The Vietnam War Sniper Known as White Feather

a quick note before i get started a commenter to one of my earlier videos suggested the subject of this video i wasn't familiar with carlos hathcock prior to some research but decided this would be an interesting subject i welcome suggestions for video subjects i won't be able to do everyone suggested but i'll consider them all now on to the story carlos norman hathcock ii was born may 20th 1942 he was born in little rock arkansas and grew up in wynn arkansas living with his grandmother after the breakup of his parents while visiting with relatives in mississippi he learned to shoot and hunt those skills came in handy in helping feed his poor family at an early age he hunted with a 22 caliber j.c higgins single shot rifle hunting with a single shot meant you needed to be a good shot because you were likely to get no more than one shot at your quarry as a child carlos dreamed of being a marine and at age 17 in 1959 he realized his dream and joined the u.s marine corps prior to deploying to vietnam in 1966 hathcock won the wimbledon cup at camp perry the most prestigious prize for long-range shooting when he first deployed to vietnam carlos was a military policeman but his sharpshooting skills were noticed by an upper echelon officer and he was transferred into a sniper position by the marine brass his skills as a sniper soon became known to the enemy he always had a white feather stuck in the band of the bush head he wore and the vietnamese nicknamed him white feather sniper he became so famous and troublesome to the enemy that they put a thirty thousand dollar bounty on him two hundred fifty thousand dollars in today's money that was the largest bounty ever put on a u.s soldier in vietnam he killed every enemy sniper who tried to collect it one would think that hathcock used some special sniper rifle designed specifically for use by military snipers but that was not the case most of the time he used a rifle commonly used by civilian hunters a winchester model 70 in 30 out 6 caliber and standard 8 power unital scope he did modify a browning m2 machine gun by mounting an eight power unit scope on it and occasionally used that weapon during his missions he also carried a colt m1911a1 sidearm he completed several famous missions including the shooting of an enemy sniper code named the cobra who had already killed several marines and was believed to have been sent specifically to eliminate white feather the two faced off and hathcock saw a glimpse of light reflecting off the enemy's scope he took aim and shot the reflecting light when he and his spotter went to examine the outcome of the shot they found that the round had gone through his adversary scope and into his eye for an instant kill he retrieved the dead sniper's rifle and intended to take it home as a keepsake but the weapon was stolen from the armory that was charged with keeping possession of the firearm another famous enemy combatant that he dispatched was a viet cong female platoon leader code named the apache woman she was famous for brutally torturing captured american soldiers within earshot of other americans so they could hear the screams of pain and suffering of her captives he set the record for the longest recorded sniper kill in 1967 when he used his browning machine gun to kill a vietcong gorilla at 2500 yards the record stayed intact until it was broken by a canadian sniper in afghanistan whitefeather's most famous mission occurred days before the end of his first deployment he was not told of the details and purpose of the mission until after he volunteered to carry it out his mission was to stalk and kill a vietnamese general over a four day and three night period he very slowly crawled over fifteen hundred yards to get into position to make the shot during the meticulous journey disaster almost occurred on two different occasions in one instance an extremely venomous bamboo viper crawled over hathcock's prone body had he not remained completely motionless and alerted the snake of his presence the result could have been disastrous on another occasion shortly after nightfall a patrol of vietnamese soldiers passed by extremely close to his position a couple of times he was almost stepped on but because of his nerves of steel and meticulous camouflage techniques he remained undetected when he got within 700 yards of the enemy encampment the intended target eventually showed himself and with one shot from his winchester rifle he dispatched his target the remaining enemy soldiers turned and ran for the tree line instead of charging in his direction and whitefeather was able to escape undetected carlos returned to the u.s shortly after that mission in 1967 however he missed the combat duty and voluntarily returned to vietnam in 1969 his career as a sniper ended on september 16 1969 when the lvt-5 armored vehicle in which he was riding hit a landmine he escaped out of the fiery crash and although severely burned over a large portion of his body he returned to the burning vehicle and helped pull seven other engine marines away from a potentially deadly explosion carlos was evacuated to a military hospital ship and eventually to a burn hospital unit stateside for treatment of third degree burns on much of his body he was awarded a purple heart and silver star for his heroism in the event after vietnam he remained in the marines and was active in helping establish a sniper school at the quantico marine base in virginia he was in constant pain from his injuries but continued in the marines dedicating himself to sniper training in 1975 he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis but continued his enlistment for a couple more years until he was forced into retirement 55 days before completing his 20-year enlistment he died in 1999 at age 56 from complications of his wounds and multiple sclerosis carlos remains a legend in the marines several awards have been named in his honor and awarded annually to deserving marines a sniper range is named for him at camp lejeune north carolina springfield armory developed a highly accurized version of their m1a super match rifle and named it the m25 white feather his signature and white feather logo are embossed on the receiver turner sadlery also honored carlos by producing a line of leather rifle slings with his name on them in 2007 the rifle and pistol complex at marine corps air station miramar was renamed the carlos hathcock range complex the white feathers career statistics include 93 confirmed kills but the total is considerably more than that probably 300 to 400 total in vietnam for a kill to be confirmed a spotter and officer had to be present to verify the kill thus the large discrepancy between confirmed and actual kills if you enjoyed this video give a thumbs up make a comment and most importantly subscribe to the channel as always thanks for watching

Channel: History & More

Views: 889,282

Rating: 4.9063325 out of 5

Keywords: carlos hathcock, vietnam, vietnam war, sniper, white feather

Id: V4N60pzainY

Length: 10min 31sec (631 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 04 2021