and keeping the whole place lit all night and things but you know one of the things that for years I didn't want to talk about it still bothers me yes next morning yeah luckily I was never shot I was a little to twice never shot oh I had to grenade that time and they got in the armored personnel carrier we hit why kaseylee hit uh what they felt wasn't like the 500-pound bomb that was the first one you took me to the hospital ship yes no I don't remember there really wasn't much they could do what the hearing I mean yeah they clean my ears they did whatever they could yeah right there yeah as soon as we came in there was there was a good handful of us that went in on a hospital ship I don't know how far off the land the hospital ship was sitting I don't even remember the name of it to be honest but we we went there and it was set up with bunks like a Navy ship Hospital air areas for the doctors and things to work on on us nurses and things there so you know I spent price about three or four days there and they sent me back to my company maybe maybe a little bit longer yeah yeah yeah while they sent me back to my base camp Oh probably about four weeks before I started combat three four weeks well my little tired that was back on base camp used to be on my personnel carrier with me want to send me a guard duly so with no hearing so so yeah I told them I I couldn't hear him so he wrote it down you have guard duty eighth grade Isis are the enemies coming I'm just gonna put my hands up go over to your bed point to you okay I guess you can be on KP duty then so I helped out with KP duty at the time with the four or five books they had there was really not much because we go out on the outer personnel carrier sometimes for 50 60 days at a time and you know if we're in a good spot they fly food to us otherwise it was sea rations so there wasn't much to do with the mess tent at times yeah we get orders and go up to a certain place we go to the wooden actually getting another water to go someplace officer some uh some other fight might occur in a different place so hurry up over there so you're expecting to go out for a week you may be up like I say he's 60 70 days say no we can go from one end of the North Vietnam where I was I mean the house as it progressed made out of grass Target or whatever take a fine steel know we can go from one end to the other we were done we were down by the ocean one day one time and half was a garden while the other half were swimming and getting clean and you know then we got all of a sudden we got a call we had to go way up into the mountains so it's just where they needed us Leko the problem was you were in the same clothes all the time you're you know you're not shower and your clothes are filthy you smell but we all we all were the same we'd be drinking sometimes out of bomb craters because we ran out of water and purify pills yeah yes well like usual I'm leading a company wherever we were going we were out patrolling and we got to a river and we're trying to find a way across the river and these armored personnel carriers if you had to it has a pills pump in there if you had the plugs underneath this thing would swim the motor to keep turning this that what swim well this one we got to the river and lieutenant calls me down and a company commander stand in there and all the other lieutenants from the other stuff squad and they're talking and if I looked at me and he said we're going through here I looked on my lieutenant he says I'm not going through there he says this is where we're going I'll give you an order I useless it's set up like a boat launch back in the United States says we've never seen anything like that before he says well if you don't do it I'm having a court-martial nice is it okay get on we'll go and he said well I'm not getting on country commander looked out I'm just glad you're getting on to them and we moved about five feet ten feet we had a hit of mine we're halfway in the water we hit a mind and the other squad said this I don't like I say I don't know how many tons this first no care carry ways but went up about year and started flipping over course I'm driving with just my head sticking out and the guys are sitting on the top of it and it flipped over came down and landed against a riverbank luckily so I didn't get you know I wasn't squashed these guys kept flying off it but most of them weren't that bad one fella didn't he hit his head on the our personnel carriers he's being thrown off and then landed in a river luckily our sergeant saw pulled him out before he drowned him but he spent two years in the hospital having his bone structure and his head and everything else and some other other things don't press cycle go yell training I don't know how you'd even say it trying to get him to live life without remembering that too much we had another guy laying inside luckily on the opposite side where the well we hit the mind to this day he doesn't remember it and that's why we you're not supposed to be inside whoa whoa joy while you're going but yeah we see him I see him on my reunion and he keeps kidding with me secure the reason I can't remember anything and I just part of my language license you dumb ass you don't do what you're supposed to something's going to happen to you but him and I are good friends we we kid around and everything he's you know I was in there no I was thrown around in there I climbed out it was laying on his side pretty much I climbed out and I guess I was dazed because I remember one of the guys coming over foot and with me over to me and you know trying to talk to me I guess maybe trying to answer and everything thing I remember was he kept trying to give me a cigarette and I