Milton Jones' interview for the Veterans History Project at Atlanta History Center

on camera today's October 5th 2015 my name is Joe Bruckner I'm a volunteer at the Atlanta History Center and with the asou ver HOF who is a senior archivist at the History Center and we are now at the Atlanta History Center in Atlanta Georgia we're honored to have with us today mr. Milton Jones mr. Jones is a veteran of Vietnam War served in the US Marines and he has kindly agreed to come in and talk to us about his experiences both his life experiences and his military experiences in connection with the Library of Congress veterans history project mr. Jones were really honored to have you here today and appreciate you coming in and sharing your story I appreciate the opportunity would you give us your full name and the city at state in which you live Milton Jones no middle name gustas your I live in in College Park Georgia at least my mailing address I actually I'm an unincorporated South Fulton County okay Georgia okay and where when were you born that's Augusta Georgia 1946 November 21st 1946 tell us a little bit about your upbringing preacher's kid a huge family great time as a kid I kind of began to realize that we were poor by the time I started into junior high school life I never understood or knew what that meant because we were always happy we had a at the time I was coming along I'm I was the seventh of what at that point was eight children seven of my mom's plus my older brother of my dads and at that time six of us were still in the house shotgun house okay I learned many years later what shotgun house meant but nonetheless there was a front room which served as the living room and my mom and dad's bedroom and then there was the did room and there were three girls and in the one bed and three guys three boys on the other side and and I can remember in the kitchen you went out the back door to go into the kitchen and of course we had no power nor it nor electricity I I can remember maybe fourth grade ish coming home from school one day and I could see the wires coming from the power pole into the house this was like it doesn't get any better than this no more using lamps kerosene lamps to a read I was a voracious reader all along and and I really had a great childhood as IB God as I began to become a teen and really got in a high school years I kind of realized that hmm little guy bookworm preacher's kid nobody really wanted to hang out with me or whatever and so I it occurred to me that I I needed to I guess develop some Street credits and and and before very long the streets had me as opposed to me developing credits I may well have been but it was it was not good not pretty my dad and I grew apart or at least I grew away from my dad and it was kind of rough during those years thankfully who had great community support great teachers counselors are my Sunday school and church and so on the strength of these people honestly and my family somehow I ended up receiving a couple of early entrance scholarships to college because I by the end I was I wasn't even present for high school by my junior year but I I ended up receiving scholarships which to me were basically just the actual letters they were always good for a drink or two if I could sneak into a bar I had no interest in actually going to college at the time and was in no way ready of course my dad does he finally lowered the whammer's is a boy you're gonna either go to school or get out of here so I ended up at Payne College in Augusta my hometown alma mater I had a scholarship to pain which is in Augusta and I had a scholarship to a full full four-year full-tuition scholarship for Morehouse signed by dr. Mayes who was at that time president I never even responded in any event after uh ID after my first semester and early into my second semester of college I realized that although I was academically sound I no way needed to be there and I realized I was wasting a bunch of my time whole lot of other people's time and with what was going on in the rest of my life which at that point I here I was just just turning 17 and I was now an expectant dad of a 15 year old expectant mother at the time I I was really kind of in trouble with the police or at least the group I ran with were in trouble with the police and I realized later on that they were the guys were actually shielding me from they wouldn't tell me when they were really going to go and do something bad because they kind of said duck was my nickname duck kind of has a chance of getting out and they literally I mean looking back I it was just overpowering to realize that that they were kind of shepherding and protecting me from from myself if you will nonetheless this all kind of came upon me early into my second semester of college and to this day I can only say that the Lord led me directly to the Marine Corps recruiter I had no no reason and no relationship that would have indicated even a conversation with the Marine recruiter at that time my nearest brother was in the Air Force had been in the Air Force for a couple years at that time and hey I thought the world of him and my oldest brother older brother had been in the Honor Army knew no one in Marine Corps and lo and behold bang on that the Marine Corps recruiter well I learned there that you're only 17 so you're gonna have to have parental consent and I take the forms down and of course notary was a the forms have to be notarized so so notary was a kind of a foreign concept to us though either that or you come down to sign it and my mom is kind of gee you know you're so young and my dad boom I'm I'm in the Marine Corps and this was March sometime in March I guess February March in April 2nd I'm at Parris Island in boot camp and I immediately conclude that everybody down there it's got to be crazy and I'm the only sane one here so it's my mission in life is to hold on to my sanity somehow or other so now mine yeah I never traveled or anything like that you know a big trip for me was taking a school bus trip when I was in junior high down to Albany State College I was a really big trip you know otherwise only travel if you if you wanted to call it that I done was working as a driver's helper on long-haul trucks delivering cookies from the cookie flat in our community Marie's cookies was like hollering distance from our house and and the drivers would let youngsters go along as quote drivers helpers which really were you hump the cookies off the truck when I get where where we're going inside done that and by virtue of that had been through at least several towns and cities mostly around the southeast otherwise never been in any place and so for me boot camp was kind of a game it was it was you know remember Milton you got a hold on to your sanity in these guys here in the Smokey the Bear cats they are crazy as hell so he's gonna go go with the flow remember you got to get out of here still sane and after boot camp during boot camp actually I guess I'd concluded that I wanted to be a long-haul truck driver these deeper guys that I kind of knew from from Marie's cookies they were they were one of the very very few if not the only ones we knew at the time where they were actually biked over the road truck drivers that that that was a job that you didn't get back then and matter of fact in Augusta Georgia at that time a black man couldn't even get a job with the city sanitation department on a garbage truck that that was a you know