I posted this page over 5 years ago and since that time the 4/9 Manchus have found over 250 members of our unit from the Vietnam War. We now have our own Domain that is linked on my index page.
This is a collection of personal pictures, letters, newspaper clippings and other things left from my tour of duty as a infantryman in Vietnam. Nothing fancy, no big war stories, just one of several million guys who went over there. I have since made a return trip in 1996 (30 years after my first trip). And another trip during Tet of 1997. These trips are being made into my present and photo pages that are linked off my main index page. I couldn't get going with the new pages until I finished with the past. So here it is.......
The Manchu Regiment has a long, proud, history spanning over 132 years. In that time span thousands of men from nearly every ethnic background and station in life have served in the ranks of the Ninth Infantry regiment. I was one of them in '66..... Our primary job was to operate in the Boi Loi wood's or the mangrove swamps of Ben Luc. But first we had to build our section of the bunkers line at the Cu Chi base camp perimeter. During the night we went on ambush patrols outside the wire . Pretty soon we just stayed out there.
News of the Day
- Hawaii Lightning News Jan. 7, 1966....
4000 men to depart for Vietnam within the week more to follow..... Mamie Van Doren to entertain troops at Schofield Barracks tonight - The Walker Report aboard the USNS Walker April 4, 1966 somewhere in the Pacific Ocean..Latitude 21 x 42 N (is that Wake Island Sir) We used 37 thousand gal. of water so we have to take salt water showers from now on.
- Arthur Goldberg US ambassador to the United Nations suggest that the UN be used to police Vietnam after the neutralization agreements have been realized.
- Mrs. Lyndon Johnson will receive an award for her recent television show on behalf of a more beautiful America.
- President Johnson returns smiling after a 12 day vacation at his Texas ranch.
Schofield Barracks Hawaii 1966
Our Distance to Vietnam 3300 miles
Ballade of the Green Tee Shirts
These are the words to a song that was passed around ship while we were under way.
I don't recall anyone singing it but it was good for breaking the tension on board.
It is sung to the tune of the Green beret's by Barry Sadler
(I just lost the under 30 crowd)
Twelve hundred men came down from Nome.
They knew that they weren't going home.
They went to the land of hula skirts,
but all they found were the green tee shirts.
Put a green tee shirt on a hairy chest,
Then wrap it up in an armored vest,
We'll hump those hills until it hurts,
Those fighting troops in the green tee shirts.
And while at home our ladies wait,
they wait each night with a different date.
Our buddies write they're such big flirts,
They don't give a damn for the green tee shirt's.
So please, dear wife, do all you can
To help my son become a man.
Just clean him up, scrub off the dirt,
But don't let him wear a green tee shirt.
Cu Chi was one of the largest U.S. Army base camps in Vietnam and home base to the 25th.Infantry Division ("Tropic Lightning") during the Vietnam war. The camp was located northwest of Saigon, close to the North Vietnamese-Viet Cong bastion of War Zone C. Although Cu Chi was located in a very wide area cleared by bulldozers and other heavy equipment, its deliberate placement in the heart of enemy-controlled countryside made it one of the most danger-prone major installation during the war.
News of the Day
- Aug 19, 1966: Henry cabot Lodge and Henry Kissinger are to visit Cu Chi today.
- Red Cross hostesses set up a office at the Cu Chi base camp.
- 6 soldiers wounded by D.R. terrorist bomb in Santo Domingo.
- The 1000th Purple Heart Award was given out at the 3rd field hospital.
- On March 2, 1968 Despite heavy fighting in the area, the enemy ambushed and destroyed a company of the 4/9th Infantry (Manchus). The company had 49 men killed and 29 wounded.
- In the four years that the 4th Bn. 9th Regiment was stationed in Vietnam it had over 500 soldiers killed.
- In the four years that the 25th Division was stationed at Cu Chi it had over 5000 soldiers killed and thousands wounded.
- In late 1970 the 25th. Infantry began preparing to depart Vietnam and return to Hawaii. The Cu Chi base camp was turned over to the South Vietnamese Army less than five years later, Cu Chi was surrendered to contingents of the victorious North Vietnamese Army.
Other Vietnam sites
The black and white photo's are postcards I got at the Cu Chi tunnels complex on my recent visit there. I'm sure they are not all taken during the war but for the tourist who go there now more of todays Cu Chi on the Present page.
But first something we could of used back then.
