D
o you believe in God? I was raised to believe in God and the Bible.
When I was on the plane going to Nam there was this young man, as we all
were, sitting beside me. He asked me if I thought I would make it back
alive. Then he broke down and began to cry and kept saying over and over,
" I just gotta make it back. I just gotta."
I began to say a silent prayer for him and myself. At some point into
the prayer something instilled in me that I was going to lose part of my
body. I thought about this for a few minutes. I thought, " I don't want
to live without my eyes or my arms but I can live without my legs." Then
I thought about this for a few minutes and decided if I lost my right leg
that I wouldn't be able to drive a car very well. So I said, " Lord, if I
have to lose something please let it be my left leg."
As the hectic day by day crap went on I totally forgot about this
prayer. But I did keep wondering if each sunrise and sunset would be my
last. On February 1, 1970 we went out on a seven klick search and destroy
patrol somewhere east of Camp Evans near the coast. I started out on
point. We came up on this huge mound, about 20 feet high and about 40
feet in diameter out in the middle of a grassy field. Sgt Langley thought
we should check it out at the top. My slack man and I went up to the top.
Just as we got to the top I heard this " Zzzit, zzzit, zzzit" go by my
a prickly pear cactus. Now that hurt like the dickens. We never could
find where the shots came from. We didn't know if it were a sniper or a
squad of ARVN's that was with the company messing with us.
We backed out of there anyway and began patrolling along the edge of
a sparsely wooded area. We found a few bunkers with dead gooks in them
and blew them up. Someone else took point about here and we patrolled
into the edge of a huge graveyard. They looked like Indian mounds here in
the States. I suppose that being that near sea level they had to bury
their dead in mounds. We found another bunker in the cemetery and several
200-300 meters to check along a stream that ran through the grassy field
and the cemetery. I looked at all these guys clustered around that bunker
and thought " One RPG will take them all out." So I told Sgt Langley that
I was moving along the edge of this cemetery with the grassy field to
my left. Skip and Chief were at my 10 o'clock and the rest of the patrol
at my 5 o'clock. I came upon this piece of cardboard stuck up in a bush.
I moved over to it and saw it had the letters C-A-M written on it. I had
no idea what it meant and didn't think to call my squad leader over. Then
I noticed a trail going up to the top of a large mound that had four
posts arranged in a six by six foot square at the top. There was old
claymore wire on the ground running from the top to the bottom and a lot
of trash scattered about. I became very suspicious that a cache may be
buried at the top. I moved slowly to the top looking for booby traps. I
then heard an explosion back where the last bunker was. "Well there goes
another one. I better go get Langley and let him see what he thinks about
this grave,' I thought. I made about two steps and the next thing I knew
I was lying flat on my back looking up at the sky without my glasses and
no weapon. I was very confused. There was this strange tingly feeling all
about me and my foot felt like when a firecracker goes off in your hand
and my ears were ringing. Then I remembered a gray cloud of smoke all
about me. "I hit a mine! Better see how bad it is!" I thought. I sat up
and looked at my legs. " Well it's gone!" I thought looking at my foot. I
felt all over me with my hands for other wounds as my whole body was
numbed by the blast. I then yelled as loud as I could hoping someone from
the patrol would hear me.
I then became very calm. This is when I remembered the prayer on the
plane coming over. " He only took a foot and not my whole leg." I looked
toward Heaven and said, " Thank you Lord." I had prayed that He take my
left leg and He only took my left foot. I felt very fortunate and
blessed.
Tex Cornelius was the first to get to me. Then McCowan and Doc. They
waded right on in there without regard for their own safety. Sgt Langley
kept calling for a medovac chopper, but they told him one wasn't
available. He let them have it over the radio. He cussed them until a fly
wouldn't light on them. There was this LOH that had been buzzing the
bushes all during this patrol, he came over the radio and told Langley
that he would take me in. Doc got on the chopper and they loaded me on.
The pilot looked at me and I saluted him with a grin on my face. He
looked at Doc with a smile and said, " He's going to make it." Doc held
my foot in his lap all the way to the hospital.
Sgt Langley came to see me the next day before they medevaced me out
of Nam. He brought me my glasses, I'm blind as a bat without them. He
told me that they found several more antipersonnell devices on that
up when he had to leave. I only knew him a short time but he felt like a
brother to me.
Some will say it was fate the way this happened to me. I like to
believe it was the power of prayer. The Bible states that when we become
one of God's children, He will chastise us when we are disobedient and
reward us when we are obedient. He rewarded me that day with my life.
This is the most vivid day in my memory in Vietnam. It has been 32
years but seems like last week. I suppose it always will.