I Cannot Forget Vietnam

I Cannot Forget Vietnam

Bob Crum

ISBN 978-1-68517-267-1 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-68517-269-5 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-68517-268-8 (digital)

Copyright © 2022 by Bob Crum

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Information and details in the book that were researched online are from Wikipedia.

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Cost of War

Mary

Growing Up

Peace Upon Green Pond Mountain

Joined the US Air Force

Eglin Air Force Base

Sara Lee

One Month of Leave

Welcome to Vietnam

Reading When Off Duty

Incoming and Satchel Charges and AK-47s

Agent Orange

Nightmare

Happenings on Cam Ranh Bay

Elite Dogs

Christmas

Rest and Relaxation

Short-timer

Back in the USA

Home

About the Author

To my Mom and Aunt Irene Micklos Kroner

and the members of the Military Service of the USA.

God bless you all.

Chapter 1

Cost of War

War is Hell. This is a quote from General William Tecumseh Sherman to the graduating class of the Michigan Military Academy in 19 June 1879. When he spoke, he made this point to the class.

In essence, General Sherman said, Some of you young men think war is all glamour and glory. You do not know the horrible aspects of war. I have been through two wars and I know. I have seen cities and homes in ashes. I have seen thousands of men lying on the ground, their dead faces looking up at the sky. I can tell you that War is Hell!

The statement is true. I was stationed on a large military installation called Cam Ranh Bay Air Base in the Republic of Vietnam. It is centrally located in South Vietnam and bordered on the east by the South China Sea. I did not go into the jungles of Vietnam. But having my life on the line each day while in Vietnam was enough for me.

Upon checking in and having the sergeant say take cover when the giant voice announces Security condition red. Take cover immediately! put real emphasis upon the words War is Hell!

I was in a small class in Milton, New Jersey, from kindergarten to eighth grade and then went to Franklin High School in Franklin, New Jersey. Two of my Milton School classmates served in Vietnam. One classmate was Keith F. Perrelli. His name is inscribed in the New Jersey Vietnam Veterans Memorial. May he rest in peace. The second classmate is Larry Fredericks. We went most of the way through school together. From Milton School, we took a bus ride to Franklin High School for four years. There I met Henry W. Bley. Sergeant (E-5) Henry W. Bley spent one tough year in Vietnam. Henry W. Bley just wanted his tour in Vietnam to end, so much so that he did not take rest and relaxation. Robert A. Bulmer was killed in Vietnam. His name is inscribed in the New Jersey Vietnam Veterans Memorial. May he rest in peace. And Gary Joseph Kovach also served.

After school, most of us went our own way. My older brother Rich saw Larry Fredericks as I was in the service at the time. Rich said he was messed up, meaning he was affected by shell shock as it was called after World War I. Now the terminology is PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). PTSD has been described in the past as shell shock or combat fatigue or war neurosis. Experts think that PTSD occurs in about 30 percent of Vietnam veterans. Post-traumatic stress disorder can occur after you have been through a traumatic event. For a veteran, this can be attributed to combat exposure. How intense the trauma was and how long it lasted are contributing factors. I only served in Vietnam for one year, and I consider it to have been the single most trying year of my life. I would rather not do it again. I cannot imagine what the troops of today have to endure to have been in war two or more times. My heart goes out to them.

The Vietnam War persisted from 1 November 1955 until the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. Peak troop strength in Vietnam was 543,482 on 30 April 1969. Total deaths were 58,318 troops. Wounded in Action were 153,313. Missing in Action were 1,587, and Prisoners of War were 778, of whom 114 died in captivity. Today I understand there are twenty-two suicides each day among members of the military service. This is heartbreaking.

These are just numbers. They vary slightly from one book to the next. But let me say that every single number is a real person. And words alone cannot describe what each troop underwent. Every troop's name goes beyond oneself. Every troop has a family and friends, and they are of utmost importance. Family and friends of each troop are touched in some way by wars.

Many years ago, I remember visiting my grandparent's home in Spring Valley, New York, for Little Christmas. They came to Ellis Island from Czechoslovakia and settled in Spring Valley, New York. My grandparents, Steven Micklos and Veronica (Popadich) Micklos, had ten children. Helen was born first; Mary, second; George, third; Margaret, fourth; Steve, fifth; Thomas, sixth; James, seventh; Irene, eighth; and Edward, ninth. John Peter was tenth and born last but passed away when only a couple of months old. Of the nine children, five of them were boys. When they were young men, all five of them joined the service during World War II.

The five young men fought during World War II. The five young men were all in the Micklos family.

Five young men of the Micklos' family joined the Navy during World War II. All five young men went to fight in the war. And when the war ended, by the grace of God, all five were alive. Two men were assigned to ships. One of Uncle Jim's ships was the USS McNair. He taught class in the Navy and was a gunner as well. Uncle Thomas rose to become a Warrant Officer and was in the service 23 years. His ship, the USS Louisville, was at one of the Hawaiian Islands when Hawaii was attacked by Japan. He was a gunner.