because that was a fairly good paying job and it had benefits and and and and our parent says yo boy whatever you do you find yourself a good paying job with a company that's got benefits period but anyway the drivers at Murray's cookies were kind of my heroes they were they were young black men who drove these big powerful diesel trucks and Marie's at that time t-too age 63 has had a brand new fleet of white 5000 diesels and big stuff so I decided concluded that I should be a truck driver and besides you know little guy Haiti Vic truck Bo power Marine Corps had other ideas and they just about dragged me kicking and screaming off to electronics communication electronics cool out in San Diego great deal so I go from Parris Island boot camp to infantry training in in Camp Lejeune Camp Geiger North Carolina and then to San Diego and I'm at San Diego for the next year in basic electronics cool electronic telephone teletype repair school in between that and my next assignment I which was cryptography repair school back at the naval shipyards at Portsmouth Virginia but while waiting there in San Diego I ended up being one of the students if you will who helped test the syllabus for marine tactical data system which is a fire-control battlefield command information system if you will a heart battle heart or at least hardened for our battlefield use so I gotten by the time I finished school in San Diego and then another seven weeks over in in Norfolk I'm its problem it is at that time a year and a half I am into the Marine Corps between basic training infantry training technical schools etc and so I'm a year and a half into the Marine Corps and then off to Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort South Carolina 110 miles from home doesn't get much better than that it just so here I am I'm 18 at the time I'm just turning 19 as I head into Beaufort actually turning 19 San Diego was just I was great you know I've never I never been any place so so I'm out here at San Diego and it's just beautiful great great town as a matter of fact many years later I never went back to hadn't gone back to San Diego since that time so two thousand five or six it was I was taking my wife off to San he rather to Hawaii on a trip because I'd been she'd sacrificed a lot while I had been working on the road and so we were going to stop off on the west coast and wherever is gonna be the cheapest ticket which was La of course and and my daughter the younger ones is dad you've got too much of your youth tied up in San Diego y'all gotta go to San Diego and and make sure you do we she and her sister bought us tickets for Harbor tour tickets for the Midway museum you got to go back to San Diego which which was great but San Diego was great for me he's a kid 17 and 18 place like San Diego for me that's a huge city at that time and just tremendously enjoyed so San Diego Marine Corps communication electronics school battalion was in a sense kind of my college experience if you will looking back on it so I enjoyed that went over to Norfolk had my time there did the kw7 cryptography repair course over there and spent a little time at Marine Barracks funny story may not be funny but we're on the naval base the Norfolk Naval Shipyard at Portsmouth and there five of us five maybe six of us who came over from San Diego going to this naval school and you know we were by that time we considered ourselves pretty salty Marines and we were really loosey-goosey and we didn't really fully understand the the reporting structure that there's a Marine barracks on every Naval Station for the most part and we were formally assigned to the Marine Barracks but in school we didn't realize it we just saw hey we're hanging out with the Navy and they're loose and goose it so we go around the the base bowling alley Club whatever and you know we we were not properly blaust as our trousers should be or you know maybe maybe our shirts are out of pants and and there was this first sergeant marine for a sergeant there on the base we'd see him periodically and every time we'd see him just guy with just me you could is almost as though he would explode periodically come over and marine you need to square square where your uniform there whatever and we kind of laughing and go ahead and do it little did we know that we were his once we finished school so we we finish school is coming up on Thanksgiving 1965 and we now have to actually report to the Marine Barracks and he's sitting there in his office he could see us as we're coming in and the joy that was on his face the man had us on every Picayune detail that you could think of they had a they had a base housing there for four merit officers and married NCOs and and so they had trash pickup well they had a big wagon that was pulled by a big tractor he assigned us one or two of us took wax wash wax and polish tractor whilst the other three or four of us pulled the wagon around to pick up leaves one detail like that after it was kind of a lesson well earned and well learned there but we go to from there too I go I never see any of my five matter of fact I never was stationed with any of the out of the four schools fifteen week school sixteen week school seven weeks seven week never saw anyone else except one guy and he was not in my class that I later saw in Vietnam and another fellow who I just learned about recently who was not in my class but we hung out together in San Diego he played host of me when I first came into Vietnam when I was trying to work my way up to my base but never saw any of these people again and so I go to Marine Corps Air Station Buford and great I'm with Marine Air Wing at that time Marine Air Wing 31 was stationed there along with Marine Air Wing 32 each of which had three flying squadrons and at that time about four three or four of the total six flying squadrons were f-4b phantom jets probably a couple of a4 Skyhawk jet squadrons and then the other squadron was an f8 crusader squadron anyway at the time the structure was that each of the Marine air groups would have three flying squadrons and a headquarters in Maintenance Squadron and an air base squadron and I was in the air base squadron marine air base squadron 31 they no longer have that designation it's been subsumed into a different type of structure but Marine Corps by the way while I was in San Diego kind of came to a realization that she you know I I miss my dad and I realize how right he was and she so I wrote him a long letter and and we reconciled and I mean I was the one who needed the reconciliation he was right where he was and it was just and we became so very close from there so when I came home on leave from San Diego and then later on getting ready to go off to Norfolk he and my uncle John brings me to the airport in Augusta small airport and he's so proud I'm walking and I'm there in my uniform and he's he and my uncle are walking behind me behind me is any that's my boy he's been all over the country he's been studying all sorts of stuff I'm totally embarrassed that had to make you feel good though absolutely absolutely and during that leave there in 65 between San Diego and Norfolk we just became so close that from that point on every time we parted we parted literally with a kiss on the lips but I was just bowled over at at his pride in me and it is just it's just lift it to me up anyway Beaufort Marine Corps Air Station Buford and Marine Corps in general was then that's why I thought about my dad I was