River Assault Division One. He was pretty badly wounded. Joe took him aboard and started bandaging him. Leroy and I decided to go in and get the others.

I awakened late and sat on the edge of the litter, feeling like crap. I had no idea what time it was. My watch was gone. It was probably lying in the road outside the army club someplace. I had more to drink that night than since I left Salt Lake City. I have no idea just how I made it back to the boat. I think I walked, but more than likely, I staggered and stumbled all the way. I had a tremendous headache, and I sat there for a while, smoking and staring off into nowhere. I looked around and the whole crew was lying about on litters and ammo boxes. Foxey was on his back snoring away, nothing unusual for him. The day seemed like a rope-yarn Sunday in boot camp. I slipped on my boots and didn't bother to lace them up, left my shirt lying on the litter, and slowly stood up to get my bearings. I scrounged through a case; the silence was broken by a voice from the rear of the well deck. "Don't take the ham and mothers!"

"What?”

"You heard me, I get all the ham and limas."

That was Leroy, a string bean of a country boy with fiery red hair and grin that went all around his face. Leroy was sitting up, looking at me with that big grin wearing his John Deer hat. I didn't want to eat ham and limas for breakfast anyhow, and if he wanted them, he was welcome to them. I told him he could have all the ham and limas I came across for the rest of my tour, Leroy sat there all squinted up at the eyes and grinning like he was in country boy heaven.

I found a box labeled meatballs and spaghetti, and I thought I'd give it a try. I shaved off some C-4 to heat it up and shaved off another chunk for some C-rats coffee. The spaghetti was filling but not very tasty. The coffee was what I really wanted. It tasted pretty good, so I made several cups more. I was out of cigarettes and had to smoke C-rats cigarettes. All you ever got in those meals was nonfiltered and menthol and they tasted and like crap. With breakfast out of the way, I was ready to find Bill and hold a sick call for the troops and get my ass chewed for yesterday.

The division was not large enough to have its own sick bay. We only had two officers and about thirty enlisted. When we were out on the ships, we used the ship's sick bay for sick call, and when in Dong Tam, we used the army dispensary next to the airstrip. Our sick call for the navy started at 1300 hours. It was getting pretty late in the morning: I had my coffee and was just about over my hangover. I met with Bill at the dispensary, and he didn't say anything about the operation, but I was sure he'd get around to it.

The army was having one of those day-after sick calls. You could always count on two big sick calls with the army. The day before an operation and the day after. There was a line of soldiers all wearing thongs on their feet with a rash on their feet and the lower half of their legs. You always see a lot of immersion foot the day after an operation. The moisture would stay in their boots and the combination of moisture, heat, humidity, and polluted water would cause the immersion foot. The line of soldiers with immersion foot stretched around the building. I decided to pitch in and help the army medics. Bill and I never had much of a sick call. Once in awhile, we would see once or two of the guys from the boats, but most of the time we would work on health records or give shots. We would pretty much handle sick call when one of the guys came up to one of us and presented himself with some type of ailment.

The army doctor had made up a solution for the treatment of immersion foot that was supposed to help dry it up. The solution was a dark brown red color. It worked quite well and usually dried up the immersion foot in about two days. So I pitched in, and one of the army medics showed me the method of application. The solution was contained in a stainless-steel bucket. The soldier would stand on a step, and at the order of the doctor, we would proceed to dip a paintbrush in the solution and paint the feet and lower legs of the patient. We were getting along quite nicely. As each soldier would walk through the door, the doctor would glance at the patient, hand us his health record, and say, "Paint it". Each soldier would take his place on the step, and we would apply the miracle cure with a paintbrush.

Of the hundred or so soldiers outside the door, one had a slightly different condition, a sore throat. Those of us in the navy, army, or any other service understand that sometimes you get in the wrong line. If you want to get what's coming to you, you got to get in the right line. You don't try to get paid in the chow line! The doctor didn't pick up on it, and I tried to call it to his attention when the soldier stopped in front of me with it clearly marked on his chart: a sore throat. The doctor was in a hurry, and we had a lot of soldiers outside the door waiting for treatment. The doctor told me not to argue and to carry out his orders, he said, "Paint it and let's get them out of here!" So I followed the orders and painted the soldier's throat with brush and bucket in hand. The soldier took his treatment and didn't think anything was amiss. Bill asked me what the hell I was doing, and I told him I was following the doctor's orders. After that incident Bill told me that he didn't want any of our guys to see the army doctor, and if they needed to see a doctor, we would send them out to the Benewah to see the navy doctor.