quit smoking before I went over so I kept telling my in why he kept arguing with me I kept owe him I didn't want it and finally he says after arguing back and forth for a while he says here okay now he says you know he just kept doing that so I you know focus on I guess what happened but yeah then I went over and started trying to help something some of our guys at the time but no one back out to the hospital ship there's the top half this finger of my brother right index finger was cut up pretty bad you wide open on one side and everything I guess maybe from hitting the gauges or something and I had a maybe inch inch-and-a-half hole in my right leg so that's where the first Purple Heart came from we probably stayed there a day or two at the most my whole squad was there fact I got a picture of always putting their armor in the new armored personnel carrier together and bandages on yeah well they they sent me another one right away by the time we we waited our squad waited in base camp for a while did things not not that walk until it no one came in and we mike sergeant and few others and myself started putting everything together in it the only thing it they had like I said I said it has pills pumps and it has plugs on the bottom well this one came in without the plugs and we were waiting for them to be sent we're out again going across the river and my lieutenant again wanted to go across the river I kept telling this isn't gonna make it so yeah he said the bilge pump work faster we got about halfway across and the personnel carrier sunk and we had two so two or three soldiers from Australia with this one of them drowned I'm not a great swimmer I had all I can do to make this Shore again so you know we yeah it was the second one yeah and it wasn't you know right away when we when this happened but yeah you know we wouldn't actually I had three personnel carries those to Winona but case on me they didn't have enough drivers that would come trying to bring them all back after three nights of fighting so they blew most of the month oh yeah he had no choice then our company started our school I started finally trying to find a way getting him out of the field he could say it wanted being one way or the other before he got his killed but all the other squads now we're getting involved too because he was doing the same thing to them and the our company commander put him in a base camp so they stay there yeah we we had $500 out on him and nobody really wanted to kill above it somehow get him out injure him or whatever before he got all of us killed he was right out over Officer Training School and we had another lieutenant came in and took over he was a teacher from Texas then when we were up but he was great he was a nicest guy in the world for when we were up a case on a Content area there he got killed the other guy spent a career in the Army so yeah I guess the nice people go first [Music] God at times we would stop in an area and I'd have one person one gunner with me and I would stay and the other drivers would stay or the same thing which they would turn on a personnel carrier and the company go out you know - I'd chuck in their different areas just patrolling around to see if there's any any and there's various cues me any enemy near us or near our camp our base camp or anything else yeah yeah I wish you didn't ask look well yeah we had never seen Saigon I was always up in the boonies more or less right into a border north and south but we were out patrol one time and we came to this little village and right away all the women and the the holding babies come out and the guy is you know trying like buku friend is what they call buku means a lot and you know they'd be waving to us and things and so we got down and we're trying to don't mingle with them and talk with them somehow and one woman came running over with her with her child in her hand and hand it to one of the soldiers to hold a baby and he's got him looking at it and all of a sudden she started running and had had a hand grenade underneath the baby and killed killed the baby killed our soldier no no no no it wasn't you never know what to expect from one minute to the other we were out driving through to get to an area and a tire came running through our lieutenant wanted to tiger-skin so now I'm driving down through the woods it up and everybody shooting at her for him never hit the thing never got him we we were shut up at night one time when we sleep on the ground you can't sleep and a kid armored personnel carriers because it's level one of it I just got off my outer guard duty and walked a guy up that's just next for the hour fell asleep and short while later he's shaking me and you know you know give me a quiet sign and we won't Gary buddy up in it sound like we're gonna get hit by five or six companies of etnies coming through so we're all waiting prepared and three elephants walk through oh yeah so we just let him go where they were on it - it was dark out you know it was nicely you know they didn't bother us they just what more they wanted to go one of the better times we had there it would whenever we had a chance we had some downtime or in an area that wasn't bad I'd write them and you know they write me back there was a phone and when we got off the hospital ship we came to I don't remember what it's like a phone booth or something there and I was able to call my parents because they got a notice from the army that I was wounded and that's all they said so I was able to call them and let them know you know what happened to me and I'm fine don't worry about it you know next time the same thing in fact it's the second time I had to have somebody else call him and say you know they