Appalachian Veterans. INSTITUTION East Tennessee State Univ., Johnson City

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AUTHOR Arnow, Pat, Ed. TITLE Appalachian Veterans. INSTITUTION East Tennessee State Univ., Johnson City. Center for Appalachian Studies and Services. PUB DATE 87 NOTE 53p. MAILABLE FROM Now and Then, CASS, Box 19180A, East Tennessee State University, Johnson City, TN 37614-0002 ($2.50). PUB TYPE Collected Works - Serials (022) -- Creative Works (Literature,Drama,Fine Arts) (030) -- Historical Materials (060) JOURNAL CIT Now and Then; v4 n3 Fall 1987

EDRS PRICE MF01/PC03 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Biographies; Essays; Geographic Regions; Personal Narratives; Poetry; Short Stories; United States History; *Veterans; Vietnam Veterans; War IDENTIFIERS *Appalachia; *Military History; Jietnam War; World War II

ABSTRACT This journal issue focuses on Appalachian veterans and on the premise that Appalachians and Americans in general are still fighting the battles and dealing with the psychic aftermath of the Civil.War and all wars fought since then. One article notes that Appalachian soldiers were 20 to 25% n e likely to be killed in Vietnam than other soldiers. West Virginia had the highest average of battle deaths: 84.1/300,000. Pickens County, South Carolina has the highest number of Congressional Medal of Honor winners in the nation. Articles discuss Sergeant York and profile lesser known veterans of Vietnam and World War II. There are memoirs, fiction, and poetry about experiences of Appalachian natives in Vietnam. A study of Appalachian POWs in World War II reports that problems of former POWs are far more severe than had previously been established. An oral history project records memories of World War II veterans from East Tennessee and includes samples of the veterans' stories. Other selections describe a soldier's wife in the Civil War and volunteer work on the frontlines in World War II. Films and books about Appalachian veterans' experiences are reviewed. (DHP)

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I N r .. "We are fighting, as always' the tong battalionedghosts of old wrongs and shames that each generation of us both in- herits and creates." William Faulkner Editorial Advisory Board With this edition of Now and Then, we would like to welcome the charter members to our editorial advisory board. These people are friends who have been providing us with free recommendations, writing and support. As members of the Now and COLUMNS '24 STORIES Then editorial advisory board, they will still be providing us with free FEATURES Medal of Ho;lor* 10 recommendations, writing and sup- ;:::Fred Chappell port. but at least we can formally More Than our Share of Heroes recognize their continuing contribution Mountaineers in Combat ....5 Green Fields Turned Red and interest in the magazine. They Ed Price a Story of Vietnam 26 .Thomas Rollins are: `The Effects of Those Times Robert J. Higgs is a professor of English at East Tennessee State We Had..." POETRY Prisoners of War University. He is co-editor (with Am- Phu Bai Poems 8 42 Years Later 31 brose Manning) of Voices from the Ron Giles Hills. a widely read anthology of Ap- Bert Allen The Other Vietnam Vet 23 palachian writing. He is also a sports Veterans of Appalachia literature expert with three books on Susan Roper that subject to his credit. His most re- Remember the cent contribution to regional literature World at War 35 Day Before Yesterday 30 was his article in Laughter in Ap- Colin Baxter Milt Tober palachia: A Festival of Southern In Revolt Against the Laws V.C. G.I. 45 Mountain Humor by Loyal Jones and of the Universe ".. Dan Crowe Billy Edd Wheeler (published by ...... 37 August House). Joyce Duncan from Sense of Peace Marat Moore is a Johnson City A Soldier's Wife Frizier native who has lived in West Virginia, by Mrs. Robert Frank On ..38 What My Father NeverI - worked as a coal miner and now compiled byNancy Joyner works for the United Mine Workers of .Told Me .... America at their headquarters in Volunteers on the Frontlines Carson Washington. D.C. Shetis a reporter by a Veteran Guadalcanal . on the UMWA Journal and is working of the American on a book about women coal miners. 48 Field Service Henry Bober Rita Quillen is a poet and teacher McQuoiirn Wright living in Hiltons, Virginia. Her book of ESSAY ,-e poetry October Dusk was recently Preacher Pressley and the School : published by Seven Buffaloes Press. of the Way it Used to Be ...40' Dave Long D_uricari ;..

Now and Then Magazine PROFILES REVIEWS Now and Then is published three times a Bert Allen Long Shadows year by the Center for Appalachian Studies and Semites at East Tennessee State University. Jo Carson ,by Ross Spear Subscriptions art $7.50 per year ($10.00 for - institutions and libraries). Juanita Quillen 4RidlardEgausteln-; Submissions of poetry, fiction. scholarly and sitistai personal ssays. graphics and photographs con- Pat Amow An cerned with Appalachian life are welcomed if ...by DavidD. Lee . .42 1 accompanied by a self-addressed stamped Linnard Shnmons :.Charles L:-Wolier envelope. We will be careful but not responsibk Judy Odom for an materials. Address all correspondence to: Isle Little Shepherd of Kingdom Editor, Now and Then. CASS, Box 19, 180A, 20 ETSU. Johnson City, TN 37614-0002 David Evans Come by John Fox, Jr 43 East Tennessee State University is fully in ac Ed Price cord with the belief that educational and -Roberta Herrin employment opportunities should be available Geneva Jenkins 21 to all eligible persons without regard to age. The Beulah Quintet sex, race, religion. national origin or handicap. Jane Woodside "...the feral edge of what The views expressed in these pages are those hers ~lade us." of the authors and do not necessarily represent opinions of East Tennessee State University or Maw Lee Settle 44 of the State Board of Regents. Nancy Carol Joyner

Now and Then/1 sectarian animosities between English, Scots-Irish and German settlers. It is curious to think that the same lead mines owned by the Quaker Embree family on the I Nolichucky River in what is now Upper East Tennessee i. not only provided the bullets which helped the Over- mountain Men defeat the British at King's Mountain but also the typo..which printed America's first anti-slavery newspaper, The Manumission Intelligencer, published in Vietnam veterans and returning mothers were among Jonesborough. With the outbreak of the Civil War, East my very favorite students when I first began teaching Tennessee and other sections of the mountain-rimmed sociology, anthropology and folklore at East Tennessee borderland drained by the Ohio River were literally State University in the fall of 1970. None of the ex- caught in the middle of the struggle between the Union aminations or assignments ! gave them could even begin and Confederacy. Vicious guerrilla warfare involving to compare with the real life tests they had already bushwhackers, bridge-burners, and night-riding home passed; unlike many of their younger, complacent guards brought the horrors of true civil war into the Ap- classmates, they had good mason to savor the precious palachian South, setting the stage for the infamous freedom of being able to carry on intelligent discussions mountain feuds which disrupted some unfortunate sec- with thoughtful peers in peaceful surroundings. Their tions well after the turn of this century. The fact that the backgrounds and experienccs contributed substance to majority of southern mountaineers upheld the Union our classroom conversation:, and on the whole I believe cause branded them as traitors and Tories in the eyes of I learned more from them than they ever got out of my Rebels; when former Confederates returned to political musings about human symbols, societies and cultural power following the demise of Reconstruction, vengeful constructions of reality. Particularly, friends and former flatland legislators punished mountain counties by students who founded Chapter 174 of the Vietnam withholding needed appropriations for schools, roads and Veterans of America in Johnson City helped me under- other essentials. In large measure, then,. Appalachian stand the process of "coming to terms with the alienation and underdevelopment can be seen as part of unspeakable;" coping with the psychological and emo- the living legacy of a war whial still continues to divide tional aftereffects of experiences that challenge our very Americans more than 120 years after Appomattox. ability to make sense out of the world around us. If we follow the premise of Ross Spears' latest film, Nations and regions as well as individuals are marked Long Shadows, to its logical conclusion (see review in by the lingering effects of war and strife, and this is cer- this issue), not only are Appalachians and Americans in tainly true of the Southern Appalachians. Though Ap- general still fighting the battles and dealing with the palachia is often perceived to be isolated and psychic aftermath of the Civil War but all of the wars homogeneous, actually it has always been a borderland America has fought since then. On the national as well characterized by divergent, conflicting lifestyles and as personal level, war forces us to redefine our identities philosophies. According to historian Thomas Jefferson and reconsider our place in the grand scheme of human Wertenbaker, antagonism between Tuckahoes (aristocratic events. In the final analysis; war makes us realize that slave-holders) and Cohees (egalitarian yeoman while freedom may not just be another word for nothing freeholders) had already emerged in the South before the left to lose, it also means different things to differen. American Revolution. In the Appalachian region, these people in different times and places; the preservation of social tensions were further complicated by ethnic and our own freedoms may well depend upon our ability to respect, understand and come to terms with those differences. It has been highly satisfying to see this magazine develop over these past few years and I hope you enjoy what you find in this latest issue of Now and Then. Please help us support Now and Then and other projects of the ETSU Center for Appalachian Studies and Services by becoming a Friend of CASS. Individual subscriptions are $7.50 for three issues; in- stitutional subscriptions are $10 per err .:Amerg - *7r. year. Larger contributions will help supp' rt the activities of the CASS .Ng Fellowship Program, which is under-

g r Te. wilting artistic, scholarly and public service projects serving the Southern 1 1' I I; Appalachian region and its people. A . Make your check or money order rg: g payable to: CASS/ETSU Foundation, 4. Box 19180A, ETSU, Johnson City, L Tennessee 37614-0002. We've come J a long way in a short time. Stay with Korean shrine in Nha Trang, Vietnam. Photo by Danny Julian, JohnsonCity, Tennessee. us.