Bill got around to yesterday's operation and the fact that I hadn't kept records of the guys whose wounds I treated. He reminded me of the morphine sureties and the fact that I was to pin the expended secrete to the collar of the patient or at least make a notation on the field medical service card, which I didn't bother to make out on the casualties. Bill gave me a tablet and told me to at least take some notes so we could transcribe the information later in the health record. He was trying to help me to be a better corpsman and do a better job for the division. I listened to him and followed his instructions in future operations. I never argued with Bill, he was a real squared away sailor and corpsman. I learned a great deal from him. I wanted to pick up as much us I could from him and someday be as good a corpsman as he was.

The crew of Tango-3 did just about everything together. When there was a job aboard the boat to do, everybody pitched in, regardless of their rate. When the job was done. It was beer-drinking time, and we all pitched right in and took care of that, too. I guess I was sort of a novelty aboard the boat, being the only corpsman in a crew of deck rates and stripes. I knew that in order to be totally accepted by the crew, I'd have to work. Besides my medical duties in sickbay, I worked on loading ammo, painting, and general upkeep of the boat. We were usually on operations for thirty days and then on stand-down for thirty days. Stand-down was time for nest off of operations and to get your boat in shape.

At night on stand-down, the boats would go out on the main river and patrol around the bigger ships for swimmers and mines in the water. We would spend the night throwing concussion grenades in the river and shooting rats that were swimming the water. The Mekong had the biggest rats I have ever seen, about the size of a small dog. C-rats had all the things in them that rats like, like peanut butter, canned meat, canned tuna, and canned fruit. On the Mekong, I learned a lot about rats. For instance, a rat will not eat spoiled food: they like fresh food, and they perfect fruit, fish, and peanut butter. You don't bait a rat trap with cheese.

One night I was sleeping in the well deck on a litter. I was lying on my back and was awakened by the feeling of something on my back and was awakened by the feeling of something on my chest. I opened my eyes, and staring right back at me was a rat the size of a small dog. The damn thing looked me right in the face, wrinkling up his nose and sniffing. I screamed and knocked him off with my forearm at the same time. My hell, I was more afraid of that rat than I ever was on an operation.

It was no wonder that the guys were called river rats and why they began to act like rats themselves. They lived with rats and dressed ratty looking. We all wore uniforms of sorts, but everybody dressed a little differently. Some guys cut off their green utilities to make shorts. There was a wide assortment of T-shirts, hats, and footwear, all of varying colors and styles to fit the individual. Each man was an individual and, in all probability, would have been a misfit at any naval command. Admiral Zumwalt, who was the commander of Pacific Fleet U.S. Naval Forces in Vietnam, was once quoted as referring to the river division as McHale’s Navy. There was no comparison. We were a lot worse than McHale’s PT crew ever was. The river rats also were not big on bathing, unless you want to count the occasional dip in the muddy Mekong or standing out in the rain with a bar of soap, which you did with your shirt and pants on; that way they got washed too. I used to kid with the guys when they came into sick bay with a rash. I examined it and proclaimed my diagnosis of creeping crud and sent them away with a bar of soap. The river rats also liked to fight a lot, and they were not particular as to who they fought with, either among themselves, with the army, or with the fleet squids out on the ships. I think the river rats did more fighting with our own forces than with Charlie.