just lost my hearing for a while he'll be fine so uh yeah I don't remember where that phone was we seemed like the only time we saw is when we first got off the know we're the base camp where we're at was right up in the well where the fighting was going on - no I was never in an area like camera obey or Danang or something like that on the end no we nobody came up to see us we had we were well controlling one time we came across I don't think was the USO show but it was getting these girls and a guy playing and singing and stuff so we stopped to listen to it but the only time we ever had anything nothing no no no no it's we probably had maybe a couple hundred two most you know we did have the artillery and the tanks and stuff you know away from us in another part it wasn't that big of a camp now the food the mess hall was pretty good well there yeah there was a there was a big army tent setup and they could cook there they had two facilities to cook the water was out of a water tank which wouldn't water tank the trailer but you know we we could you know we'd eat there but then you you weren't there that long I very few times we were there a week or so and we go back out and now you're eating sea rations again that were from Second World War yes we're at an area that they thought was really safe and ate the mess hall would make it cooks wouldn't make something and they'd find out by helicopter and drop it to us but one of the problems we had also was you need the food for the mess hall then you get out in areas where you're eating sea rations would wind up with diarrhea so every time you kept switching back and forth you are into photography pizza but yeah it's just the way a life you get used to used to living it they're terrible they can't even a little box and it had maybe some type of ham in there cursos all I don't know dried a food or something like what it was packed back for a second world war so it was still so safe did you have maybe a little peck about four cigarettes which I trade off to somebody else that's about it yeah it's just those little sea rations they have a can of some type of food in it till a little rope so that's enough thing you get used to it you need to use the there are always shortages of water purification tablets malaria tablets the food no I don't remember many the food wasn't there you know if we're off for a long time a lot of times this stuff was dropped to us by a helicopter but when we leave Basecamp inside the armored personnel carrier we we stack amo pretty high we would stick C rations and things like that C rations had a little piece of toilet paper in there for you yeah most everything we need it was inside that armored personnel carrier when we left unless we wound up being out for too long and then they got to fight you know fly something back into us we had days out there where mighty be 100 10 15 20 degrees so even with the armored personnel carriers you try to find a spot that you they can't see it that well and hope you don't get hit you know try to stay in the show you water week well you say water out for a long time we try to find a river we had two big water cans leak and carry down but there was time when they if they can push the green algea pas aside and drink out of it fill your canteens up at the water did you have nothing else you get to you see it's a way of life I mean your whole squads doing it your company's doing it and you hear a gun go off you react or by the way you just go in motion all know what you have to do yes I'm the type if you have to do something do it yeah you don't think about it too much but no everybody act about the same yeah when I was just before we went over the USO was there and they handed a little package in and that package was was a pair of rosary and I'm Catholic and don't practice it as much now but that done we pretty big pretty well into it I took that pair of rosary beads I got around my net for the whole year I was there yep yeah I can open my room on across whether I hope they're not I feel it did no no you might have a regular go under stop guys are walking around talking to each other you know we got to make sure we're worst the armored personnel carrier is filled with whatever we need next time we go out just in case you know you never know when you're gonna get a call to get out there like I said before you never know how many days you're gonna be out there I want I want I put in for Australia for R&R and my medic and one of the other guys I got close to infect a guy that was with me when I hit - look your name went off they put me in from Bangkok and so the orders came from Bangkok but I had a good time the three of us went to Bangkok together it was five days if I remember right and Eko out he did bars you're in and you know you talk another other soldiers have gone through our and our doctor I was headed to the plane to go to go to Bangkok and one of my neighbors so probably three houses up from where I grew up was just coming off the plane yeah the only time I saw him or heard overheard until we got that home yeah so what yeah it was a nice time I'm good it was back to somewhat of a normal life because you're drinking a lot it's to over New Year at the party in your there's some shows you go to massage parlors yeah it was get your mind off it completely [Music] you said well it didn't I don't know it's time to go you just went yeah that's a whole great great yeah fact I see a couple home line and reeling four times doing one Mike I saw some lieutenant we have right out of school for a while is you know it just couldn't deal with him he couldn't talk to him you know where everything and you know and close to getting us killed a few times my pardon all