about to say the Marine Corps in general provided the kind of structure that I needed and I always knew in the Corps in that organization at that time in my life exactly where you fit into the scheme of things okay exactly what my role is and so as I applied that to my assignment Beaufort being part of the air base squadron part of our role was whenever and if ever we went ashore in in any sort of operation amphibious landing or otherwise as we went ashore my squadron with a variety of skills our job was to get an airbase up and operate know as quickly as possible my specific role there was to make sure that security communications were up and running as quickly as possible and at that time that meant typically telephone and teletype and cryptography so great assignment there then in Buford this reminds me by the way when I mentioned security communications I while in San Diego had to have a national agency checking order you know security clearance in order to operate in my specialty and I kind of realized at that time that oh I was advised if you will by command that I wasn't going to be able to get my security clearance and the reason was that I was listed as a card-carrying dues-paying member of a communist front organization on the Attorney General's list and I'm kind of and so turns out that that my junior high school was directly across the street from what at that time was probably the largest black church african-american church in Augusta Georgia Tabernacle Baptist this was I was at that school from 1590 60-ish through about because we did 8th 9th and 10th grade there's true say 63 early 63 mass meetings civil rights marches etcetera mitad from there well 14 year old kid you come out of class Vic sign freedom now mass meeting she walk across the street come into the church they got a registration list of people who are attendee list whatever you want to call it you sign the list that made me a a a member and somewhere in those meetings the pen got passed around and I probably took the remainder of my 50 cent or 25 cent lunch money and through in the past so that made me do spaying yeah and it turned out that the meeting was being conducted by the I forget which name it was originally and then it later got changed to I believe it was originally called the National Negro labor council that organization like so many other civil rights organizations was infiltrated by the by the FBI and whether they were or not is probably immaterial because they were posted as a communist front organization so since I'm 14 I would not have known it but for the fact that I was denied my clearance and of course I appealed if you will I guess that would be the appropriate term and lo and behold eventually my communist sympathies were waived by some general back on the East Coast I wasn't sent here at time however to to operate in the full range of my occupational specialty I really needed a top-secret crypto clearance I because you know I was apparently suspect because of my communist tendencies apparently I only got the secret crypt I didn't get the top-secret crypto thing that occurred to me though many many years later is how many other people who walked into that meeting with me and other such meetings had on their record some place for other yeah something like that and so they are going through life and they apply for this educational program or apply for this job or whatever and are turned down or and they have no idea of why exactly and they've got this quote black mark on their record that that that they are totally unaware but that that came about while I was in in San Diego senator was an exciting place I also applied for an enlisted appointment to the Naval Academy while I was out there and of course you you have to go through review boards and I did the review boards in my organization and then all the way up to I forget what is the Naval District on the west coast southern West Coast probably the 11th but in any case I went through review boards all the way up to the naval district level and came through all of them with flying colors lo and behold there and very fine print in the Naval Blue Book of Medicine in surgery one of the many among the many reasons one could be disqualified from a an officer appointment was a disorder which I'd had at eleven called nephritis it's an inflammation of the kidneys and I had this thing when I was 11 years old and it kept me out of school for about six weeks I had to have an itinerant teacher never any recurrences ever and at that point or or since but of course there's this little fine print and my view was that a it just wasn't time in their minds for young black guy from Augusta Georgia to be at Annapolis yeah that would have been 1965 also so I I trudged on and did what I do he's just gonna roll with it and in depth on his point hmm Vietnam was getting more active every year we were sending more trees yes Vietnam got active early that year the first organized units were sent over and they were Marines out of Camp Pendleton and they staged I forget which regiment and I'll get to the regiment wrong but they staged out of several areas in Southern California some states on Long Beach some staged out of Camp Pendleton directly Oceanside and in San Diego and this started in about early spring of or maybe even late winter of 1965 early part of the year and so I'm in San Diego at that time I'm I'm if you remember the Gomer Pyle TV show my barracks is is literally the entrance to the left of the flagpole on that big parade deck that they showed at the opening in the closing of the door yes and that Farex there and so so lots of things would happen out on that huge parade deck troops coming and going would would come through there who weren't based in San Diego but just happen to use that facility and so we we kind of noticed that things were picking up and and troops were going over to Vietnam and I'm kind of saying mmm that's not some place that I really want to go so maybe I want to start trying to see if I can work my way back east and maybe just kind of get away from it yeah and so and that's partially why I was so long there in Sandy I had it up quite a few weeks if not a month or two over between my last class and the time I went over to add several months as a matter of fact and time I went back caught my class on the East Coast and so now I'm back east I'm in Beaufort I'm a hundred and ten miles from home I'm in this fascinating world of air power and understanding how marine air-ground Task Force teams work together during that year I went afloat as part of Marine Expeditionary Brigade that that was operated we operated in the Atlantic and the Caribbean area and back then the the island of Vieques Puerto Rico was still open and being used as a live firing range they they shut it down no just within the last 10 years or so I didn't know it at the time when people actually lived on the Garneau they had big signs up to us reservation you know danger do not enter but there were people living in other areas on the island a brigade we were doing joint exercises and it's just go down and just literally blow the island away just what what you did at the time and being I was on board the pocono USS Pocono which was the command ship AGC 16 was with the command ship for that particular Amphibious Ready Group as we went down there and this is just exciting we had it at while we're at Beaufort for operational readiness we kept a detachment down at what was