Whenever we got a chance, we would jump on the back of a truck in convoy to Saigon. It was a bumpy ride at fifty miles per hour through jungle and dirt roads. You did not stop for nothing; if you did, Charlie would hit you for sure. Our first stop was usually the air force enlisted men’s club. The air force knows how to go to war. They take everything they have stateside and put it in the back of a C-124 and take it with them. Their clubs were as good as any nightclub I have seen stateside. There were gold-vein mirrors on the wall, carpeting on the floors, and chandeliers on the ceilings. It wouldn’t take long, and a few rats would start talking down the fly boys and doing their boatswain’s mate routines, which included eating beer glasses, pulling down their pants and trying to light farts, and urinating in a shipmate’s to see if he would mistake it for beer and drink it. You never wanted to leave your beer glass at the table when you got up to take a piss. Except for R.D.—he would leave his glass and hope that someone piss in it so he could gross someone out when he returned, We were unacceptable guests, and the snobby bastards would ask us to leave their club, and we would leave, but not before dropping our pants and mooning them on the way out the door.

Next stop was one of the Vietnamese hotels. At the top of most of the hotels was usually a bar complete with American booze and Vietnamese girls. These were not the village type; they all dressed in those long silky dresses with slit up the leg. They spoke broken English, and most their vocabulary was what few words they picked up from their customers, the American G.I.s. But they were beautiful girls, and for about twenty dollars, one could be all yours for the night. The girls were there to make a night’s wages, and the moment you sat down, one would come over and sit next to you to buy her Saigon her ‘til the bar closed and then would discuss the business arrangement for the rest of the evening.

I sat down, and a very pretty Vietnamese girl came and sat next to me. She put her arm around my neck and put her face next to mine. I could smell her perfumed hair and feel her soft skin next to my face. I couldn’t wait ‘til closing time and wasn’t about to buy Saigon tea all night. My medical mind kept reminding me about sexually transmitted diseases, that it was my duty to lecture my shipmates on in monthly classes. My flesh was weak, and I was in love, at least for this night. I blurted out, “How much?”

“Two thousand pi,” she replied.

I didn’t haggle with her about it. She would not take the money herself; I had to give it to Mama-San who ran the bar. Mama-San explained to me that 2000pi was for all night and directed me to the room we would have. The room had two beds in it, and we used one. The girl was very professional about the whole thing, and after I had got what I had paid for, she laid beside me and tried to go to sleep. There was a knock at the door, my buddy John. John was drunk as hell and didn’t have enough money for a girl for the night. Being a good shipmate, I offered him mine; after all, I had paid for her all night. She jumped out of bed when John tried to get into bed with her, I guess she got the idea right off. She was running around the room throwing things at us and yelling at us in half-English and half-Vietnamese, kept telling us that we were number-10 G.I.s. We both thought it was funny, and I was laughing so hard, I threw myself on the floor with my gut hurting from laughing. She had no sense of humor, she ran out into the hallway naked and yelling for Mama-San. Mama-San was a fat Vietnamese woman who spoke excellent English and could put a sailor to shame with an endless chain of profanity, and she used it all on John and me that night in the hallway. I told Mama-San that I wanted my money back, and if I didn’t get it, all the river rats would leave and want their money back, too. Most had already used their girls for the night and would support me in getting their money back. Mama-San had a big heart for the rats and a keen mind for business, and she made a decision that made good business sense and good customer relations as well. She ordered the girl back into the room with the two of us. It is one thing to share you chow or your beer, but when you share your girl, now that’s a shipmate.

A big event that everybody looked forward to was R&R, or rest and relaxation. ON R&R you got five days out Nam in some really exotic places like Japan, Hawaii, the Philippines, or even Sydney, Australia. The government paid the ticket for your flight; all you had to do was get to Saigon to catch the flight, and go and enjoy. I put in my request for R&R and was given three choices. My first, second, and third choice was Sydney, Australia. The guys were coming back raving about the place and the girls. I had seen enough Oriental people, I was looking forward to seeing some round eye.

When you put in your request for R&R, there was a statement at the bottom of the form informing you that you would be required to give a urine specimen to determine if you had a sexually transmitted disease. It seemed a bit strange to me at the time, because I know from my training that a urine test is not used to diagnose a venereal disease. If you want to rule out syphilis, you do that with a blood test. Gonorrhea is ruled out with a test in which the discharge is stained for viewing under a microscope. I had done both of these tests many times in the lab.