right I never really saw person I didn't like there I mean everybody was there for the same reason we all know that we all ya help each other you hung around together no they were great and it took them probably five six years the guys from my squad to get me going i reunion no no I just I just wanted to forget everything in fact when I got home my mother said talk to me about it he says my father was Second World War Army and he told me my sisters and my mother comes home doesn't want to talk about it Tony don't push them so they took both my parents died not knowing a thing what no I just yeah I'm very very little but I didn't want to talk about it but now the guys already fourth were great he kept busy well it wasn't really an excuse but I was divorced and I was raising three kids from 8 to 9 8 7 8 and 7 9 and 11 I think they were when I got custody of them so that was my excuse I can't go on Aurelius I hang up the phone I don't want to talk about it and finally this Jimmy Oliver that was went through high school with the same squad with me called me up he says Tom and Hooton really and sadistic this year I'm picking up your kids are old enough force they were pick me up and we went up to the airport here in probably Airport yeah we're waiting for my squad to get off a good portion of it and the first guy off the helicopters the guy was inside the armored personnel carrier when I hit the mind and we didn't know whether he's gonna make it or not when we left them still fighting just doesn't remember that day at all then a sergeant a few others and the guy that hit his head against general personnel carrier were flawed up in a river spent two years in the hospital afterwards see him every time on reunion and it made me feel so so much different wanted to go eat here had a good time with them you know everybody was there nobody was you know nobody died that at least from my squad well they did that we had a good good number from my squad died but this core of soldier isn't friends oh I don't even remember guess and no no I'm guessing maybe 10 10 12 at the most yeah years ago the whole fifth infantry has a reunion every year in each year it's you know if you want to be involved too deeply involved and be wondering presidents you put in for president you'll be like fourth vice president each year you work up so you have four years to get you wrapped together so wherever that President is each time this you know that's what you're going for the really yeah so I've been all over than in the Grand Ole Opry we've been you know all over the Northeast and the South haven't been out to Texas or in the West area yet but you know I see a lot of the country well were there for it's a five-day where you and you we using say for for yeah the fifth day is you know all meetings and stuff so we we go home North Carolina we went to Fort Pillow for Pope for what the heck is a fort down in North Carolina but drawn a blank on it now I'm sorry but we we went down to see a ton of museums from down the south beverage museums army museums Fort Bragg we even had done a bunch at Fort Bragg talk to some of the soldiers there yeah each year we there's bus bus trips different places my squad for awhile bus trips are going off when we go off in a wrong direction but now we decided to start taking the bus trips with everybody it's nice you know there's private or wife's there despite 200 people into the Union I don't need to remember the be honest is its I want to say st. Louis but it is a little further south I don't remember to be honest oh yeah well the fifth Infantry even those papers should be coming out soon so you have to all the information will tell us things so we could start booking now I haven't heard from sensitive he came back from the last one where the next one's going to be no took pictures as much I could a lot of times its I try to take pictures of me more in the our personnel carrier squad and things like that I send them home and it just a little back then it was a little cardboard camera and once it still they said at home my family sent me another one so now as far as the journal no I just bought one letter that I wrote to probably it was on my way from Seattle to Luke a Monday on the plane that I wrote to my family at rest of the letters I don't know what happened with them too oh yeah yeah even down tying medicines are getting dark or something and stuff yeah [Music] not really I mean yes just how pretty the country is even up where I was I mean is it was they say it wasn't a Hollis you would expect to see it was sort of made out of grass a cardboard piece of wood having to find it whatever they defined but yet the land around it even with the bomb craters and stuff like that it was pretty we had tents well we had tents that were I'm trying to think how many were and I think four were an attempt but they we slept in a tent on a cot they had sandbags would up about four feet high maybe three feet high and on the outside of a would de s in beds built the right build up so if you're asleep and you'd be found at the level of the sandbags and now that's what we did for the you know a year pretty much your I was back and still and base camp and you know seeing the guys that we're still there there's still some base camp that where you know wounded or you know going someplace uh party quite a bit knowing it's next day you're getting up here you're leaving and you have a problem was a party too much and I woke up the next day on a big helicopter they're not helicopter airplane where all the guys are sitting on the ground with a big strap across the wall not in the grommet a for a big strap across them all buttoned down there had to be a hundred fifty two hundred guys