then the Naval Air Station Roosevelt Road for Rico so with periodic glad to go down there too yes so Alberto Rico yeah Hank bad when we went up when we went a float with the expeditionary before with the expeditionary brigade after we finished the exercises well then we took Liberty so we ended up in Aruba Netherlands Antilles we ended up in Jamaica and in st. Thomas Virgin Islands and some good travel great travel I'm 19 years old I guess yeah just turned 19 and and I'm a professional and experienced professional in my in my field I I know what I'm doing I and I've got a broad array of skills it's just this is great life is good and so somewhere along the way that summer life is good and I I get these orders do the orders basically read they all kind of said about the same thing I report to the officer in charge Fleet Marine Forces Westpac western Pacific so we get orders to Westpac injures oh damn yes yes so actually I had a report to Camp Pendleton to to to get ready and to do some pre deployment training at Camp Pendleton and so when did you take off and for your deployment in Vietnam we left on board and OH rust-bucket named the general Leroy al tinge was the name of the ship and I think it was probably one of the world war two Liberty ships that was that was really purpose and the Merchant Marines were operating the darn thing and so we took off I wanted to think it was in November my records now say it was December of of 1966 okay I we arrived on Okinawa I dunno on like Christmas Eve of 66 now I'm in Buford by way while I'm in boot camp I started writing the lady who is now my bride of 47 years now we we've known each other since we were three and two respectively and and we grew up in the same community same sunny school in church and then they moved when I was about 12 and she must have been 11 at the time and so we saw each other maybe once a year she'd come home to visit relatives and let's see her like at the holiday time and that's it so last time I'd seen her was 1960 three holiday season so now I go in the Marine Corps in yeah boot camp you need to hear from somebody I'm writing letters I'm write letters she's by then probably a junior or senior in high school she could care less she's out doing whatever young ladies do when they're in high school and and so eventually I write her like eight or ten or twelve page epistle and include in it a stamped self-addressed return envelope and and she finally answers so we strike up a relationship through the mails actually all the time I'm in boot camp in South Carolina and then North Carolina and then San Diego and then Norfolk and now back in South Carolina at Marine Corps Air Station Buford so we're over a couple of years we were now in 1966 and I go down to Miami and visit her if they live in Miami Miami and visit her a couple times and and we becomes we became serious through them through the mails and and I guess technically we got engaged through the mails when I sent her a couple of couple of friendship rings so I said our friendship ring and a birthstone yeah birthstone ring and I let the jewelry salesman know I saw me coming today hey Marie he says he sells me a ring and I say well you know I like this friendship ring but her birthday's in December also tell you what you send her both of them and don't send you back the one that she doesn't this is meantime I will I won't send you a bill and Josie Cynthia of course I'm not too Swift with women I send her both of them she can't in any case we we've been we've been communicating and so I go down that year to visit her a couple of times and I'm I'm sure I even got picture I brought with me a copy of it with me we went out her her parents treated us to a night out on the time town cuz hey I'm I'm a marine I got no money but we went out and I had my my uniform on which which at that time bought some respect and so I go and visit her I get more orders October to Westpac of 66 and I know I'm going to Vietnam so I go to Miami to visit her and during which time her baby sister is born but I go visit her and and we talk about marriage etc we couldn't make it happen but we actually did go and we exchanged bands and so I come back to home Augusta visit my parents because quite frankly I have no no desire at all to go to Vietnam but hey I'm a Marine I do what the Big Green Machine wants me to do so I go out Camp Pendleton and we train out there for several weeks we board the ship either late November or early December we're at sea for roughly a month and I show up on Okinawa just at Christmastime and Okinawa was great as I look back though most things are great for me oh I don't remember but I'm on Okinawa and I'm at Camp Hansen on Okinawa and I'm with an organization called provisional service battalion now the way I get there I'm on ship and it's an old clunker and we're out there doing nothing and I realized and I'm kind of saying to myself and to others because I met my classmate my junior high and high school classmate on the ship neither one of us having known the other was in the Corps and we'd both been in the Corps for a couple years at the time and bumped into him on ships saw him then never saw him again until after we were both out had a reunion with him and some other friends at home in Augusta earlier this summer anyway so I'm telling him and other people man I I got to figure out a way to get off this ship before he gets to Vietnam I mean I'm just being candid I really did not want to go to Vietnam and so I I met this captain I think the guy was in a card game but I heard him talking with somebody else about it he knew somebody who was in this outfit on Okinawa and he was going there so I'm be good to know and turned out he was the brig warden while we were on ship and I guess that was just some temporary duty he was assigned we had a dozen or so troops who were over the hill or whatever as the ship was sailing or maybe fighting the night before shore Patrol picks them up they dumped him into the Brig so I go to work for this I kind of chat with him and ask him about the prisoners oh you know they're just they're just you know over the hill or either fighting they're just in the can until we get where we're going and and I said what did I do he says well you know I take them out for PT maybe it's on work detail hmm you need some help so I ended up going to work for him as the is the assistant brig ward and so I marched these guys out to work details and that kind of a thing which is good because we were starving on the ship and and periodically we got to clean the Ruess mess they were eating like kings roast whatever anyway I got close to him and I learned about this organization now I don't I may have ended up there naturally anyway but this this provisional service battalion on Okinawa and I go there and turns out the organization was we were part of in a large organization called the ninth marine amphibious Brigade the ninth map as it was called who was responsible for all of the troops marine assets in the western Pacific that were not in the country of Vietnam and then of course all of the troops that were in country then they reported to the three math as it was called the third marine amphibious force that was in country part of the responsibility of the of the ninth marine amphibious Brigade was to provide outfit the the landing forces battalions which were the 26 Marines that I ultimately ended up with but I didn't didn't know that at the time they operated out of