Finally it came to me that they were testing for something else, like drugs. Drugs were available in Vietnam, mostly in Saigon on the streets. If a person was inclined to, he could buy just about any illicit drug. There were a few stories about G.I.s trying to smuggle drugs back to the United States when they were ordered home. I got to now every man in the division and lived with them from daybreak to sundown. I laughed, played, fought, ate, and slept with them in those boats. During my entire time with the rats, I never knew anyone who took illegal drugs or bought any, and I never seen any illegal drugs on the boats. I’ve seen all of these men at their best and at their worst. At their best, they were self-sacrificing, courageous men who endured tremendous hardship and fear to do their duty. At their worst, they were the misfits of the navy, most of them IBM’s, instant boatswain’s mates, by virtue of the fact that they had flunked out of a navy school for scholastic reasons or because they had screwed up somehow. Most of them were drunkards and would never miss a beer call or a night at the club in Dong Tam.

For the young men like myself, there was the fear of dying or becoming permanently disabled for the rest of your life in a misunderstood war that was thousands of miles away from everything you had come to know and love. We were all well aware that our fellow Americans were calling us drug-crazed baby killers. Students were rioting on campus. The morality of our involvement being questioned by both public and private citizens. For the older men, there was that fear, along with the loneliness and separation from wives and children. It was a shock enough for a single man to leave a country he is familiar with. Leave behind all that he learned to love about America, like Sunday football, Christmas parades, discos, cards, and American girls. The married men left homes and family behind them to go and do their duty as ordered. There used to be a standard line in the navy. It went, you didn’t get issued a wife in your sea bag. A wife signs on too for the duration, and both endure the loneliness and hardship that war brings. For the rats, alcohol was the drug of choice. Alcohol could not erase a husband’s loneliness or the jeers of the American public, but for the moment, it would help you think of other things.

I knew them all. I seen them fight over drinks, chow, women, and sometimes for no reason at all. I seen them fight in battle with courage and devotion to duty that would be equivalent to any past naval hero. I was there to see the tears of a shipmate who got a Dear John letter. I sutured their drunken lacerated heads and bandaged their wounds. Many times I knelt at the side of a shipmate, holding his head in my arms and listening to his last words as he closed his eyes for the last time and life left his body. I knew them all, and they were not drug-crazed killers, but average guys doing an extraordinary job under extreme conditions. They were rats, they were misfits, but they were glorious heroes in an inglorious time. It is a point of pride in my life to have served with those gallant men.

River divisions 111, 92, and 91 were all part of River Assault Flotilla One. Combined with the elements of the 9th Infantry Division, we were the Mobile Riverine Force. We also made several operations with the Vietnamese marines. When we loaded the Vietnamese, we had to watch our gear closely. If you left any gear adrift, you would never see it again. On the boat, I kept my cruise box locked. It contained the medical supplies that I used on the operations. The Vietnamese marines were called the Rok Dou Marines. Rok Dou means crazy water buffalo. They had their own doctor who made operations with them. He would stay aboard the boat when they hit the beach. The doctor’s name was Dr. Dat. He had several medics who worked for him and carried his medical gear.

Once on an operation, we had a soldier who was constipated from eating too many C-rats. Dr. Dat tried to give him an injection in the stomach to take care of the condition. I was responsible for all the America soldiers or sailors who got sick or injured on the boat. He could treat all the Vietnamese he wanted, but I wasn’t about to let him touch any Americans. What the guy needed was a good dump. I was prepared for this problem, it was a common complaint from the guys on the operation when all they had to eat was C-rations. From my cruise box I mixed up a black-and-white for him. That is a mixture of milk of magnesia and cascara sagrata fluid extract. The mixture works real good, and if you are impacted, you won’t be for long. I made the soldier hang his ass over the fantail of the boat and stay there ‘till he took a good dump. After about an hour, he was able to back to full duty. Bill agreed with me. He didn’t want Dr. Dat treating any Americans either. That is what we were there for.

