Old War Stories Anyone?

G

gostwriter

New Member
I'm new to the forum so I hope this is the appropriate place to post this.

A few years ago I took my dad who is 83 to the reunion of his naval ship, the USS Rochester in Washington DC which by the way was the first ship to arrive in Korea during the Korean War. I was amazed at all the great stories of the Korean War and life at sea in general.

As an on again/off again freelance writer, I am looking for stories that anyone would care to share about the good old days weather it's a story about growing up during the great depression, serving overseas in world war II or the Vietnam war, growing up in rural America or anything that is interesting to you that you think others would like to know about.

If I am able to gather enough stories, I hope to put them together into a memoir type magazine article. If you would care to share your story please let me know.


 

I am a Vietnam veteran. I was in Vietnam for 14 months in 1965-1966. This was before things really got hot in Vietnam.

I was in "Recon". It was our job to go into the jungles and root out the bad guys, call in for airstrikes and set booby traps. We had a few really well-trained explosives guys in our platoon that could really set some high tech booby traps that could take out a dozen or more guys at one time depending on how close the Cong would be together.

I was wounded twice and was only sent back to the hospital for recovery one time. I did my R&R in Germany for about 15 days when I took a bayonet to my right shoulder and upper chest and then was sent back to the battlefield.

Today, soldiers are sent home for the same type of injury. When I came home from the war, nobody really cared. We were not given any kind of welcome and we never received any kind of thanks from anyone anywhere, including the airports and even in my home town. Like I said, nobody cared, so today, I never talk about the war unless I meet up with another Vietnam veteran.

I go to our Batallion's reunion every few years and there are fewer and fewer there each time I go. Some of guys were taken out by agent orange, which didn't affect them until years later.

I don't have any regrets about the enemy that I killed, but some of my 'buddies' from my unit that I speak with from time to time tell me that they still have nightmares and have lost their wives through divorce over their mental issues. The worse that I ever have is that sometimes I feel very remorseful, not regretful and I will become depressed for several days or a few weeks. It just comes on me and I can't make it stop. It has to go away by itself.

I have some horrible stories, which I don't want to talk about, but we did some things that I never thought I was capable of so that I could stay alive. My wife of 42 years can recognize when I am depressed and she always tries her best to get me to cheer up by taking a vacation somewhere or just going away for the weekend. This doesn't help because it follows me wherever I go. I go anyway just to please her and I try to act like I am having a good time because I know when she sees me sad it makes her sad also.

Today's soldier is so much more fortunate with the weapons that he has to use and the people are always thanking them for serving, me included. It does help when you know that your fellow countrymen appreciates your duty to country.
 
I would personally like to say thank you to you for your service and for sharing your story. I suppose in a way your service never really ends, you carry it with you. I appreciate everything that you did and the suffering you had to endure. I took my dad a few years ago who is now 83 to the reunion of his ship; the USS Rochester which was the first US Ship (a heavy cruiser) to reach Korea at the start of the Korean War and he was the only surviving member there of the ships original crew in 1946 when it left Quincy, MA. The stories and the comradary of these guys was incredible!

Thank You Again and God Bless.
 

Heartwarming story. :sentimental: Reckless went through so much, was nice to see she made it to retirement without too many bad injuries, thanks for sharing that Ozark.
 
my late dad served in the USN in ww2. following the tradition I served in the USN during Nam from 1966-70. he never talked much about it. I found out a lot about more about his service after he passed away.

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