2/Now and Then !"-7, The inspiration for this issue came during a writers' group at which ETSU English professor Ron Giles read some work he called the Phu Bar Poems. They had to do with his experience as a serviceman in Vietman. The poems were electrifying and revealed a side of Ron that the others in the group had known nothing about. Now and Then's poetry, editor Jo Carson and I wanted to hear from other veterans as well. We felt they had s 'me strong things to say but had often kept their stories to themselves. We wanted to open a conduit. We knew from research done by Steve Giles, Chief of Psychology Service at the Mountain Home Veterans Ad- ministration Medical Center, that Appalachian soldiers had died at higher rates in Vietnam than soldiers from other parts of the country. We thought Appalachians would have a lot to say about war and its aftermath. Thus we began planning an issue on Appalachian veterans. tz Bert Allen, associate professor of psychology at Milligan College was, at that time, doing research on aftereffects of being a prisoner of war on World War II veterans. His reasons for caring about veterans were both personal and social. His experience as a Vietnam veteran gave him strong feelings about peace and war. He agreed to be our guest editor. The material we have gathered did not disappoint us. One man, not a writer, dropped off a long story called "Green Fields Turned Red." He had written it, he said

said, to get whet he did and what happened to him in 4111111111. Vietnam out of himself. The document was raw, 3 shocking, frightening. He said he would like us to publish it because he hoped others would learn from words those Private Frank Sovidd. Shenandoah. Pennsylvania, the first American soldier to escape from a German prison camp. tie is a PolishAmerican things he had to team from brutal experience. and was captured at Hill 304 near Chateau Thierry. Most of the other stories and poetry that we gathered, from established writers and from new ones, carry an edge of pain. It wasn't easy for those who shared their stories to talk and write about their lives. Some of the work isn't easy to read either. But we hope to honor veterans of Appalachia by sharing this work, by reading, by listening and by learning from them. Staff.. I would like to add a special thanks for help on this 114,.,s issue to the members of the East Tennessee Chapter of Director - Richard Blausteinsv Z.1.7 Associate Director - William Cook the American ex-Prisoners of War, to the Johnson City g4, Chapter 174 of. Vietnam Veterans of America, to the Editor - Pat Arnow Veterans of Foreign Wars of the U.S., John Sevier Post Poetry Editor - Jo Carson . Hausmat: 2108 and to my husband Steve Giles. Support Staff - Carolyn Cerrito, Ruth n, Margaret Liu, Mark Mathis, Terena Slagle, Mary Beth Tober, Cathy Whaley ©Copyright by the Center for Appalachian Studies and Services, 1987 * * * SBR NO. 13(1.014.87

6 Now and Then/3 Papers also include a collection of letters from her

MIL husband during the war and materials reflecting her I A work as an Army camp hostess. At present, the Archives of Appalachia does not IL hold any material on either the Korean or Vietnam wars. It is important that every effort be made to preserve letters, certificates, diaries and memorabilia documenting recent periods while the material is still The methods of warfare may change over in existence. generations, but the strains of the exposure to For more information write or call the Archives of death and of the long separation from family and Appalachia, Sherrod Library, Box 22450A, East friends are apparent in the letters of soldiers in the Tennessee State University, Johnson City, wars of both the 19th and 20th centuries. In a letter Tennessee 37614-0002, (615) 929-4338. dated July 25, 1861, Confederate soldier J.H. Hamilton wrote to his fiancee of his experience in Charlottesville: There we met the wounded, the sick, and dead from the battlefield of Manassas. I saw one poor fellow who was shot through the head. He was lying in a From the Mtiseum box, all bloody, just as he came from the field of battle. Helen Roseberry In the same letter, he told his fiancee that he had dreamed of "being at home" and "of seeing you." He stated, "Oh, I was so disappointed when I For several years, the Reece MuSeum staff and many awakened and found it all,a dream." A collection of of its patrons have been aware that our exhibition of letters from William Brewer to his wife Gladys historicai artifacts has become stagnant and outmoded. during World War II express similar desires to Planning of renovations began in 1981 and has pro- return home and concern over the well-being of gressed steadily since. In March, 1986, with funding from family members when news from home was not the Tennessee Arts Commission and the Center for Ap- forthcoming. palachian Studies and Services, consultants from the The Archives of Appalachia holds several collec- Tennessee State Museum and the Smithsonian Institution tions of papers containing information on the Civil met with the Reece staff to study the space and collec- War, World`War I and World War II. Of special in- tion to develop a renovation format. terest are photocopied typescripts of four a Al War Renovation began in this fiscal year with relocation of a diaries: Finley Patterson Curtis, Rufus A. storage area, repositioning of the log cabin which has Spainhour, Theodore A. Honour and Mary L. dominated the exhibition since its original installation, Pearre Hamilton. The diaries, some of which in- refurbishment and insulation of the walls, and repainting clude correspondence, offer insight into the writers' of walls and ceilings. An outline showing the reflections on war, descriptions of military activity chronological history of Upper East Tennessee has been and the stress created by the long separation from developed and a storyline is currently being drafted by family members. The archives also has a small col- Dr. Eric Lacy, Professor in ETSU's history department. lection of letters written to Colonel John H. S -ving as design consultant for the project is Deborah Crawford of Jonesborough, Tennessee which relate Brtzfelder, Chief Designer, Smithsonian Institution, Na- to the recruitment of men and mustering into tional Museum of American History. service of the Confederate Tennessee 60th This exhibition will be the first of its kind, touting the Mounted Infantry. The Burton-Manning collection heritage ofUpperEast Tennessee. As we research for of audio tapes includes oral renditions of stories this project, it becomes apparent that Upper East Ten- relating to events of the Civil War and World War I. nessee holds a very significant place in the history of the In addition to the Burton-Manning audio tapes, entire state. The Upper East Tennessee region is rich in the papers of Congressman B. Carroll Reece and heritage with contributions from the likes of Andrew Le Roy Reeves include materials reflecting each Johnson, William Blount, Andrew Jackson, John Sevier, man's participation in World War I. Fro -11 a different Samuel Doak, William Bean, David Crockett, Daniel perspective, the Thomas Highley Morris Papers Boone, the native peoples, and many others. contain a series of files created from the attorney's Our design consultant was and is quite impressed with efforts to assist World War I veterans in receiving the objects in our collection and with the wealth of infor- their disability claims. The archives also holds a set mation with which we have to work. Through funding of photographs collected by Harry Range which from CASS, the many talents of the Reece staff, the in- depict gruesome battlefield scenes. terest and energy of Deborah Bretzfelder and Eric Lacy, The archives' materials on World War 11 largely and the support of University administration, an exhibi- consist of Clifford Maxwell's negatives resulting from tion worthy ofUpperEast Tennessee residents will result. his service as a photographer for the Navy; The staff itself is excited and inspired along with Bretz- photographs collected and taken by Tom Daniels, felder and Lacy as we look forward to the months formerly the photographer for ETSU; and pictures ahead. We invite you to share our vision. William Brewer sent his wife during his tour of duty in North Africa. The Gladys Addington Brewer 7

4/Now and Then highest rate in the nation), Alabama at 70.9, Georgia at 68.9, South Carolina at 68.8, Tennessee at 66.4, Kentucky at 65.4 and North Carolina at 62.5. More Than Our Share And Giles found, "The rates for the Pnpalachian region of East Ten- nessee, Southeast Ohio andEastern. of Heroes Kentucky approximately matched those of West Virginia, all of which Mountaineers in Combat indicate that if you were from the Ap- palachian region of those states, you were much more likely to be a Ed Price casualty." From these figures Giles draws the conclusion that Appalachian soldiers "Appalachi?ns make good soldiers. "We want people to know there is saw more combateither because Everybody knows that. They know it, an epidemic of combat-related stress they were assigned more combat duty we know it, the military knows it. Our syndromes affecting soldiers from the or volunteered for hazardous region respects the fighting men and mountains, and that there are serious assignments. The reason for this reveres its veterans. In war, when the barrie s to their receiving adequate stems from the mystique about Ap- fighting gets-thick, somehow a bunch care," Giles says. palachian heroism and skill and at- of Southern mountaineers seem to be Giles first became aware of the lop- titudes about God and country, Giles at the front," says Dr. Steven Giles, sided numbers when he was working believes. He calls this mind-set, "The Sergeant York Syndrome." Alvin chief of Psychology Service of the in West Virginia for the Vietnam Veterans Administration Medical Veterans Readjustment Counseling York, a hero of World War I, hailed Center at Mountain Home in Johnson Program. He had worked with Viet- Continued on page7 City, Tennessee. nam veterans in Denver but ir. West This psychologist, who has worked Virginia he was seeing a larger pro- extensively with Vietnam veterans, portion of combat veterans. He began has found an unfortunate result of this to study the figures. pattern. Soldiers from Appalachia "Your chances of being in Vietnam were most likely to die in Vietnam. were somewhat higher if you were The figures he has compiled also sug- from the city, but your chances of gest that Appalachian soldiers suffered being killed in Vietnam were much more trauma-related combat stress higher if you were from the country, disorders than soldiers from other and that was doubly true if you were regions of the United States. from Appalachia. The data suggest Yet today many Appalachian that the increased likelihood might be veterans are out of reach of help they as high as 20 to 25 percent," says need because the Veterans Ad- Giles. ministration concentrates its programs He found that the national average in urban areas. was 58.9 battle deaths for every 100,000 males in the population. States with Appalachian areas had especially high numbers They included West Virginia at 84 1 (the 4 . :, By nowbie enemy realized they -.- . , - "?.t'- -.4Pwere fighting onlY,;one man:-A :P' csz. :4, t.,' ,,,:-,-Gtimanlieutenant.and seven. 1,er soldiers 'prepared-to rush him with a ing o Leger ,bayonets. They charged down the-t hill and York, his rifle being empty,,' picked them off with his pistol. Their bodies formed a line down the lviii..Cullurn York::, . '- -hillside. 1,- - i;'±' By this time one of the prisoners, ::::::;Tinirth of the ruggedheroic , -'1 York's superiors took his religious a German major, offered to order mountaineer has at its base the tradi- convictions seriously. Major George his machine gunners to surrender. tion of gims r.nd'the stories of such Buxton, who had &respectable corn- "DO it," York said. folk heros as Sgt. York. Alvin York mand of the scriptures, set about With the 90 Germans who sur- .lived in a time and place where it convincing York to fight. York came rendered on the hillside, 'York and -,:iiivas impossible to go-driving off to to believe that he was God's chosen the survivors of his patrol had more the nearest Food Lion for a pound .s.'. warrior; that he must kill in order to than 10P prisoners. A few more :of hamburger for supper. Hunting save lives. America's war with Ger- Germans picked up along the way ,...-;.was the Only, way a poor family many became a holy war for York. back to the American lines swelled could put meat on the table. York He had faith that God would protect :the number to 132. Before the 55belonged, to such a family. His father:-. him in battle and that he would .: rumors among American troops in