Camp Schwab on Okinawa and our our outfit provisional service battalion provided material equipment maintenance support for and other types of support for these floating battalions which were called special landing forces and they go out on seventh Fleet missions and they would actually land them in Vietnam and they may be ashore a day or weeks or more so once they went ashore basically they just got kind of chopped up chewed up and and and eventually what was left of them were pullout Ghana R&R and and and then their terms would be up or their tours I should say would be up meantime they're outfitting a replacement set of battalions there were two of these reinforced battalions are special and enforce a and special line and force B so they would both be with different Amphibious Ready Group sout in the with the seventh fleet anyway our job was to continually for the next set that we're going to go afloat and they kind of collectively call these regimental landing team 26 our LT 26 so we were constantly outfitting the next group to go go ashore and if need be repairing and replacing and refurbishing some of the equipment that might have been salvaged from the last group that that went in and so there was a lot of work but it was it was great work it was meaningful work and and Okinawa just was just a great time great time for partying a great time for work great time for extra assignments and just just just - I could've stayed there but I eventually went to Vietnam from there yes yes talk about that when you found out you were going and count your feelings more and then yeah I'm did once you got there yeah I was doing a great job on Okinawa and I guess that's probably when I first kind of understood what later became the term workaholism I I just worked I found stuff to do I did my regular assignment I took a job extra job a couple days a week nights a week working in the enlisted club that was fondly referred to as the animal pit because 95% of all Marines going to and coming from Vietnam stopped off at a transient area right adjacent to the animal pit do we close that thing up just about every other night with the young this is old Oh western-style brawl going on in there so I'm working at the animal pit part-time I take on extra assignments as training in self which was really out of my bailiwick and I get some special recognition for that I I take on a volunteer thing as a scorer for the inner Service baseball league on okay now I'm just I'm in my zone and I'm doing stuff great I ended up going to I got finally got promoted to corporal because I was still a lance corporal III had not made any rank back stateside and so I finally made corporal and I go to NCO school amidst all of this it's an inner service school with Army Air Force and Marines in it and I end up coming out first in the class plus I done all this these other extra duty things and had been recognized for it and so I end up being awarded a meritorious mast and then subsequently a meritorious promotion to sergeant with only three months time in greatest corporal and so I'm just jubilant but I didn't realize that along with that promotion came a came a JIT for Vietnam oh damn G so okay I gotta go yeah I went I bought a Continental Airlines charter I'm probably one of if not the only one of very few people on the plane I mean it's got flight attendants the whole kit and caboodle I'm one of the few people on the plane who are sitting there with full gear on you flight jacket got my helmet under my seat the whole I got everything except a weapon and people are kind of looking at I'm uh I'm just sitting there I'm dumb and dumb actually I'm I'm I don't want to go over here but here I am and so we land in Da Nang and actually probably within hours after we land there's a little incoming in to the airfield not much but enough to cause people to go diving into bunkers and things I felt pretty good about my stuff I had online yeah exactly so I report in I meant denying and I find now as I talk with people at reunion recently this is typical and I think it was it was probably one of the terrible things about the whole Vietnam experience is that people went in went to war individually not as a unit and so I come in I report to the marine NCO whoever there and guy looks at my orders are you have your case on so where's that he's about as far north as you want to go so how you get there probably get a rough rider' ding-ding-ding-ding me is Rough Rider I'm not too Swift but I know that I don't want to be on a convoy going someplace way up into Indian country as it was called and so I'm thinking and trying to figure out okay I know I don't wanna get on a Rough Rider and so you're kind of left to your own devices to get to your unit you got to find them and get to them so I'm I'm kind of bumping around asking people here where are you where are you where are you headed I'm headed back to the world I'm getting out of here you know where are you going I'm wonderfu by I finally talked to a guy and and he says I'm going to full bite but I know some people up there there's a chopper goes through to uh Khe Sanh from there except for Phu Bai so sure enough I get on a chopper with him and we get to Phu Bai when I which is right outside the old imperial capital of way and we get the phu by and along the whole here's my neighbor next door neighbor who I knew from letters home that he joined the Corps didn't know anything else about him apparently several of several being as many as half dozen guys from my community join the core after I joined the core and so here's Richard Richard Jordan he's there and and and here's John Kelly who's who I met and we spent a lot of time together in San Diego while we're in tech school there he was a he was a radio technician and I was teletype and telephone and crypto they basically hosted me I think they're living like kings in info by anyway I stay there for several days and you know they take good care of me you know make sure I know where the good Chow is and whatever and I then manage to board a chopper into Dong Ha on the way to Khe Sanh and so eventually I could go to town car and then work my way over the caisson and I get the caisson and you know things are kind of quiet at the time I knew about what is now called the First Battle of Khe Sanh also called the hill fights Hill a 881 South in North Hill 861 951 all of these were hills and Hill 10:15 although they weren't much happening there all of these were hills that I'd seen we'd seen coming over the wire as we were back on Okinawa that this was all hot I'd never realized until I got the caisson that these hills really were here's caisson about 700 and however many meters and then these hills were all here's Hills a higher altitude surrounding caisson and and so now I'm kind of putting two and two together gee it was bad up there the last several months it's quiet now quieter I should say and it kind of stayed quieter while I was there now according to my fitness reports I did a marvelous job of keeping equipment running I essentially was the electronics maintenance chief in my role there so you were in charge of maintenance and repair of the electronic equipment yes that's been specifically communication oriented electronic equipment and related test equipment and and there were other technicians there you know some working on radio some working on other devices but apparently and I say apparently because I honestly have no real knowledge of this apparently