know or that airplane and I woke up and here's two guys holding me and they said your squad drop you off and said wish you the best and your head at home all right I'm fast I'll drink it never woke up doors on the poor honey her party oh yeah yeah we pull out a camera on baby back to the war I guess Japan again you know it was an army plane we're on then and then we went back into I forgot exactly where it was when we changed over to avoid commercial airlines that was a long it yeah no no he was wounded the night after I got wounded a second time he gets a shot through the shoulder wound of out-of-country in the hospital and then them I don't know how many different operations for everybody he's doing fine no no Deborah are ya Denver because I wound up but no I don't even remember the name like for Colorado Springs I don't remember it in the I'm sorry if it's been so long but actually the fifth Infantry were real re-upped and the whole unit trained there for a year before they went over and I myself and Jimmy went over is uh as replacements after the Tet Offensive yeah Fort Carson yes what is what Carson Colorado no no if I would have stayed another month and a half I would have been west of time I'm thinking of months and half could be different I could have got out I had less than six months to go they wouldn't let me out when I can but I said I have to be wounded twice I'm going home and luckily my wounds weren't as serious as if most of them so I went to acting they back to the barracks again and at Fort Carson Colorado they've passed their processing through a lot of them were going back in or me Kevin retrained and tried to get him to a real list they've looked at me and they hooked on my medical record says you can't we can't place any place do you see a doctor and it talked against it it doesn't did not mean for a near balad noises so I wound up in a the base laundry there was probably five or six soldiers GIS there and a lot of civilian women from Colorado Springs and her husband's are overseas and I was present sure throughout two weeks and they put me in charge the rest of the the military there we worked 8:00 to 8:00 to 4:30 and we're off you didn't have to do guard duty or anything seven months I think it was yeah right the barracks for everybody else just like basic training pretty much pretty much I think one time I had to go on guard duty I think they're short-handed if somebody says no it's like for some reason but I did guard duty up Nicole were one you know for a week plus working another time they had us confined to company area and when tell us why and this went on for probably a month or so and then all of a sudden we got the call everybody on the buses so we took our packs and everything got on the buses when we sat there another hour or so now if I said but we're not going right now everybody off so we got off and then maybe I don't know it's been so long maybe another month later or so three weeks later they told us uh here off you can go wherever you are you're not confined anymore so then we asked them yeah we asked them before anyone tell us what we're going don't we asked him where are we going it's okay I kind of state so we were on our way to Kent State but never made it luckily now which they would have never got me to even probably I want to say hold a gun but I wouldn't never shot a gun again I haven't shot a gun since I came home though you know they're gonna have to be somebody's gonna be have to you have to be affected my family one way the other enemy before I'll you ever shoot anybody again yes yeah no I just remember saying to bite everybody and you know getting on the on a cab and go to the airport I went home maybe three four times in between you know up to Connecticut in fact I want so many times home that I owned the army some money out of my last paycheck we had we had a guy in a company commander's office that Gloria he was signing all paperwork for that when the commander would tell I mean we're now to sign a book of make it look like his name so a lot of times when the commander the company commander was gone he go over is got a in it you know got to know I got to know him for it real well here's a date so I want to go home so he's signed the order and everything and I go home so he was doing that with a lot of the people so when I time to leave I had more vacation time than they said oh so I had to pay some money back yeah it wasn't good my family that I call the family I didn't want to surprise him because I remember when I was I'm not a month off before I went over there was my father and I were watching news one night and some guy heard noise and the door turned so I'm trying to open the door this house and he shot through the door killed his son it was coming home and surprise him so I said I'm not surprising anybody so I have my family came to the airport I was engaged when I went over she was with somebody else when I came back which showed up you know back then you could walk up to the planes and everything at the airport where we're getting off and here's my family happy I'm happy to see them when the protestors are there call us baby killers and things like that head Brawley yeah not not many but there was a handful from there you know and you couldn't wait to be honest get today to get the uniform off just happy to be home and these people I just didn't realize and we didn't want to be there either wasn't our call so I don't really remember ice I worked when I was in high school I worked as a electrician's helper gentleman during the summer and I once I got the draft notice and everything I went electrician to unit Hartford and I put my name in for the apprenticeship and if they had a quest by