;'died in 1911. Most of Alvin's siblingsreturn home in one piece. --. -- the trenches stopped,that day, York' had already left home and he On October 8, 1918, York and a was said to have single-handedly 1 assumed responsibility for the farm patrol of 16 men were roaming the captured half the German army and -and the blacksmith shop. Income Argonne Forest in France, searching the Kaiser as well. : was sparse and to provide the family out German machine gun nests that In recognition of his heroism, much-needed food, York became a had been spraying American troops York received the Congressional -crack shot. for several days. The patrol Medal of Honor, the French Croix 'When he was drafted Into the blundered into a group of about 20 de Guerre and a host of-other Annyii1.917, York was a con- -Germans. Only a few shots, were ex-, honors. But it was not the military tiOus "eabjez-tor. He had been ap---changed because the Germans were that turned York into a household .:.;

PP:anted Second Elder itilhe:Church .;:.unprepa*red fora fight. The group ::;;;Aword., It was the Press who made `)": christian.Uriioniri Pall:!'was taken prisoner by the .4hirn a popular:,culture 'Tennessee; he believed and -?Arnerkans. As the Yanks prepared The Saturday Evening Post, the -741:itsteCI: tit" ,his Bible, esp.-tic-lath/in Its to march the prisoners to their own magazine with the largest circulation i;OdmonitiOn, "Thou shalt not kill." lines, they were peppered with in America, published the story in

iHefound himself at odds between:lhullets. ,-the April 26,-1919,-,issue. -.', ...,...... ::.:-... '111s duty to hii country and his .- About 40 yards to the left,-on the .'-' Thi.publication of that article ':-.:, us beliefs. Twice be apPied for,crest of a nearby hill, was an;entire Li.,'assured York's .fame.-The offers ,,,-,j;

a.-.= :eiriiiirit ori the birsii of.his 'ef :f::-::.battalion of machine guns. :-::;-, ''. '77-1-begans,..;;. tO roltin. *Dere were pro- .:::,1-",?. 'Ind 'twice heI,Vas iijicted.... , 7-..,-.: NiniAmericans became im- ,.., posals to endorse products likecard7;.; -Sealfzed'.- he either1ad to accept mediate casualties York dived be-:2.5.-1 games; proposals to appear in iiiiionliispend'the rest of his°';!::'hveen two hushes and was unhurt 'A,.: vaudeville and the movies. York --,;;; ØIig the law. Flefenterid the 'The rest of the patrol was pinned turned- downevery offer. He was a 7...4.14.;.;. if; '-i.'*-: ';'...:7:,.. .--v-, down by machine guns. York looked,man of prinCiiile. He made it knpwri

up to the crest of the hill. One ,: he wanted to use his fame to bring Iti . . . .,-;machine gunner poked his head up .:, progress to his home,,poverty- :, :to see the result of the firing. York *.:stricken Fentress County, Tennessee. *:picked him off with his rifle. Four America liked the' image of a .-; limore:peeked over the crest to see.-:. mountain boy who, had.met the....4',.:t

where the shot had come from. -,,-,,,enemy on his ground and hid ;:. -York killed-them, too. -..,- soundly drubbed him. And-they;41*, 44, ,,,,:, By this time the iurvivirg machine2. liked York the humanitarian.

r gunners had located York in the But the public did not or could ../..,,

'bushes and opened fire. Bullets tore not know that for years Alvin York !-

,,.up the ground around him,, but was plagued with nightmares. He .,;,*. none hit York. Every time a German :would avoid the subject every time rose above the line of the hill to aim someone brought up that day in his rifle, the Tennessean killed him..Argonne. ..: -- - And each time that he did, York s , Ed Price A-Malawi soldiers whofofellwith Sgt. Yorkprayedn that God would have mercy For more about Sergeant York see iirsct bis where they in theArgonughtne :ried on the man's soul. review on page 42.

6/Now and Then 9 from the Appalachian area of - In the Shadow ref Six Mile Mountain Tennessee. e- . "Both trords, 'York' and Sbc Mile Mountain is r,)t much of a would not leave them. He sheltered his `syndromi,' are devices to encourage scenic wonder by most mountain stan- wounded comrades with shell crates people to %'..onsider a whole constella- dards, but it is significant around in and then faced the enemy alone, still tion of issues that impact on why a that it is the first promontory of the Blue firing. He died with his rifle In his hand, select group of the overall population Ftiete in central Pkkens County, South -The road that winds past his home died in Vietnam," he says. Carolina. It stands all alone, surrounded "belowSixMile is named for him. The most important lesson from by rural communities and very deep- Pfc. Charles H. Barker died in hand- these figures, Giles thinks, is that at- rooted people. The folks of Six Mile and to-hand combat on an approach to titudes about heroes can cause beyond are considered "mountain "Pork Chop Outpost" In Korea on Juke people" in the old-time tradition. 4, 1953. His patrol surprised an enemy casualties in battle. Four, Congressional Medal of Honor party on the slope. While Barker and a The mystique of heroism and skill winners grew up in sight of Six Mile companion coveredtheir advance, the can be linked to the mountaineers' Mountain. Three grew up in its shadow. patrol moved up the hill, but the enemy love of guns. "The tradition does not Because of these tour men, Pickens began firing. Barker's group was too celebrate command, rank or strategy," County has more winners of the coun- short of ammunition. to withstand the at- says Dr. Charles Walter, another try's highest combat medal per capita tack. He moved into an open area and psychologist at the Mountain Home than any county-in the nation, according fired alone as his comrades withdrew. VA. "Although it is soldierly, it is not to the Pickens Office ofVeterans' Affzis. When he ran out of ammunition, Barker essentially militaristic. Uniforms, Two of the winners fought in World' fought to his death. He was 18. War 11. Pfc. William A. McWhorterwas Marine Lance Cpl. James Donnie regimental honors and formal military fighting in the Philippines on December Howe, died at 22 in a bamboo thicket in organization are not part of the tradi- 5, 1944, where a Japanese demolition Vietnam.on May 6, 1970. Friends say tion. In fact the Tennessean is often squad was besieging his position. In the he had planned to marry his sweetheart, depicted as fighting an enemy who face of McWhorter's fire, one threw a Donna-Wade. But in the predawn has those trappings. The tradition live charge into the gunners' trench. darkness, enemy grenades began hitting lends itself to the notion of the, in- M:Whorter picked up the grenade, bent his group's position. Howe threw himself dividualistic, mobile, non-conforming over it and turned away as it exploded. upon one, sparing his fiends. man, who, on the rack of his pickup His companions were saved. He was This kind of selfless loyalty is not truck, heti the rifle he learned to use killed instantly. A building at Fort particularly astonishing in this area and as a boy." Jacksonanda bridge on US 178 over doesnot,as some outsiders have sug- This love of guns is supported by 'US .123 are named In his honor.. gested, reflect a combative nature, so Pfc. Furman L. Smith, one of 10 much as It does an ingrained penchant the stories of veterans at Mountain children, was 19 and engaged to Arnie to "do right"--and a natural antipathy to Home. One of Sgt. York's cousins Rampey when he died May 31, 1944, bullies. ; who was a patient there recently told near Lanuvio, Italy. As his group, ad- - DOt Jackson Giles that he had gotten his first gun vanced on a German position, 80 Dot Jackson is a reporter for the at the age of sixa .22 rifle. He was Germans began firing at close range. His Greenville News.Pledmont and lines in company fell back but the squad leader- 12 when he got his first shotgun. He Sir Mile, South Carolina. . got a pistol in his early teens and just ,andenother soldier had fallen. Smith before he went into the Army, he bought a 30-30 rifle. "This is not an . . v.".**The figures dispel one peription of unusual case," Giles says. Congressional Medal of Honorthe regrOp, yet rehiorce'a second. The An informal survey I conducted "4e42,iierCePoif?i! 1i.the- among 100 veterans at Mountain highe's`i.that Appalachianslerveliiti'lliantheir Home confirmed the psychologist's share in.the military. Their.iiiteed seivie:i tion for valor r. point. I asked two questions: At what in recent Wars was actually kinder than age did you get your first gun and In both the Korean ar~d the Vietnam ; thenational average. The perception how many guns did you own when Wars, the nation's highest decoration for reinforced is the courageous you entered the service? valor was awarded to Appalachian dangerous serviceofferedby those frO'ric/' Only three veterans said they never "2,soidiers at 'al:higher rate than to soldiers..the Appalachian eigio; who-do ertei...1.;;;; owned a gun., Of the 97 who did, the from other iftirts:of thecountry.: ,- i'47; usual age for that first gun was eight Inthe KOreitWar 9%, of military per- BP'tAllan or nine, with the earliest being five sonnel came froM the Appalachian rS *.;:" and the latest being 15. Most of those region. Yeti::of the total number of Con- For the purposes'of this sitidY, the Ap.:-....- first guns were single-shot .22 rifles. gressional Medahof Honor awarded, palachian region was deftnedliithe way Shotguns usually came later, at age 18% (23 (0 of131) were won by Ap- the Appalachian Regional Commission ` 10 or 11. palachian soli:Uri. defines it. All of West Virginia and poi- In answer to the second question In the Vietnam War, the Appalachian, lions of 12 other states were included. about the number of guns owned soldier represented 8% of the total In The data have been analysed using the when inducted into the service, the military service:Yet, 13% (31 out of Chisquare statistic. Thanks to Jerry average was two; usually they had a 239) of the Congressional Medals of Pickard of the Appalachian Regional rifle and a shotgun. Honor were won by natives of the Ap-. Commission for providing many useful The, evidence gathered informally at p'alachian region. figures. Continued on page 8 Now and Then 7 HEROES Mountain Home supports the "Sgt. York Syndrome" theory. Most of the veterans said theyweretreated dif- ferently by their superiors, though no PHU BAI one would admit he wanted it that way. In the heat of combat no one would admit that he personally enter- 62nd Aviation Elects a Mascot tained any notion about being a hero. Said one veteran: "I was terrified.I These two dogs just trotted in and took up did some dumb thingsthen I a big brown one,-;avored by the officers wonder how I got back alive. The who let it lap beer'from a saucer Southerners in my unit egged me on and kept it in a rotor box with this macho crap and I reckon I beneath their hootch, egged them some, too. It was the and a little black mutt, fed by the EM thing to do. Then we'd show off for who let her sleep in the bunker the Northerners in the unit and show next to the three-seater them how proud we Georgia boys where the sand smelled. would be to go out on patrol. It was Dave Hall, from long a, long o, all bullshit. But at the same time I El Dorado, Arkansas, think we all really believed it back said the enlisted dog then. Or maybe we thought is was was a lucky canebrake bitch cur goddamn Southern duty to and called her Clubs. believe it." But the old man ordered a vote And Giles and other health profes- and said we had sionals see the results of the to pitch the loser over the concertina unromantic side of the tradition "in to mama-san. the number of Appalachians who died We knew Clubs had it bagged or who suffer post-war physical, because,we outnumbered them, mental or social problems." but the brown dog won. Dave Hall said it gerrymandered in. * * * Once she cleared that' wire, Clubs snapped at mama-san, wiggled down, Ed Price has been a free-lance photo- sideswiped a rocket crater, journalist for 20 years. He's from and rounding a bamboo stand, Frederick. Maryland and now lives in ran for my life. Johnson City. . -