The Rok Dous had just about as much success in locating Charlie as we did. Charlie had the advantage—he lived in the jungle and under the ground. Charlie subsisted on a handful of rice and traveled throughout the countryside on foot as light as possible. On one operation, we spent five days up one canal and down another and never did catch Charlie. After the operation was over, we came out of the canal and into the main river. I was in the well deck with the Rok Dous. Leroy was on the flight deck and yelled out to me, “Hey Doc, offer the gooks some Salems.” All the Vietnamese like Salem cigarettes. If you broke out a pack when they were around, you would have your hands full keeping them off you. There were Salem cigarettes in the C-ration meals, so I broke out a pack.

Leroy pulled a little joke on them. When they all gathered around, he poured a bucket of water down on them. The Rok Dous took this as a gesture of disrespect and not as a joke. They locked and loaded their weapons and came out of the well deck to the flight deck. There was five of them who took it serious enough to kill over. As they were grabbing their weapons, I cleared the well deck, and so did the snipes. They were mad as hell at Leroy, but I was sure they had no problem considering me as a party to the action. In a matter of moments, we were all looking down the barrels of their M-16s. This is one of those times that you wonder if you would live to see tomorrow. In combat if you get hit, you most likely would not see where it came from. This was like standing n front of a firing squad and waiting for it. Leroy and I started toward the back of the boat. Al came out of the coxswain’s flat and stood between the Rok Dous and us and ordered them back into the well deck. One of them came forward and put a rifle butt alongside Al’s head. Al was unarmed but still stood his ground. A boat cam alongside, and the Rok Dou commander cam aboard with a U.S. marine advisor. The Rok Dou commander ordered them back into the well deck, and they complied with the order.

Al got us all together and ordered us all to stay out of the well deck until we off-loaded the Rok Dous. Everybody completely forgot about Foxey. This was one of the rare times he had allowed someone else to drive the boat; he’d allowed Joe to drive the boat back to Dong Tam, and had been in the back of the well deck the whole time. Foxey had slept through the incident and all the way back to Dong Tam, as well. Once we had off-loaded the Rok Dous, Foxey woke up, yawning and scratching like an old bear coming out of hibernation in the springtime. I guess that the Rok Dous did not mess with him because he had no part in the prank.

I expected Al to get all over us for the prank when we pulled in, but he didn’t. As a matter of fact, he never said anything to us at all. I had seen Al in combat many times. Even picked shrapnel out of him while he stood there without anesthesia. Al had a lot of guts, and it took a lot of guts to stand there facing down those rifles and stand your ground when you take a rifle butt in the head. Al was a strong leadership type. He was one of those people you would follow to Hell, if he led you there. He was one of the worst on liberty and one of the best when the going got rough.

I got my R&R to Sydney in October of 1968. I had three days to get to the R&R center at Camp Alpha in Saigon. My main concern was money. I made a quick trip to the disbursing officer of River Flotilla staff and drew a thousand dollars that I had on the books. The disbursing officer gave it all to me in twenties. That was more money than I have ever had at any one time. I stuffed some uniforms in a small bag, jumped a truck to Saigon, and spent three days there waiting for a flight to Sydney. It was about a twelve-hour flight to Sydney with a stopover in Darby on the west side of the country. We touched down in Darby at about 1:00 am, and we all started changing some of our American currency to Australian currency to get a beer or two between flights. I remember standing at the bar in my whites and looking at the assortment of coins in my hand. Trying to decide what to use to get a beer. A voice came from the side of me and said, “It’s two bob for a beer, Yank.” Two bob was two dimes. I thanked the guy, and he told me that he was in the navy too, the Australian navy. He showed me his ID card. It didn’t have a picture on it, and it was handwritten. It kind of looked like a draft card you got when you registered for the draft. The guy who wrote the entries had a real shaky hand. Under the entry of rank was recorded “RSS.” Well, the R looked like an A to me. I looked at him and stated questioningly, “You’re an ass?” At that moment he yelled to everyone in the bar, “This Yank called me an ass,” and he started laughing and telling everyone he was an ass, and bought the whole bar a round of beer. Any place else you would have a fight on you hands, but not with the Aussies. The Australians were a fun-loving people who like to party and have a good time. I found the Australians had a great sense of humor, they were very gregarious, and I think that they genuinely like having the Yanks in their country.