I was the and I and I recall that I thought I was the the electronics maintenance chief or NCO in charge and my fitness reports that I got this year kind of confirms that write-up of my professionalism and keeping the equipment running and keeping message traffic open in in case on an in spite of the conditions there the lack of available parts and support etc etc and so I worked I our equipment thank God was in a bunker or our workbench area and as I recall it we were right at the command center the combat operations center and that we were right across a what I will call a generously a parade ground between there in the chow hall and then the air strip was out the on and and of the few memories I have are the Seabees out always maintaining or repairing because the F strip would get blown up and they're out there these guys I mean they're being shot at is they are out there relaying the airstrip all the time just just a constant thing I I do recall the airstrip was close used at some point while we were there the rats horrible and big you know like wharf rat sighs guys I mean he's these rats you stamp your foot on he's one piece of me it was that type of thing and actually we would shoot rats but the brew tribes him in the mountain yard people oh sure they would actually use their crossbows which was their standard arms and they would shoot the rat with an arrow and take that guy home oh I remember the brew as as we call them mountain yards variously just a really really both simple and almost pure yeah people very very nice people to be around and and you just automatically had a sense of loyalty they periodically some worked on the base others would come in with with because they were there were any number of what you want to call them dog types of units operating out of case on and and and you know they kind of kind of the weird guys the spooks etc and and most of these units had indigenous people working with them because they did you know they disappear off someplace rather for X number of weeks days weeks and nobody knew where they exactly yeah they were they were gone over and Elias had gone up into North Vietnam or wherever but and and and the brew they were Hey we kind of live here but you got the sense that they really didn't consider themselves Vietnamese or anybody they considered themselves modern yards you know we just happened to be typically friends of the Americans yes they were they absolutely were they absolutely were so I remember that I I should remember and people tell me about it and I see the names I should remember in October when c-130 crashed and burned I've got the names from the wall of probably five of those crewmen died there only one say of six crewmen survived and that was the the captain the commander of the craft because Khe Sanh was a major resupply issue even when I was there the the the road was cut shortly after I got there the the highway where convoys would have come in the the North Vietnamese had basically taken over and cut that road so he couldn't come in anymore through so all of the supply and evac was done through air and I can remember them trying various that I guess they were testing I I remember I first was introduced or at least became aware of low altitude parachute ejection where they come across the runway you know that high and basically use a chute to jerk the cargo out while the plane never stopped and kept going I remember Thanksgiving of 67 which was just a couple days or so after my birthday I had my 21st birthday there in Khe Sanh I don't remember that but I remember Thanksgiving we had we had fresh eggs like that morning and we had we had real real turkey in the chow hall and I understand the chow hall got laid on completely blown away but we had real we had real food and all of this through air drops and and it was amazing stuff I remember Colonel and Lounge David lounge who was our he was our commander he's also he was a cowboy he was a John Wayne with a big red mustache you know all over the place just the guy was hey you know it's Joey I'm just going out there and doing whatever and so I remember him I remember nothing of my shop I can I can see a workbench and and some maybe test equipment and a few people with with no faces I have no idea who I worked with I've now learned from my records that my communications officer was a major John I believe it is Shepherd I'm sure I had another senior NCO there no idea who here he would have been and other texts and other communications people in the area I do remember communications traffic regarding the build-up of enemy troops around the base I remember that I remember communications traffic about sense source which I've later learned or what they were calling the McNamara line but I didn't know that term at the time but I was aware of of traffic about sin swords that have been placed in because we're we're way up in what was then South Vietnam kind of near enough Laos that you could see there and just short hopped from the Demilitarized Zone so these sensors were placed right throughout the Demilitarized Zone with the intent of being able to detect movement of substantial movements of troops course I also remember on more than one occasion and apparently some rock apes were who were words not only setting off this sense is there but but it started up quite a few skirmishes around our perimeter they they throw things and or they are out walking around cuz you know you got you got troops there you got Americans who tend to be kind of messy with their garbage and and hey it's good eating around here for the for the rock ape so they come up and started start start a small battle there but but I I just don't remember any specifics I was reading just last night about the the one c-130 and I was surely there October the 15th and I I was in eyesight both my hoots where I slept and my shop where I worked and the chow hall which was there at the time all over within eyesight line of sight of the airstrip and I have no memory of that if you ever either figured out yourself or have somebody tell you why you don't remember some of that no no on the letter I kind of think I figured it out my myself or at least time this is my theory is that I'm i compartmentalize pretty effectively and and you know if if we had to go do something else right now you know I could kind of put this into suspended mode while we went off and did the other and I think personally that that was something that maybe I wasn't prepared to deal with and and and I put it in a compartment but I think the compartment became sealed so to speak once I got home I mentioned earlier that once I left caisson eventually made it back here first thing happened after the trans-pacific flight I land we land several of us again traveling individually I don't know these guys several of us get off the plane again another Continental Airlines charter with flight attendants the whole kit and caboodle we land at Travis Air Force Base we get off the plane we're so thankful to be back in the world the good old US of A we get off the plane we kiss the runway kneel on KISS runway I'm home I'm back in the world everything's gonna be great a few hours later after processing out we walk off the base along comes a hippie bus they throw crap feces whatever else out on us call us all sorts of names and it's like how can I hit this experience into into the feelings that I was just expressing and I couldn't and and as we traveled as I travel because