Vietnam Guns and Fury by JERRY DALLAPE

Author:JERRY DALLAPE
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2018-08-17T15:51:53+00:00

ORDER OF MARCH FOR F COMPANY MAY 16, 1967 (DALLAPE COLLECTION)

Suddenly word was passed back to move out, double time. Our slow pace turned into a trot and we were dodging between banana trees as we ran through the grove. After running four or five minutes we came upon a huge hedgerow straight ahead which was impossible to break through. It must have been ten feet tall and three or four feet thick. We exited the banana grove into a small clearing. Marines from the front of the squad were running up and down the hedgerow to the right and to the left, trying to find a way through. They found an opening in the hedgerow to our left. By this time my legs were weary. The seventy pounds of gear I was carrying made running absurd. My lungs were ready to burst. Something had to go. My pack was full of goodies that I had received in the mail from my mom while in Phu Bai. I had a can of shoe string potatoes and a hard salami, delicacies I relished. But they had to go. I dropped my pack, never to see it again.

We squeezed through the opening in the hedgerow. To our left front there were trees and underbrush. To our right front were a few trees and a dry rice paddy. The paddy was nothing more than a large open area. On the far side of the paddy was a tree line stretching about a hundred yards in the direction we were headed. Our point man started to cross the open area with the rest of the squad following behind him, but as he entered the rice paddy the whole tree line erupted with small arms fire. Joy and Eichelberger from the rocket team were immediately cut down. Joy was killed outright and Eichelberger died soon after. My gun team automatically dropped to the ground and crawled to a position where we could start returning fire. Rounds were whizzing through the air all around us. Everything became a chaotic blur. Bark from the trees was splintering and falling to the ground along with branches and leaves that were falling prey to the North Vietnamese automatic weapons. It was impossible to tell exactly where the shooting was coming from. The shots seemed to be coming from everywhere.

Corporal Goodman, crawled to an opening where he could observe the rice patty and the tree line on the far side of it. He began firing into the tree line. Gochnauer, my gunner, positioned himself next to the rice paddy on the right side of Goodman and started firing the M60 machine gun in the same direction. Hathaway, the ammo carrier laid down to our right. I started opening boxes of machine gun ammo and attaching them to the machine gun. Corporal Goodman rolled onto his left side and attempted to say something to me, when a bullet ripped into his lower back and exited out his hip. His body lurched toward me and he made a loud dog type whimper.

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