We flew to Sydney; buses took us to the R&R center, where we arranged for our hotels and rented civilian clothing. We changed into civvies at the center, and then they turned us loose for five days. Some of the guys got offers at the R&R center to stay with Australian families, and some took them up on it. I went to a hotel to check in, but I didn’t stay there that night or any other night I was in Sydney.

After I put my bag in the room, I walked out of the hotel to take a long walk and get my bearings. Sydney reminded me of San Francisco. It was chilly, and a long bridge spanned the bay. It reminded me of the Bay Bridge that ran from San Francisco to Oakland. It was a city of many cultures and people. People from all over the world were coming to Australia. There were tall buildings and on the side streets what looked like turn-of-the-century houses. I thought that this is what America must have been like once, a melting pot of people and cultures.

I wandered into a disco called the Whiskey a Go-Go, where I was approached by a girl selling tickets to a boat ride. I had ridden enough boats over the last nine month, but I figured it would be a good way to meet some girls. I bought a ticket and I’m glad I did, because it started me on a beautiful friendship and a girl I’d never forget.

The boat shoved off in the late afternoon, and there were plenty of girls,, booze, and food. I got myself a rum and Coke from the bar and found a place to sit down. That is when I met Avis. Or should I say she met me. Avis was not Australian; she was from England. She was in Australia working as a secretary for a beer company. Avis was a tall, green-eyed blonde, with a full figure and didn’t beat around the bush; she came over, sat next to me, crossed her legs, put her arm through the crook of my arm, and said, “I want to meet a Yank. Where you from, Yank?” I told her my name was Mike and that I was from Salt Lake City, Utah. “Oh that’s where all the Mormons are. Are you a Mormon?” I told her no. “Well, are you a cowboy?” “No,” I replied. I told her that I am just a guy from Utah who is in the navy.

We talked for hours about the navy and Utah, as I went back to the bar several times to drinks for the both of us. Avis asked me where I was staying. I told her about the hotel near King’ Cross. She thought o was too expensive and asked of I would like to stay with her at her flat. Momma didn’t raise her boy to be a fool, and in a heartbeat, I accepted her invitation. When the boat part was over, we took a cab back to my hotel, got my bag and a refund on the money I had paid for the room. Avis gave her address to the cab driver, and, unknowingly, I was about to enter the gates of a single man’s heaven.

Avis was renting with three Australian girls who all worked different shifts at the beer factory. Every one a beauty and happy to have someone with pants around the house. This was one of those wonderful situation that you stumble into once in a lifetime. I stayed with girls for five days and slept with each one of them. When one or two of them were working, I spent time with whoever wasn’t working. They served me breakfast in bed and cooked every meal for me. When we went out at night, I had to keep all four of them happy. They all wanted to be hugged and kissed. This was a wonderfully exhausting experience. But Avis was my favorite. Avis would wait patiently and say, “Now that you’ve had your fun, how about spending some time with Avis?” I spent a lot of time with Avis. She was real special, and she made me feel more love than I had ever felt with a woman up that time. Those five days I spent with Avis and the girls in Sydney was as close to heaven as a young sailor had ever come. When I got back to the boats, I never told the guys about Avis and the girls. I don’t think they would have ever believed me. But I’ll never forget Sydney and the best liberty I ever had.

When I arrived back in Dong Tam, the division was ready for operations again. We picked up troops the next morning and headed downriver for a little inlet that led to some tiny village and spent three days chasing Charlie through the jungle. On the first day of the operation, I began to let my guard down, I had become too relaxed riding these boats. We were into the operation all day long. We had loaded and off-loaded the troops two or three times and kept moving to another area without any contact with Charlie. The whole crew was getting relaxed.

We had taken off our helmets and flak jackets and were kicked back, making coffee and eating C-rats in the well deck. It was just before dark that we picked up the troops for the last time. We didn’t load any troops because we were designated the medical aid boat. We were slowly cruising down the canal. I was lying down on a litter that I had laid on top of row of ammo cans. I had just closed my eyes when two explosions went off that deafened my ears, rattled my eyeballs, and knocked me off the litter and onto the deck. I laid on the deck knocked senseless by the blast. As my sense began to come back to me, the only pain I could feel was the pain coming from a bump on my head that I got when I hit the deck. I jumped to my feet, put on my helmet, and began looking about to see if anyone had been hit.