'0 1.404

...And history seems to bear out ...And in the Civil War the fact that in all timeR>those people who inhabit mountainous countries It is a fact worthy of note that East are endowed with a lofty spirit of Tennessee furnished more troops to patriotism and loyalty to country, the Federal army than any section of and are the first to respond to its call the Union in proportion to its when menaced by foreign or population. The male population of domestic foes. Hence arises the fact E4st Tennessee in 1860 between the that East Tennessee, and the moun- ages of 18 and 45 years was tain sections of adjoining States, 45,000. Out of this population the have always furnished more than lowest estimate of troops who joined their proportion of volunteers in all the Federal army places them at the wars in which our country has 30,000, the exact number put down been engaged. in the statistics of the Government is 31,092, besides a large number that * * * joined the Confederate army. This from History of the Thirteenth Psychologist Steven Giles adopts the character of Alvin York to talk about the aftereffects of war. large proportion of troops to the Regiment Tennessee Volunteer He has used this persona in a videotape produced population is explained to some Cavalry U.S.A. by Samuel W. Scott by the Medical Media Service at the Veterans extent by the fact that many joined and Samuel P. Angel, 1903. Administration Medical Center of Mountain Home. He uses the program, "York and the Ap- the army both over and under the See review ofnewreprint on palachian Combat Soldier" in presentations to legal military age. page 43. community, professional and veterans' groups 8/Now and Then POEMS

Ron Giles

Moon Over Phu Bai Top swapped the seabees two bottles of scotch for lumber and built a porch on his hootch. We sat,there with Dave Hall and watched the moon the first time they walked on it. I said the scriptures prophesied it would turn to blood, and Top (whose name I swear was Tommy Tell) said the Mets would win the pennant too. Top and Dave Hall laughed, Bunker emplacement of Battery "B," Second Battalion, 138th Artillery and Top held his knuckles out at Fire Support Base' Toinahawk," located approximately 20 miles south and said, of Phu Bal. Vietnam. feel that moon drip.

Straining Rainy Season Every evening after chow this mama-san from Hue Before the last monsoon, chugged in on a motorcart under the drenching sun, and bought two cans of slop we hunched in teams of six from the mess sergeant, to lay the PSP, who couldn't solve hauling each plank like a coffin, why he was missing so many spoons. dropping the serried edge All these spoons MIA into the fitted side and no 'counting for them, of its grounded mate. until we were playing poker one night When we finished the pad. and Dave Hall said, we lounged on a bunker "Sarge. papa-san on the KP line and watched the Hueys sway in, slips the spoons in the slop." hovering down like witch doctors. The next night Beyond the levee road we saw the Cobras Nicolas the second cook lace fire from their dark hoods, strained the slop with a dip net, but we felt safe. knowing the rain and Sarge, papa-san, and mama-san would fall stood in a soundless semicircle and the war skid to a natural truce. and watched him like he was digging a grave. Two weeks later, He scooped up six washed down in a gully. in the silence that saves the plt ,king leaned like tombstones, silverware and face. strown by vandals: the road, Dave Hall said it was how wiped like sweat into the South China Sea. rituals began. with a man like Nicolas bent to the slop cans seining for spoons. * * * Ron Giles is an assistant professor of English at ETSU and a Vietnam veteran. Now and Then/9 c.