Back when I was just a little kid, I remember them showing me pictures of the ships. But I had no idea they were in a war. I did not know about war. However, my grandparents knew all about World War II, and I can only think of how much it troubled them to see their five young men go off to war. The five young men were brought up through the Great Depression along with four young women. They lived through the Great Depression into World War II and beyond. My grandparents brought up an outstanding family despite all the hardships they went through.

Chapter 2

Mary

My mom, Mary, was the second child born to Steven and Veronica Micklos. She did not finish high school because she had to work to help feed the family. High school was very important to her, but the family came first. She cooked and cleaned and helped a Jewish family bring up their children. From being with this Jewish family, she became an excellent cook. Also, from her mother, she learned her recipes. She had the best of two worlds: a Jewish mother who sought her help cooking and cleaning and raising their children to her own family which she helped provide. Cooking of ham, turkey, chicken, leg of lamb, pierogi, halupsie, tongue, kidneys, cakes, cookies, and real hot chocolate are just a few of the recipes she learned. Grandma was an excellent cook. And she did not cook on today's stoves. She used a large coal stove. I still remember looking up at the large pots and pans on the stove. They seemed big enough to feed an army. She had a large family to feed every day.

Mom and Aunt Margaret learned how to cook from their mother and prepared their dishes with a little of this and a little of that. That is how they became good cooks, by learning from the best, their mother.

During the Great Depression, my mom went into New York City to help a Jewish family raise their children and learned how to cook Jewish recipes. I only learned some of the food, such as knish, gefilte fish, lox, matzah, herring, and challahs. I can remember mom taking pickled herring from a jar for a snack. Her taste ranged from home-cooked meals her mother from Czechoslovakia made to a Jewish mom's food. Mom fed me some of the pickled herring with onions, and it tasted good. She could say the types of Jewish food as if it was only yesterday, and she was back in New York City.

My Aunt Irene told me how much she looked forward to see Mary once again when she would come home from New York City. Once, Aunt Margaret put Aunt Irene on a bus to travel from Spring Valley, New York, in order to visit her big sister Mary in New York City. Little Irene was afraid to go by herself, but Mary was there to greet her. Knowing my mother, she gave her a big hug, and you could have seen the love in her face once she saw Irene. The people my mother worked for had a young girl about Irene's age, and they all had a nice time together.

My mother learned much by helping two mothers and their families, and later in life, she had her own family. She married Clarence Crum, and they lived in Cozy Lake, Milton, New Jersey. Dad was a linotype operator in New York City for which he traveled five days a week, forty-five miles one way. At first, my dad and mom had a collie named Rusty which they brought over Green Pond Mountain to swim in the large beautiful lake. How did dad manage to get Rusty over the cliff? It ran over two and one-half miles along Green Pond Lake and down the rocky ledge, which was about one hundred feet above the water. Bringing Rusty down the cliff was a difficult feat. Dad was an orphan and was brought up in New York. He swam in the Hudson River with his friend Jimmy Dougherty.

Dad and mom had four children. Richard was the eldest. He was full of piss and vinegar, always telling jokes and playing tricks on us. Mom often ran him around the house with a broom raised over her head, trying to smack him back into shape. I was second born, usually very quiet, possibly because mom talked so much that I had to listen to her and could barely get a word in edgewise. Sandra was next, two years younger than me. She was very studious and graduated first in her class from Jefferson High School. This was also Jefferson High School's first graduating class. When she finished from Douglass College, her first job teaching was at Jefferson High School. Sandy loved dad and mom very much. Bartley was last, much younger than us three, and was mom's little boy.

Chapter 3

Growing Up

As a small boy, I can remember growing up in the country in the town of Milton on a small lake called Cozy Lake. I fished the lake and caught sunfish, pickerel, catfish, perch and bass. Along the bank, I would find small one inch in diameter young snapping turtles with their heads sticking up through the seaweed. They were easy to catch. I brought one small snapping turtle home and let him wander around the house on the floor.

I soon forgot about him, until my mom said Oops! because she had crushed the little turtle with her foot.

My world was full of pets. There were ringneck snakes, ribbon snakes, frogs, turtles, flying squirrels, gray squirrels, cats, fish, salamanders, a raccoon, and others. Stephanie, a neighbor, had found a newborn gray squirrel and let me look after it. The little squirrel slept in my shirt pocket. On a school trip in second or third grade, we went to the Gingerbread Castle, and I bought a present for my mom. It was a small skunk sitting next to a tree stump. Mom made me feel it was the best thing I could have chosen for her. As a little boy, I remember picking an assortment of flowers alongside the road to give to her for a bouquet. She was the best mom a boy could ask for and was worth everything good I