the time I left that time would have caught you know towards my pension when I was over but I didn't get accepted until I got home but you know got home in June and Frank September they started in the class so I was working yeah just a little bit to pay for my books the electrician's Union had their own classes and you worked you worked five days a week and you went two nights a week except for the summer for for schooling so uh you know I used it for my books and everything the rest is paid for buddy Union my uncle happen to be a Protestant one that came home too so you know right you know that's what I did for a career you know we did Don I rise as a commercial and industrial lead into houses yeah I left my license go probably two years ago filing ah I'd made a lot of friends I started a veterans group and after I started going on reunion citizen veterans in East Granby were never even invited in their Memorial Day Parade or anything so I spent seven weeks going through the touch of Southwest and calling them and made a lot of nice people who made a lot of nice friends through this group in fact why the kids guys I went to high school ran into him Home Depot and the whole field got taught and told me he happened to move in the same town um and just two years before that became real close for instance but uh yeah that's what mostly were my my friends are me I see yeah actually people aren't off I've lost a good handful of friends from you know after they were home four years of dying but thank you busy not with just the East Granby veterans we talked about trying to going into American Legion or sometimes they want to be screaming veterans that we great support from the town we give out a thousand dollar scholarship each year that graduation yeah we've got them from Second World War on right on down when we got a couple stolen the reserves to come yeah that takes up most of my time yeah you know I could help a lot of them are older veterans so it's younger which I'll be seventeen huh a couple weeks but does younger ones do most of the work and things we just said Home Depot donate a shed and they helped put it up with us so we we we have a fundraiser tab say it was one of them so we could get the money for the scholarship so we needed some place to store at home people for free I mean gave us a shed worked on it with us so I mean it's yes you know me doing a niggard community we started last year in the community center and tell it's where Excel is now so yeah we have other fundraisers there's though you know there is right over there veteran scholarship fund we leave containers like that out around town and people dropped it or change at restaurants and stuff like that in there we go into the schools oh I can see the Memorial Day non-moral day Veterans Day do you think a before a day after the close on Veterans and the elementary schools we go and there's skits and things they get they do for our songs and stuff and high school middle school we spend the whole day in here with them talking about they will take the kids and throw we talked to one we've been doing that for five six years now know that's one of our better days that's what it really it makes this whole thing worth it they say for years I didn't want to talk about it I get people asking me questions and stuff and I you know I felt bad saying everybody just don't want to talk about it and to like on the real Ian and some of my friends but that's still it affected me the most I guess even after going on the reunions it took me another year year and a half they say I'm gonna do something and get these veterans involvement I'll and we now they're in the parade smart marks Auto Parts has cruise nights and stuff and his him and his some of his workers drive golf carts for the our older veterans so they could be in the parade the rest of us March and you know we do a lot for the town we're starting now until the very beginning putting a monument in the center of town for our veterans so it's it's changed my life when I was rated busier but yet they say other people I met either veterans or non veterans or there's some nice people out there really are the honest I wish nobody had to go through it again I used to tell everybody you know there's a worker gonna start the two presidents let them fight it up and not us but I have two sons that luckily they didn't want to go I didn't want them to go I mean I'd do anything for the country and it was four cuts just one of the things that bothered me too I'm over there fighting for yet Japanese which need to help but yet it's not doing anything for our country and at times that would bother me but and came down to what I think my kids would go with it was for this country but I'm glad they didn't have to once we get off the camera I should probably well be but yeah I I don't know I really it was an experience in a way I'm glad I went through it but in a way I wish I never set foot on it it's just something at times you got to deal with it you you did it and a lot of people don't understand why you want and I guess they have to be in the same situation but I am starting to notice more support for veterans in the military you are coming home now which we didn't have for years I helped I volunteered on the 50th anniversary of Vietnam here at the Prairie Airport and people I met there the supporting us it was fantastic I mean it's Jenna been there when these people that had nothing when they came home he should have been there for [Music] you

Channel: ccsuvhp

Views: 10,947

Rating: 4.7419353 out of 5

Keywords: Connecticut, veteran, interview, vietnam, war

Id: TigQNvdfx1A

Length: 69min 6sec (4146 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 15 2017