MEDAL HONOR

Fred Chappell

I Am One of You Forever, Fred tion. and he had expected none. display personal feeling. Chappell's 1985 novel (published by They were silent farm folk, both of But on this occasion it was his duty Louisiana State University Press) in- them from the true oldtime mountain to do so. He had to give a public troduced a lively North Carolina stock, shy and ill at ease in any public speech and exhibit himself before family, the Kirkmans The author is situation. Pruitt owned a rocky little neighbors and strangers as a bona fide now working on a new book about ancestral farm far in the obscurities of hero. My father had commiserated the same family. Medal of Honor is Bear Creek Cove. Hard to imagine profoundly. Quiet almost to the point an excerpt from that work In it. the how he'd ever fed and clothed a of utter silence, Lewis would turn father of the family, Joe Robert. family on those flinty acres, but he scarlet when called upon in class and teaches high school At this point in had done so and done it wellfour drop his head and mumble inaudibly. the story, he has been asked to see stalwart boys and two devout and in Still he was a good student, in- Mr Pobble, the principal. Joe Robert dustrious girls. Salt of the earth. as terested, if not precisely curious, believes he is about to be upbraided people said, and my father thought following everything that went on in (or even fired) for some practical that the phrase lacked force. classespecially in the General jokes he pulled on his fellow teachers. He had met them before, in painful Science classwith unaltering atten- Instead he finds the parents of a public circumstances. Their son Lewis tion. They had never been close, but former student are waiting in the prin- had returned home a highly my father felt a bond with Lewis, he cipal's office to see him decorated war hero. He had sustained admired his serious and gentle com- a terrible chest wound in Italy. portiaent and his willingness toward "Good morning, Joe Robert," the Surgery had done wonders, but he his life. principal said. "I'm sure you was a changed young man, hollow- Not the sort of boy expected to remember the Dorsons, Pruitt and eyed now and haunted. The wound turn out a war hero. But who can Ginny." was beneath his shirt. Didn't that predict courage or desperation or "Oh yes," my father said He shook make it more terrible, hidden away? whatever accidents and quanti2s ac- hands with Pruitt and nodded to his Was he not still always in pain? There count for valor in combat? l wife. "How are you-all getting along?" would be no way.to know, Lewis was to my father that Lewis' quietness had They gave no answer to his ques- his parents' child, he didn't care to been an index to his courage all 10/Now and Then 13 continued along. It wouldn't have been easy for Then it was his turn. He rose and He spoke slowly, softly, but his hill him even to attend school, all that walked slowly, not lifting his eyes twang was as distinct in the office as youthful racket and enforced from his feet until he had reached the mandolin notes. "It was in Detroit socializing. Always easy to think of safety of the lectern. He spoke just city, where Lewis was helping them Lewis as a solitary figure in the fields the phrases that time and occasion re- people makf, cars. We didn't know and woods, happier away from quired. There was nothing personal, nothing till last Sunday and we went people, happy with his dog and the nor even distinctive, in what he said; up there and they buried him on slow seasons of nature. It was the he read from typewritten pages un- Tuesday. They had doctors going mountaineer strain, as fine in Lewis as doubtedly supplied him by the War over him after he was dead, I don't it might have been a hundred years Department. But he read audibly and know why. And then we couldn't ago. correctly, his hands not shaking too bring him back home. The War Department had arranged badly and his trembling knees hidden "He's buried in Detroit?" my father a Lewis Dorson Day in Tipton. There by the lectern panel. Before our asked. must have been hundreds of like proud eyes he mastered what might "He's buried up there in the biggest celebrations across the country, the have been the worst fear he'd known graveyard you could think of. A effort to sell war bonds tied in with until that hour. multitude of stranger graves. And local heroes. But there could have No one would remember the then we couldn't bring him back." been few young men for whom the modest platitudes, but many would He knew how much that meant to occasion was so excruciating as for remember his red-faced bravery. them, how they would want him in Lewis. He would have faced the guns Then it was over and Lewis shook their little Baptist churchyard. Or at Anzio with more equanimity. hands with all the people on the plat- maybe on one of the back hilltops On the softball field in the middle form. evenblindlyhis mother, and there was a family plot, shining with of town they had set up a platform, the band played, and a surprising birdsong. with wildflowers. tacked bunting around it and draped number of people filed to the booth at "How did it happen?" it with flags; and from a fortunate third base to invest in War Bonds. Ginny Dorson stopped looking into high school in the next county they There was a strong consensus of my father's face now and her mouth borrowed a marching band. The front opinion: Ole Lewis done real good, thinned to a line like a razor cut and page of the weekly Tipton In- didn't he? Mighty fine speech. her hands clenched in her lap. That teffigencer was given over to Lewis, And that was the last time my was as much grief as she would show five separate stories and four father had seen Pruitt and Ginny here. She was not defeated, not photographs, including a picture of Dorsonsix years ago, during his first broken, but her raw determination the Dorson homestead, a weathered brief stint as a teacher. They had made her look more alien than ever, tin roof shack perched on a rocky hardly changed, though of course painful in her blue flowered dress. ridge, a tilted well housing on one they looked out-of place, bewildered "He was shot with a pistol," Pruitt side and a smokehouse.on the other. here in the principal's office. Maybe said. "That was all they would tell In the grainy background of the photo Pruitt was a little leaner, had me. Them policemens couldn't say no appeared the dim lines of the weathered a little more grayly; and more than that. They didn't nobody outhouse. maybe Ginny had put on a few gentle know Lewis up there. He was just Pruitt and Ginny had refused to pounds. Otherwise he could find little killed and nobody knowed anything, speak, but did agree to sit on the differenceexcept in the air of dark nobody didn't care. He was just a platform and rise when introduced. sorrow about them at this moment. stranger in that place, and then he The Dorsons' family Baptist minister Their quietness had hardened. was dead there." offered a prayer as fierce as a tiger They all took seats in the uncom- "It's a terrible thing," my father and too long by a mile. Lewis had fortable straight chairs, and Mr. said. "I didn't even hear he'd gone up chosen my father as his favorite Pobble spoke to my father in a set to Detroit." teacher, so the task fell to him to say level tone like a doctor delivering a "He went to find a job. That's what that Lewis was a good boy and a fine medical verdict. "We have some bad he said he did. But it wasn't no job, student. But he said instead that news, Joe Robert. Lewis is dead." he was all restless. He didn't need no Lewis was a fine boy and a good stu- "Oh Lord," my father said. But he money, what with disability. He just dent. Then the mayorwhom my had known as much. It would take couldn't find no peace after he come father couldn't abide (he was also a the most serious sort of business to out of the service. Get in the truck member of the school board)had bring Pruitt and Ginny to the school, and ride the roads all day and all told the stories of Lewis' bravery in to a large public place. "That's an night and even when he was home combat. By now we all knew these awful thing to hear." He was glad that he couldn't sleep. Walk up and down stories by heart; yet we were glad to Don Pobble had spoken; Pruitt the porch all night till sunrise. hear them again. They composed a Dorson might not have manged to Sometimes he might sleep a little bit transfixing account of cool self- zay the words. There was more tact when it got sun-up." possession and resourcefulness. Even in Pobble than my father had "He was unhappy," my father said. Lewis listened closely, but with an ex- recognized. "When did it happen?" "We'll never feel how he felt." pression suggesting that he could not "It was last week, wasn't it, Pruitt?" "He couldn't have no peace. He quite credit the words. Pobble asked.

.Ai i'r. Now and Then/11 ..e_ ' jrcontinued left all his peace over there in the schooling, Ginny and me, and we the latch of the shell pouch. The foreign lands. We don't believe our thought maybe the schoolmaster leather was dark and glossy and so boy ever came back to us, Ginny and ought to be more serious minded. But old it must have belonged to his me." it tickled Lewis about you and we father or grandfather. He offered the "But you got to see him. So many knowed he was a good boy and pouch to my father, then changed his of them, in their graves there, we maybe it was all right." mind and took it back and dumped never even got to see again." Don Pobble said, "Joe Robert has a the contents into his lap. A double "No,"-Pruitt said sharply. He made famous sense of humor." handful of shiny smudged ribbon and an edgy silence in the room. "We was My father gave the dry little man a spotty brass. "They gave him all these cheated about that, him back here but warning glance, but Pruitt took no medals," he said. "To be proud of." not in spirit, not really with us." notice. "I can't hardly even read. I "Yes," my father said. "We're sup- "Yes, all right," my father said. "I can read in the Bible all right, but in posed to be proud of them." see how you felt apart. There must some other book I can't make no Then Ginny stood up. She rose have been a great many soldiers who headway. I used to watch how Lewis quickly and decisively, smoothed came back like that." would pleasure in books I couldn't down her awkward blue flowered "We have prayed there wouldn't make nothing of." At last he stopped dress and said, "Excuse me. I need to be," Pruitt said. "We prayed there searching my father's face and visit the ladies'." Her manner made it wouldn't be mothers and daddies flat dropped his gaze to the pouch. clear she had planned to leave at this had to go through where we been." "Lewis was a good student." my point; and she had not told Pruitt. "Yes," my father said. father said. He looked at her, surprised. "Wait But he was thinking of Johnson "I don't know if al, so many books a minute," he said. Gibbs, who had been like his brother. is a great good thing. I done ail right. "No," she said. "I need to go." or like his son. and buried now in our and my daddy before me. with only Don Pobble came from behind his own family plot in Bright Hill the Bible. But if it made Lewis proud desk and went round and opened the Cemetery, and how that was no com- to know the books, that would be fine door for her. "It's right down the fort. not in the least, simply to know with us." hall," he said. "You ask Mrs. where he lay after he was killed in the "The way the world is now, we Whateley here and she'll show you." Army and shipped back in a box. have to read the books," my father Ginny nodded and, keeping her how the telegram that told us said. "We don't want them writing eyes fixed on the floor, squeezed past wouldn't leave us be till it had made things about us we don't know." him at the door and went out. He us crazy with visions and longing. He The gray farmer leaned so far for- closed it gently behind her. wished he could think about Lewis. ward it seemed he might topple, and "It's too much for her," Pruitt said. but Lewis made him think of Ginny touched his left arm to warn "She's a strong woman, but it's too Johnson. and think of all the good him. My father could smell the odors much." times past and gone, and all the time of him now. the salt of flannel "Will she be all right?" Don Pobble left in the world that Johnson would underwear and lye-washed denim, the asked. "Should I ask Dorothy to go have no share in... sweetness of leaf-mulch and newly with her?" Oh yes he does. he is beside us turned soil and cow. He peered from "No," Pruitt said. "She don't want now even as I tell you this story. his crouched position into my father's no company. She just don't want to "We felt obliged." Pruitt said. "We eyes as if he were searching out be in here right now." He gathered a was just going to send word and then something in a treetop. Then he handful of the medals and held them we talked about it and decided we straightened up. out like coins. "But we decided on better come and see you." He drew a It was the pain then, my father this together, Ginny and me. She worn bulky leather shotgun shell thought, that clutched his backbone knows what we wanted to do." pouch from his jacket pocket and set and doubled him over. It'll be a Don Pobble sat behind the desk it on his sharp knee, let it balance miracle if that pain doesn't kill him again. "What had you decided?" there without touching it again with soon. Then lie realized it wouldn't. "We wanted Mr. Kirkman here to his hands. "Lewis thought a lot of Pruitt would live with it; it would be take one of these medals if he'd have you." he said. "He thought you were with him in the fields at loon and in it. To remember Lewis by." a good sort of man and he was his house at midnight, but it wouldn't "I don't know, Pruitt," my father tickled at how you would tomfool kill him. said. "That doesn't seem right." around. He used to make us laugh "I hear tell you lost a boy in the "Lewis didn't take no pride in like cats at the supper table, telling war." them. He stuck them in a shoebox something you said or done." "Not my boy, no," my father said. under the bed and never took them "I see," my father said. But he "A young man close to me. Part of out. Might as well of buried them. But didn't. He had never imagined Lewis the family." we wanted you to have something, laughing, that boy so redfaced Pruitt seemed satisfied with this one of these." He hefted them, as if serious. answer, as if my father had passed a gauging their weight "We didn't know what to think test. For the moment his agony had "It doesn't seem right." my father about that. We can't claim to much exhausted itself. He thumbed open said. "These are things that have to