after after after that point I was with two three other Marines who we were trying to find a pay match to get some money because we partied on Okinawa and so we were broke and naturally and so we make it over to trade I'll in the Naval Station at the time and get some pay and then on my mom so I'm headed home and I realized that you know maybe something's wrong with me because if I'm in an airport and I said on the bench you know all of a sudden people just kind of got up and vanished and so I get back I've got two and a half months three months actually roughly left in the core and I'm reporting back into my old unit at Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort Marine Air Base squadron 31 and I've got leaves so I come home and we immediately marry within a week after I returned home few days later here's caisson emblazoned on the front pages on the six o'clock news in magazines Time magazine Trevor and this is to the question of you know the compartmentalization and also to feelings in general I'm looking at this stuff and my first I guess impulses man thank god I'm out of there I'm back in the world I'm not dealing with that and and so then kind of the next thought was I wonder if anybody heard me thinking that because I'm supposed to be back there with the troops with my brothers and you know did anybody does anybody know how I'm feeling about getting out of there and and and and what I currently thought that they would think of me if they knew I was kind of rejoicing about being out of there and this thing was just constantly in the news meantime I'm trying to I'm trying to get situated for a civilian career no I'm career wasn't even a thought a job you know a civilian job while I was at Khe Sanh I came across an old magazine evany magazine that happened to have a one of these little coupon ad recruiting at people with whatever skills electronic maintenance skills you complete this and I sent the thing back in to IVM turned out it was IBM Atlanta and literally I got a response from them while I was a caisson and we found the letter I don't know 15 20 years ago and I kept it and I kept the letter it was folded up in my pocket got case on the spots of caisson mud on it you know red mud but I kept that letter you know I'm thinking this is my ticket when I get back and sure enough this was would have been say octobrush of 67 when I communicated with them September October they answered in October if I'm not mistaken actually the letter dates like two three days before this c-130 crash that I talked about where the crew was killed I have no memory they c-130 crash I do have and I have the letter as evidence of the memory of the of communicating with IBM so I'm trying to I guess rationalize what the heck is happening here because I've been essentially out of the primary society during a period of its biggest change if you will and out of the country 1965 Voting Rights Act all of this so I'm trying to fit all of this into my head meantime here's this never-ending barrage of information about case on case on the marine and and and I don't remember it at this point but I I read I have an old time magazine from 1919 sixty eight so I'm a month home at the time and even the magazine article talks about how they continue to show the flaming crashed yeah c-130 aircraft out there and it wasn't only one for several crashed and burned out there I they Glee remember the carcass of an aircraft out there but I don't remember the so I think to the question of of why I think that was kind of a self-preservation and get this thing locked off someplace rather so that so that I could operate so I mean time I'm this is first quarter of 68 I'm trying to prepare myself for a to get this job and my bride she had no clue whether or not I was just to be the provider that that I needed to be I think I think she just uh she just believed in me but thankfully I went ahead in contact that I contacted IBM and she and I drove to Atlanta because there was little and no and Augusta was too small to have any significant resources there and but at Khe Sahn the I guess the biggest thing for me was maybe this didn't happen maybe whatever I do remember multiple occasions of making it to a bunker during relatively infrequent incoming we would take in rockets a little mortar little artillery here and there while I was there now as soon as I left I mean they were sustaining incoming at the radar like thousand fifteen hundred rounds a day coming into the base and so I'm reading this and I'm seeing this and and and it it was I think it was just more than it was an overload psychologically and I just kind of pushed it off and so I got back here I didn't really with the experiences that I was having and realizing that that that it was not invoked to be even associated with the military and the thought of being in Vietnam you definitely didn't want anybody to know that so I think that also kind of contributed too much to this thing being kind of locked away or at least no memories because because I haven't I have no real memories there then once you got back you settle down and started working on soon yeah yeah it's interesting I got that letter from from IBM and I was holding onto that thing like this is this is my ticket and so I I come back we're living in Augusta which is hometown for me I'm stationed at Beaufort South Carolina 110 miles away so I take a couple days off and we drive over to Atlanta and I come in to the IBM office now money I don't have a I I don't make an appointment until I get here so we come into the IBM office and I have my uniform on and I come into the office and I ask for the same open I called in asked for the gentleman who had offered the letter to me and of course he be shunted me off to to the appropriate person and so I asked for for this fella mr. Lovett they'll love it and he wasn't around probably so I kind of stood around and in those days 68 most offices kind of had a kind of a glass front area you know had a kind of a big imposing reception desk where the receptionists and kind of look over at you had a door to the back office that was also glass so you got this vietnam guy out here in the lobby so all right it's just tell me you know well we're gonna see if we can't get an appointment for you and if you'd like to call back says no you understand honey I need to see somebody so one guy comes out he actually takes me back and interviews me and he he's got favorable words good good to have you here good interview I'm sure you know we'll we'll be in touch you know and Pat me on the back end ain't going anywhere yeah I mean I'm spit-shined I got my barracks barracks had on that boys shine and gleaming shoes I'm squared away yeah and so he goes off into the back I'm still around I can see people kind of come into that kind of looking out the witnesses is a crazy guy still up there yeah so a guy comes back out again I have a couple of interviews finally I tell him says you don't understand I need to know if I got the job he says oh this is highly unusual ie our practice is to let you know by letter what our next steps are do you understand I'm getting out of the Corps in a month or two I I got a brand new life I need to know everybody gets a job he vanishes off again you know in meantime I think this is becoming kind of a soap opera in the back because other people are coming along so he finally comes back and this is highly irregular I'm not authorized to tell you what the salary might be