The gunners were already popping off round on the .30s, and they were joined by the big guns on the coxswain’s flat. I ran to the back of the well deck and lifted the hatch on the coxswain’s flat to check on the rest of the crew. Foxey was at the wheel, he was okay. Al was on the radio to the CC boat, yelling into the mike to be heard over the guns. I yelled to Al, “Is anybody hit?” and he broke away from the radio long enough to yell, “Hell, no, get back down there,” and kicked the hatch with his foot. Lucky I was wearing my helmet, because the hatch came down on top my head. If I wasn’t wearing my helmet, I would have been the only causality of the battle. Our boat was the only one hit, we took two B-40 rockets in our port side. The rockets didn’t pierce the armor plate on the outside of the boat. It was my lucky day, the rockets hit right where I slept on the inside of the boat. If the rockets would have penetrated, they would have blown me to hell.

That was a day for all of us to remember, and night too. When we beached for the night, we were called on the radio to go downriver and pick up some wounded troops on the shore line. When we beached a few hundred yards down the canal, there was one soldier waiting. He told me that there were seven wounded in the jungle about a hundred yards in. He was pretty badly wounded, Joe took him aboard and started bandaging him. Leroy and I decided to go in and get the others.

It was so dark, we couldn’t see our hands in front of our faces. Neither of us said a word. Leroy had an M-16 and I had my .45 caliber automatic. Our eyes were bulging out of our heads to catch a sight of something in the darkness, and our ears were straining to hear sounds. I was afraid that we might trip a booby trap or step on a punji stake left by Charlie. We stepped slowly and quietly, listening to the crack of every twig on the ground and the slosh of watery grass under our boots. We walked for what seemed like an eternity, not knowing where we were or if we could find our way back to the boat. Finally a worried voice whispered, “Who goes there?” I replied in a whisper, “Doc, and another fool.” The voice came back, “Come on in.” Leroy and I moved in slowly and quietly. We didn’t take time to evaluate the extent of anybody’s wounds, just who could walk in and who had to be carried.

Two soldiers needed to be carried. Leroy took one, and I took the other, and we used the old fireman’s carry. The rest we had hold hands and hold on to use to lead them out. We had to stop three times on the way back to the boat to rest. In the distance, I could hear the sound of the roar of the boat engines revved up at high r.p.m.’s, good old Foxey was keeping them loud for us so we could find our way back. We found our way back by the roar of the twin diesel engines and the sweet perfume of diesel smoke. The ramp of the well deck was down and waiting for us to enter. They all made it alive, and we dusted them off on a chopper when we moved into the canal. Leroy and I gave Foxey a big hug.

The next day was Sunday. We were beached near a small village on the river. The chaplain came aboard all the boats to talk with the guys and give a small service for those who wanted to attend. We stayed beached for half a day, loaded the troops, and headed for Dong Tam.

That was the last operation I went on with the crew of Tango-3. When we got back to Dong Tam, Bill Shealy told me I was being transferred back to the Benewah. I spent my last moth and a half in Vietnam on the Benewah, working in sick call, getting regular baths, eating good chow, and watching two-sheet movies on the mess deck. But I had got my chance to do what I felt I had to do, and I got my medal too. Admiral Zumwalt awarded it to me on the Benewah.

I was aboard the Benewah about a month when the boats of River Division 111 came alongside to pick up troops for an operation. I was on the weatherdeck of the ship, watching as the boats pulled in one by one. There were some new faces and some familiar ones too. Tango-3 had a new boat captain; Al had taken a round in the head on an operation. Leroy told me that he had got a letter from him in a vets hospital stateside and that he was all right. R.D. had got drunk in Dong Tam, after being a veteran of three wars, had fell off the pontoon, and drowned. They were going out without me, and some of them would not be in Dong Tam to drink beer tonight. As each boat pulled up, one of the crew would see me on the deck and yell, “Hey, Doc!” I would wave and try to hold back a tear.