12/Now and Then continued Itk be earned." echoer that closed in on him like But that wasn't what he meant. He "He would do his duty, like they bricks in a wait. The sadness in him hadn't meant anything. The world told him," Pruitt said. "he wouldn't was the old familiar one he thought was what my father knew. He do nothing just to get these." he was leaving behind, the terrible wouldn't want to imagine anything "No, but" imagined pictures of the young men more than the world, nothing better "We thought you might've wanted he had taught lying mangled and or worse. The world was more than a remembrance." He thrust them lifeless in alien mud. It seemed he plenty. "I can't tell you how bad I almost directly in my father's face, a could taste the old newsprinthe had feel," he said. soiled and gleaming jumble of faultless stared at during those years and hear She nodded again and stepped honors. the sad radio after supper at night. aside now, edging into shadow, to let My father saw, with fine relief, that He was trying not to remember; he him pass her by. She had no more to Lewis' Purple Heart was not among didn't want to think about any of that. say to him ever. He was dismissed. them. He sighed a hard sigh and Among the shadows was another He walked down the hall, feeling made himself relax. With a quick shadow that came toward him. It was her presence retreat from him as she stubborn twist of his wrist he lifted difficult to recognize her in this light, made her way back to the principal's 9.-le from the tangle as if he were but it was Ginny, all alone in the dark office. Neither of them looked back. plucking a weed from a flower bed. hallway. "Mr. Kirkman," she said, The hall shadows smoothed away the He stared at it in his blunt fingers, stiff and he could hear the brittle deter- sound of their footsteps. little rectangle of ribbed green and red mination in her voice. There was But he couldn't go to his classroom silk, striped like a Christmas candy. something she must say to him; she yet. He pushed into the faculty men's He had no iaea what it signified, and had come out here to hide in the restroom and stood at the tall open hoped that it was nothing more than shadows and meet him alone. window and rolled a shaky Prince a good conduct -ibbon from boot "Ginny?" Albert cigarette. It was midmorning camp. He shova id it to Pruitt for his She stopped in front of him. Her now, a bright blue spring day, busy approval and the farmer nodded head was lowered so that he looked with robins and white butterflies in the grayly, without looking. into the part of her hair, the thin schoolyard grass. Odd. In the hallway "I don't need this," he said, "to cloven vulnerable line. She ,vas with Ginny he had felt that the sky remember Lewis. We're all going to unsteady on her feet, swayed like a was gathering to rain, but it was bright remember." young willow tree. "It was something as fire outside in the other world that "That wouldn't mean so much. he wouldn't tell you," she said. seemed no part of the one inside. Strangers and all. But I'm obliged for "About Lewis?" It can't be the books, he thought, it you to take one." "It was him that shot hisself," she wasn't the books and the lessons. But "I'll be keeping it," my father said. said. "It was Lewis killed hisself." when he thought about Pruitt and "I'll put it somewhere." "Oh Lord. God, Ginny, I'm sorry." then Lewis his old doubts came Don Pobble spoke. "We've got "It won't nothing to do with you or flooding back. It was nothing but some things you might want to have, this schoolhouse here," she said. disaster, this whole century, and the Pruitt. Some pictures of Lewis in the "Pruitt ain't satisfied, but I'm satisfied schoolhouse with its foolish hopes and yearbook and on the track team, and it was nothing to do with you or the silly rules stood right in the middle. some other things." books." How could you be sure it wasn't the "I've got to he going alor.g," my "It was the war," he said. fault of the books and the lessons? father said. "I've got a classroom full She nodded. He took out the medal and looked of kids waiting for me. They won't "It was the war," my father said. at it, tiny and weightless and tawdry, know a thing till I get there." "And it was just like he was killed in like a scrap of cellophane or tin foil a They stood up and Pruitt shook the war. Just the same." child might pick up and treasure out hands with my father. "I'm mighty She made a little noise, not crying of the roadside weeds. He stared and obliged," he said, in a voice that was but not words. then stuffed it back into his pocket not much more than a whisper. He He wanted to touch her, but he with a helpless angry gesture. seemed weary now, more beaten knew better. She didn't want to be than when my father had first come touched. Lewis had done his duty, 711:: in. and this was her duty now to tell my "Thank you for coming," my father father the straight of it, to make it -4:- said. "You be careful now. Take care dear. He knew, my father knew all Fred Chappell's latest book is an of Ginny." But Pruitt was past that, but he didn't know what to do anthology of his poetry and prose, answering, and my father nodded to or say. It was like trying to clasp hot The Fred Chappell Reader, Pobble and left and went through the smoke in your arms. "I'm sorry," he published by St. Martin's Press, 1987. other room without speakirs said. "I thought the world of him. He teaches at the University of North Dorothy and out into the dim More than that." Carolina at Greensboro. hallway. He felt blind. The broad She raised her small white expres- empty corridor with its rows of gray sionless face. "More than the world," lockers seemed endless, full of she said. "There had ought to be Medal of Honor first appeared in the New shadows, and his footstep raised more than the world." Mexico Humanities Review. U. d by permission of the author. 16 Now and Then/13 PROFILES

Bert Allen Bertram Allen U.S. Army 1968 to 1970 Overseas assignment: Vietnam

He is passionate in his feelings about Vietnam, about war and peace. As guest editor for this veterans' issue of the Nowand Thenhe says, "I hope we enlighten those who are not veterans about the full cost of war and its products. I hope it says war never ends for those of us who fought it and our families. And I hope we can honor those who are veterans because they have paid a ,-4Juanita Quillen high price for fleeting gains." Bert Allen is a tall, soft-spoken, articulate man. He is clean-shaven, his hair is clipped short. He says, "I finally joined middle Americain appearance." He teaches psychology at Milligan College and lives in Jonesborough with his wife, Jill, and their two children, Amy, eight, and RB, 10. 0 -_- &native of Richmond, Virginia, he came to Tennessee 3- -...,,, in 1963 to attend Milligan College where he majored in English with the intention of going to law school after his undergraduate work. "I did go to law school briefly, didn't like it, quit and got drafted in 1968." He was trained in artillery destined for Vietnam. S7 LinnardSimmons "I was in the Army, 25th division. I arrived in-country mid-December, 1968. We were in an area northwest of .; Saigon, between Saigon and the Cambodian border. nic14;11. About three weeks after I arrived, I was wounded. I was firing a howitzer. It was between 10:00 and 11:00 o'clock at night and we were providing counter-mortar

41::1 fire for another support base who was already being at- *4. tacked. A third fire support base came under attack and we were turning our guns around to begin firing for them when we came under fire as well. One of the first half dozen rounds landed at our gun, put our gun out of commission and wounded people. I was so new I didn't realize we had even been fired at, I thought we were David Evans turning a gun that was very hot with a round in the tube L. and the round exploded on us. Later I learned we had been hit. "There were three of us actually on the-gun. The lieutenant, who was our battery executive officer, was acting as a radio telephone operator. The lieutenant was right next to me. He lost his leg at the knee and the gunner was paralyzed. I was very lucky. We were sup- posed to maintain noise discipline at night and I knew the X-0 had the radio telephone in his hand and picked up the telephone and said 'medic on 3, medic on 3!'I didn't get an answer and finally I realized I wasn't 3oing to get any answer. The mortar round had severed the wire from the phone. I started screaming to the other Geneva Jenkins guns and finally the medic showed up: 14/Now and Then PROFILES