but I can say that you will be getting an offer I didn't hear anything else doesn't matter if I mean what the salary is I don't have an appreciation for civilian money anyway boom go out of there sure enough the next week or highroad long I get a letter from IBM with an offer to go to work literally to start I'm getting out on April Fool's Day of 68 and they want me to start up April 2nd and so I call him and ask for a little bit of time to get moved and so I I started on April 8th and actually going to IBM essentially I traded my Marine Corps uniform for an IBM dark suit with white shirt you can wear any color shirt you want it to as long as his wife and drab tie and I traded my Marine Corps uniform for the IBM uniform and I traded my hard metal ring core toolkit for a nice disguised like a briefcase IBM to get and I came to an organization IBM of the 60s which was very regimented very hierarchical in its organizational structure I knew exactly where I fit in the organization what my role is what my contributions could be etc had a great time with IBM State they're 30 and you were used to a structure or the Marines and you just go to another screaming it was it was like pea in a pod I would just boom a natural fit for me with IBM and I stayed there 33 years actually a couple months shy of 33 years and I retired there about 15 years ago yeah well that's a credit to you for your persistence I mean a lot of people who just walked out of that office waited for a call hey I had a new bride that makes you persistent yeah tell us a little bit before we finish about your family wonderful family wonderful support structure my immediate family my wife and our two daughters and I mentioned my daughter Norma my older daughter Barbara my wife we go back to three and two years Oh respectively we have Monica and Marsha our two daughters they're both young professional women doing their thing the odor has been in the law firm marketing business she works for for a major law firm and has been at with law firms for many years and the younger is as is a counselor who happens to now be for the last several years probably five years ago doing working as a contract family military family life consultant so she's been working with the various military you it's on the stress both the service member and their family so so she kind of we were always kind of always felt she's she's looking into my mind from the beginning so she kind of helps to manage me but she's uh kind of an aside her first couple of years doing this she'd do an assignment a few months and then she'd be off doing her regular practice and then she'd go back and do she was working with the army and then she's working with the Air Force and she did several you know four or five of these rotations I'm kind of sitting back there saying to myself she you know I know that's her business but sure would be nice if she really had a stint with Marine Corps cuz that way she'd see how it's really done so sure enough she's now probably in her third year or a third cycle anyway of working with marine corps so she she works and right right now with Marine Corps Recruiting stationed right Atlanta and I think she's hooked like the world are you well they're blessing to me we have wonderful friends a wonderful family as far as my siblings and and they're still eight of us left alive and you're a lucky man yeah yeah and so they're plenty of of subsequent generations Norma has my three grandson our other girls have you know have no children yeah that's wonderful I want to ask sue before we get much further if you have any questions that you'd like to ask and one thing what we want to do also before we finish is give you a chance to say anything you want to say over and above what you said you don't have to but if there's something you want to get all the record just something you left out or the best as you want to give just feel free to do it well I would just kind of and I've alluded to it along the way my experience as a veteran if you will having immediately upon my return and then actually getting out of the Corps I spent years and I think I mentioned to you I never would I wouldn't have been caught yeah with anything like this I got rid of everything that I had that was military related I think I got one Field Jacket that that that all of the old uniforms anything and it was like you know travel incognito don't let anybody know yeah not that they wouldn't have known anyway but I hid the fact that that I was a veteran and it was that way for years i after i got out i then started in school at night at georgia state and and i I just kind of didn't didn't get too close to anybody because of the atmosphere toward military and I went that way until the mid 80s so I'm talking over 15 years and I'm reading an article about the moving wall that men this was the Vietnam Memorial I guess had just been introduced at the time and I'm reading an article about a moving version miniature version in Atlanta and I was compelled to pick up the phone call home and and told Barbara that gee let's let's keep the girls out of school whatever day this thing is here I want to go and it was when I went down there and it was it was the dirt park of whatever the thing is right now at Five Points in Atlanta I went down and and it was like boom a an awakening whatever and makhotin moment even for our girls that Monica when she went off to college she said her birthday a birthday gift to me from her was a a print it's a pretty popular and common print but it's a print of a businessman standing at the wall with his briefcase down and he's standing with his hand against the wall and they are comrades if you will fallen comrades trying to reach from within the wall and so she must have been middle-school age when this when this experience at the moving wall happened so it had have been impactful for her but for me it was it was just like things just open up I just I mean I thousand tears and even then though I never was really I hadn't reached the point where I wanted to talk about the military or and certainly not publicly acknowledged that I had something to do with the military and so probably at about the time I'm retiring from IBM which would have been 2000 2001 it was actually January 2001 I retired I begin to within that this last 15-year period have more and more interest in and so now I've been trying to put together you know Mike's free and it's been very cathartic for me to try and rebuild my especially my time on Okinawa and on Vietnam in Vietnam yeah well you've got an amazing story and you're an amazing person them and you growing up you didn't have the opportunities that some people had back then but you made your opportunities both with the trucking company when you're unloading it when you were a teenager you had the way up to hanging around the office at IBM and you served at one of the more dangerous theatres of Vietnam during a dangerous period and your family obviously loves you and respects you for a lot of reasons and we want to thank you for doing this and and particularly thank you for your services oh thank you thank you for the opportunity thank you for your service and for coming

Channel: Atlanta History Center

Views: 19,356

Rating: 4.9200001 out of 5

Keywords: Veteran (Profession), Atlanta History Center (Museum), Library of Congress Veterans History Project

Id: nhKXXucHjpw

Length: 90min 34sec (5434 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 19 2018