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Company area of 1st Bn. 4th Marines, Phu Bai, 1966/67. Notice the old French 'pill box' on the hill. |
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In An Hoa, a military knucklehead ordered 1/4's company corpsmen to man a temporary Battalion Aid Station while our Marines worked an operation in a near-by valley. This photo was taken through a screen... I am playing my harmonica... and no doubt wondering how my people were doing without me. |
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I borrowed these diagrams from the Handbook For U.S. Forces In Vietnam, printed June 10, 1966. I received my copy while recovering from surgeries in St. Albans Naval Hospital... maybe just a bit late? |
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Remote detonated H.E. shell hung over a trail |
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One of the worst looking foot traps, the punji-bear trap |
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Simple trail booby-trap with grenade |
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Of booby-traps, two most common in the North of the area known as I Corps were the simple punji trap... a hole with sharp barbed metal spikes or bamboo spikes at it's bottom and covered with a grass mat, and the grenade cluster. The cluster was usually 3 or 4 hand grenades with their fuses wired to a single trigger. When stepped on, the grenades exploded immediately. My very first wounded Marine lost his foot to one. |
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What the newspaper SHOULD have reported was how I was refused service in bars and restaurants, insulted by strangers and made to feel an outcast in my home town whenever I was home on convalescent leave. Can any of us ever forget how it was when we got home? |
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Goodnight Saigon |
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We met as soul mates
On Parris Island
We left as inmates
From an asylum
And we were sharp
As sharp as knives
And we were so gung-ho
To lay down our lives
We came in spastic
Like tameless horses
We left in plastic
As numbered corpses
And we learned fast
To travel light
Our arms were heavy
But our bellies were tight
We had no home front
We had no soft soap
They sent us Playboy
They gave us Bob Hope
We dug in deep
And shot on sight
And prayed to Jesus Christ
With all of our might
We had no cameras
To shoot the landscape
We passed the hash pipe
And played our Doors tapes
And it was dark
So dark at night
And we held on to each other
Like brother to brother
We promised our mothers we'd write
And we would all go down together
We said we'd all go down together
Remember Charlie
Remember Baker
They left their childhood
On every acre
And who was wrong?
And who was right?
It didn't matter in the thick of the fight
We held the day
In the palm
Of our hand
They ruled the night
And the night
Seemed to last as long as six weeks
On Parris Island
We held the coastline
They held the highlands
And they were sharp
As sharp as knives
They heard the hum of our motors
They counted the rotors
And waited for us to arrive
And we would all go down together
We said we'd all go down together
Yes we would all go down together
lyrics by Billy Joel |
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HM3 John 'Doc' Patrick USN-FMF
Camp Del Mar/Camp Pendleton, USMC
1965 |
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Marine Links Page |
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Neither the United States Marine Corps nor any other component of the Department Of Defense has approved, endorsed, or authorized this product/service/activity. |
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