"When the medic came, he brought spare time to go out to Vietnamese was in the classroom I found myself a couple of litters. The Catholic villages, about Roman Catholic sisters very concerned about kids' family pro- chaplain was there that night. Doc who were taking care of orphans and blems, adjustment and difficulties in and somebody else carried the litter displaced people. wrote about in- school so I began course work in with the gunner on it, the chaplain teresting jobs that American GIs were counseling and moved from there into and I carried the Lieutenant down to doing in Vietnam. We did not write psychology. the aid station and Doc tended to about day-to-day combat, the civilian "Feelings were still high about Viet- them. I tried to hold a bottle of I-V press was doing that. To some extent, nam and we were still at war. When I for the gunner but I got to where I I was generating propaganda. Looking first started going to class, I didn't let was ready to pass out. Base camp back, there were things we could not people know I was a veteran. And I sent out a dust-off chopper and by take pictures of, could not write was defensive. I had joined the midnight, the wounded from the in- about. When I say that. I am judging military, even in the draft, as a super- fantry and our area were at the what I did then with knowledge I patriot, I continued to be a super- hospital. I wasn't dusted off have now. patriot...1 was still supportive of what evacuated for medical purposesuntil "I was under fire again. both with was going on in Vietnam, I was still the next day. I didn't know that any the units I was covering and at base naive about the conduct and intent in time you got head wounds you had camp. Base camp came under routine the war. Part of that was self- tbgo in to the hospital and some of rocket and mortar fire and probes of preservation. To be in opposition to my wounds were in my head. The our perimeter by sappers. A sapper the war at that time would say that next morning, the medic had a fit was a person who carried in explosive what we had done, my friends' losses because I was still there. They had to charges on his person. You stayed at and my losses were for nothing. I call a chopper out to take me back. I risk. wasn't prepared to say that. was not incapacitated by my wounds. "I came home in January of 1970. "I did not experience the night ter- Shrapnel. Some of it worked its way back to Washington, D.C. My folks rors or any of that, or if I had them. out. some is still with me. I've got a had moved while I was in Nam. I they were at first and I don't piece in my thumb and some little didn't know what I wanted to do so I remember now. I was startled by loud pieces in my knee. I was wounded on was substitute teaching in an elemen- noises and surprises, the classic January 10th and on January 11th, tary school in a Washington suburb veteran's problem. I think all of us the movie they showed at base camp and taking graduate courses in educa- who spent time in combat and at risk was Green Berets, John Wayne doing tion at the University of Maryland. feel some guilt for surviving it all. I his macho best and there I was. And, The University had some federal fed a second sort, for being wounded no doubt, there was a training film funding for people who were in (what turned out to be) insignificantly somewhere to tell me what I should terested in being teachers. When I when people I was with were have done instead of what I did do. Three days and I was back. An outpatient. "I went back to artillery. I stayed on the guns until somebody saw that I'd graduated from college and could do math and put m° in the fire direction center. I did that 'til the end of April and somebody else found I'd majored in English. Most of the guys over there weren't college graduates. I got orders to come back to base camp 1 and meet with this Colonel. I did not elo know what I had done. I got into his office. There were other officers there and they were asking questions like, `Could I write ?' Did I feel competent in English ?' Could I use a camera?' and I evidently answered like they wanted because shortly after I got called again to go back to base camp V and begin writing for the division newspaper and public information office. "Basically, we wrote positive, color- ful, pleasant articles about the war. We wrote about American GIs who were teaching Vietnamese people AN. -- English, about American physicians Bert Allen in the back seat of an OV10 "Bronco," October 5, 1969, for a mission along the and dentists who were ut:ng their Cambodian border. .18 Now and Then /15 PROFILES wounded severely and then I had the opportunity to leave the artillery and Juanita Quillen feet, I said, "What's going on? What to go to a less hostile setting. is it?" They said, "Come on, get in "We who fought the Vietnam War U.S. Army Nurse this foxhole." That was our initiation tend to think it was different from 1941 to 1947 to the beach. Of course we lived in other U.S. wars. Therewereage dif- foxholes after that. We dug foxholes ferences, time at risk differences. Overseas assignment: and we sandbagged and the operating Research suggests that the average Italy, Sicily, North Africa room tent was set up. People coming Vietnam veteran was 19, the average in who were woundedwereplaced World War II veteran was 26. Nine- When a group of Vietnam veterans on litters on the outside of the tent, teen is still adolesence in our society. set up a rap group at the Alcohol maybe 50 at a time. We'd take them Those who went through the regular Treatment Unit of the Mountain as we could get to them." rites of passage in the 60s are Home Veterans Administration Quillen cared for soldiers with every generally becoming more conservative hospital in 1985, one of the staff imaginable injury. "Mutilation of all as time goes abng. Many of the nurses wanted to sit in The vets ob- kinds, arms and legs and eyes and Vietnam veterans have moved to the jected. They thought her presence bodies and we had a lot of infections left. Me, for one. I'm not just for would cramp their style, certainly their because we didn't have the antibiotics nuclear disarmament, I'm for total language. What would this woman that we have now." It is only when disarmament, I don't care about old enough to be their mother under- she talks of the injuries that she has bilateral disarmament, if it takes stand about their experience in war? seen thathervoice quivers a bit. She unilateral disarmament, then I'm all The nurse, Juanita Quillen, per- moves on to describe the work of the for it.If I am a good person then I sisted, and from the time the group 15th Evacuation Hospital. am going to try to be a good person began meeting, she participated. She "We did what they called leapfrog. regardless of the economic system understood more than they could We set up a hospital behind the lines under which I find myself or the have imagined. And because of the and as the men pushed on and the pontical system under which I have to group she has learned more about lines moved farther away another live.I don't believe any transient inter- herself than sheeverimagined. hospital would leapfrog us and be national conflict or political stance is A veteran of World War II, Juanita closer again. Therewerefour of us worth losing people's lives over. The Quillen lived under fire on the that would leapfrog each other as the people we fought against in World beachhead at Anzio, Italy. Like many lines moved forward. War II are now our strongest allies Vietnam veteransherwartime ex- The unit replaced by Quillen at and trade partners and the people we perience caused her problems that she Anzio had been bombed, with many fought with 40 years ago are our did not recognize for years. In fact, nurses and patients losing their lives. most significant enemies. It doesn't her scars remained hidden until she Her unit did not lose any nurses, make sense." began attending the Monday night but, "They shelled almost contin- (N&T: What about Hitler's genocide sessions for Vietnam veterans on the uously. They weren't shooting at us, against the Jews or Pearl Harbor...) Alcohol Treatment unit. they were shooting over us. At the "Whatever else you can say about Sitting in the dappled shade of the Navy. Theywerefiring back and forth we-were still killing to stop killing pleasant grounds of the VA hospital, and we were sitting in the middle of and it is like spanking the six-year-old she remembers a time of her life that it. You sometimes would be walking to get him to stop hitting the four- she does not usually care to recall or in the area, from one tent to another, year-old. We teach violence, we teach discuss. She is a well-spoken, trim and that tent would suddenly disap- corporal ways of responding to other woman in her 60s who remains com- pear before you could get to it.It people from the time our children are posed throughout the interview. But would be hit. tiny. Then they get more violence she describes a highly stressful time. "The bombers were not really after from the media, our folk heroes, our She's willing to share her story now the hospitals. They were after am methods of discipline. We teach them because she believes her experience munition. Wewereshelled one time very well that if you don't like then and now might be useful to because they saw us taking ammuni- something somebody else does, you others, especially to Vietnam tion crates into the hospital to use as respond in a corporal way and in time veterans. fuel to burn. They thought wewere of war, that is killing. I've had When the Japanese bombed Pearl harboring ammunition. Some of our enough." Harbor in 1941, Juanita Quillen, a patientswerewounded." native of Bluff City, Tennessee, was After three months of living under finishing nursing school in Abingdon, constant fire, Quillen's unit moved on Virginia. As soon as she could, she to North Africa, then into Sicily. Bert Allen does speak of his and joined the Army. "I didn't know what "Patton was going like a house afire others' experiences in Vietnam for wa, was all about and I thought it through Sicily." She says that General classes and other interested groups. wouid be interesting," she says. Patton's forces "went so fast that they He can be reached through Milligan "We landed in Anzio and theywere couldn't keep the supply lines up with College. shelling when we got there. Shrapnel us. Thereweretimes when we'd go was falling, it was red-hot. I had no for several days without food." Yet, Jo Carson idea what it was. I was looking at all the medical company would continue these things landing all around our working. 16/Now and Then ID PROFILES

Though she speaks of her ex- that "most of the symptoms of post come back and they're forced to go to periences calmly, she admits that she .traumatic stress disorder do not calm a group they don't want to go to. But was scared all the time. But she also down until you deal with it.It only most of them, after they go a few remembers her wartime service as the goes_away when you take it out and times will say it's one of the biggest most exciting time of her life. "I can say 'this is a problem' and then deal helps they've had. empathize with Vietnam veterans on with it." "One of the things I hear more this. You can never again find She did not expect to gain insights often than anything else is, 'you mean anything as exciting as living under from her work here. She had worked other people felt this way? I thought I fire.I only lived under fire for three in psychiatric facilities in California was the only one and I thought I was months but I could never be happy and Texas where she spent 27 years crazy.' It gives them a chance to see or satisfiedwith a mundane job. and raised a family. She came back that this is not craziness, it is You crave excitement. It takes you a to East Tennessee in 1981 to take something they learned as 4 means of long time to settle down. If you ever care of her mother. That was when defending themselvessurvival do. It changes your life. she started working at the Mountain tacticsand they have not been able "I know where Vietnam veterans Home VA Hospital. to change." are coming from, their complaints "They asked me if I'd be interested She believes survival tactics and really ring a bell with me." Quillen ia working over here in the Alcohol distrust of government, two symptoms produces a Xeroxed sheet. "I brought Treatment Unit. I said, 'Yes, if you of PTSD often experienced by Viet- along some of the symptoms of post don't have any Vietnam veterans.'" nam veterans, make readjustment es- traumatic stress." She explains that She laughs and says she told the per- pecially difficult. post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) sonnel office, "'I can't cope with Viet- "They're paying for something they is the long-term result of life- nam veterans.' did not ask for. It's wrecked the lives threatening circumstances. PTSD "I changed. They began to talk and of a lot of men. They've gone emerges in survivors of any traumatic I began to hear what they were say- through marriage after marriage. event including a war, earthquake, ing." They've become alcoholics, they've flood or rape. Symptoms often do not She believes in the work that goes gotten on drugs. they've medicated surface until years afte; the tauma. on in Building 37. It's a brick structure themselves so they could I Jrget some Recognition and treatment of PTSD that looks just like most of the others of these things. They're pushing it has been focused on Vietnam on the grounds of the 85 year old back and it keeps coming out because veterans, but veterans of other wars hospital. A detoxification program in it's not dead yet. It's serious stuff." are not exempt, as Juanita Quillen the lower part of the buiding is for Because she works at the VA, Quillen has learned. sobering up the vets. If they wish for aces only the most troubled veterans, She traces her finger down the list further treatment they can then enter not the majority who have had few of nearly 20 symptoms that can show the 32 bed Alcohol Treatment Unit problems readjustingbut she knows up, including depression, anxiety and upstairs where they usually stay four that many others are still suffering. flashbacks. She pauses at one. "I to six weeks. "I just wish that more Vietnam withdrew from crowds. I can One of the most positive parts of veterans knew that there's help. They remember sitting in meetings, I had a the treatment for Vietnam veterans, shouldn't go off and try to hide what fear, an overwhelming fear. Quillen thinks, is the rap group. She they feel, but they should talk to " Difficu4 with authority figures.' I explains that there are no professional peopleand the best people to talk to experienced a lot of this when I came counselors at the sessions, only are other Vietnam veterans. back. I had been doing these things Vietnam vets (except for herself, but "They've suffered long enough. I all the time and I didn't particularly she contributes only her presence, not would like to see Vietnam veterans appreciate someone telling me how to her advice). "It's a. lay group." she ex- come into their own." do it. plains. "There are five or six Vietnam Juanita Quillen knows it's never too "Another thing I had a hard time veterans who have volunteered who late. Because of the rap group at the withand still have a hard time h-we been aole to stay off booze and Alcohol Treatment Unit, she has withis emotional distances from put their lives together. They come learned about and begun to change people. I don't think I've cried for over and talk with these men and tell long standing problems of her own years. them how they feel and what has stemming from her wartime ex- "'The inability to talk about war ex- helped them. They say. 'now I did perience more than 40 years ago. periences.' I'd mention odds and ends this, I don't know if it will help you of things that happened but I think but I'm going to share it with you.' Pat Arnow I've told you more today than I've Some of them have been on this unit. told anyone about what happened. I "We have 10 Vietnam veterans on really don't want to talk about it, even the ward at present and they are an now I don't." angry group of men. Most of them Hyperalertness and sleep distur- did not want to go into the group. I bances were two problems she had think if it were not mandatory we that faded over the years, she says, would not get a group together. The but she notes that time is not the consensus this last week was that they curative that heals the wounds of war. were forced to go to a war that they She knows from her own experience didn't want to fight and now they 20 Now and Then/17 PROFILES

Tullahoma, the town nearest Camp Forrest, did not welcome black soldiers from the base. "It was a small town, you know. They didn't let us downtown after 6 p.m. We could go during the day if we were shopping. We had to be buying something. `Course we did have places we could Linnard Simmons go in the black section." Simmons also encountered prob- U.S. Army lems as a result of segregation when 1942 to 1945 he traveled home on furloughs. "On the trains, they put us on the first Overseas Assignment: coach where the smoke from the Northern Ireland, engine was the worst. They used coal Belgium, France, on locomotives back then, and the smoke was awful. Then on the buses, Germany we had to sit in the back where the service during World War II. Despite motor was, where it was the hottest." Jon esborough, Tennessee, resident protests from black leaders such as A. Or,-2, during a stop-over in Chat- Linnard N. Simmons, along with Phillip Randolph, Walter White of the tanooga, Simmons ran into trouble more than a million other black men NAACP, and Judge William Hastie, with two policemen and three MPs. "I and women, served in the United the military continued to con,orm to just went into the bus station to get States military forces during World "established soda! custom." me a magazine. Those policemen and War II. Drafted into the Army on General George C. Marshall sum- the MPs, they came-up and asked August 1, 1942, Simmons marized the prevailing attitude when me, 'What you doing in here, boy?' remembers, "When I was called, I he commented a few days before I'm 6 feet 5 inches tall, a. -4 they're was proud. It was my country. IfI Pearl Harbor that "the settlement of calling me 'boy.' " couldn't fight for my country, then I vexing racial problems cannot be per- "I didn't know I was doing wrong should be in some other country. I mitted to complicate the tremendous to be in there. See, that big waiting felt good about it.I helped do the task of the War Department." room was for the whites. We had just job. I helped win the war." Linnard Simmons states that he a little pigeon-hole waiting room in A quiet, friendly man with short was not really too aware of the con- the back." gray hair and a neatly trimmed gray troversy over segregation when he Simmons runs one hand over his mustache, Simmons looks younger first entered the army. "I didn't think close-cut gray hair. "They told me to than his 66 years. He still has the much about it at the time, but later get my magazine and get on out of soldier's ramrod posture, and he still onoverseasthen I started to think there." His voice deepens. "That deserves the ni,* .iames of Slim, about it some." Even on the battle- made me feel bad. Real bad. Here I Stringbean and Streamline. field, black troops remained am a soldier getting ready to go fight He grew up on farms near Forest segregated in their own units. Most for my country, and there's places I City, North Carolina, and Fairdale, served as support personnel, not as can't go to buy a magazine." West Virginia. After two years with combat soldiers. When he did make it overseas in the Civilian Conservation Corps, he "Somewhere along the line, late November, 1943, Linnard moved to Johnson City, Tennessee. Governor Bilbo of Mississippi said that Simmons acquitted himself with He was working at Charles Depart- black soldiers iidn't have sense honor. He earned four battle stars, a ment Store on Main Street when his enough to use modern American Good Conduct medal, the World War draft notice came. weapons. But in the Battle of the II Victory ribbon, the European- At Camp Forrest, Tennessee, near Bulge, during the breakthrough at African-Middle Eastern ribbon, the Tullahoma, Simmons went through Bastogne, there were black tank bat American Theater service ribbon, and basic training. As at all other military talions and black truck drivers that a Presidential Citation for bravery. installations throughout the United went down through those cities that "The only time I was really scared States, black troops were segregated were on fire, that were bombed. was on D-Day. That's the time I from white. "We had our own com- "General Omar Bradley said that wanted Mama. Now, I didn't have a panies, but we had white commis- the Negroesat that time we were mama. She died when I was eight sioned officers, three white lieutenants `Negroes,' now we're blacksBradley months old. But ifI could've called and a white captain. From the first said that the Ncgroes did have sense Mama, I would've called her then." sergeant on down, everybody else enough to use the modern Am,..,can Approaching Normandy Beach by was black. We had our own mess hall weapons. That made us feel good." ship around 4 a.m. on.the morning of and our own drill field. We weren't While he prefers not to concentrate June 6, Simmons saw a pre-dawn sky allowed to mix with the whiles." on those experiences, Simmons did that was "almost as bright as broad S,:paration of the races was stan- face discrimination during his military open day. All those shells and bombs dard policy in all branches of the service. and tracers going off. About 10:00 18/Now and Then PROFILES

97, Michigan, Simmons has remained in

9 rt Tennessee. He worked at Range Motors in Johnson City from 1946 until he left for Michigan. Between 1958 and- 1984, he was employed by the U.S. Postal Service. Retired now, he keeps busy with fishing, gardening, his coin collection, and his handicrafts. He enjoys re- laxing at home with his wife Dorothy, whom he married in 1947, and with his two daughters and five grandchildren. Looking back, Simmons believes that his years in the army had a beneficial effect on his life. wouldn't have gotten the job at the post office ifI hadn't been a veteran." Simmons sees many positive changes in the military and in American society as a whole since World War II. He believes that the honorable service of black men and women like himself helped bring about those changes. The desegrega- L tion of the armed forces, for example, began in the late 1940s by order of President Harry S. Truman. "Back then, during the war, we Linnird Simmons shows his woodworking in his Jonesborough home. only had one black general, Benjamin our soldiers had the Germans on the enemy fire. His legs are scarred from Davis. We had a few black colonels move. I got off the boat about 1:30 shrapnel wounds he received a few and captains and a few lieutenants. or 2:00 that afternoon." days after D-Day. Now we've got generals and admirals Simmons landed with the first truck After more than a year of service in and people going to West Point." company supplying the front line battlefield areas where danger had He does not express any bitterness troops. "I was a truck driver an the become routine, Simmons found it at having served in a segregated `Red Ball Express.' I hauled ammo fairly difficult to settle back down to army. "Some people treated us nice and gas and food to the 101st and civilian life again. even in those days." He mentions "an the 82nd Airborne. I followed them No special parades or welcoming old. old white lady" who once with supplies all through Europe." ceremonies marked his return. "In stopped to chat with him and his Often, he also ferried troops to and France now, we had a big parade brother when they were home on from the front. "They'd fight a week, there. Two or three black companies furlough. "We had our uniforms on, then get three days' rest. We carried and some Polish and Yugoslavian and she said, 'This is two nice tall them out and then carried them back soldiers we had liberated from Ger- young men.' She got in between us, to the battle again. Sometimes I've man prison camps paraded through walked about a block out of her way had to drive the dead men behind the Soissons. But I never had a parade in talking to us. lines to the cemeteries, and I've America. We had won the war, and ! "That made us feel proud. We hauled German prisoners to the POW guess they had already started to were soldiers doing our part. All of camps. Coming and going, men and forget about us by then." us, we did our part in that war, and suppliesit was a full load every After his discharge, Simmons we played a good part, too." time." returned to Tennessee. He had With the Third Army at the Battle planned to live in Baltimore near his Judy Odom of the Bulge Simmons was cut off for sister, but after he got there a bag nine days and nights by German containing clothes and war souvenirs Judy Odom teaches English at forces encircling the Allies. Finally, was stolen from his sister's apartment. Science Hill High School in Johnson General Omar Bradley's First Army "I knew I didn't want to live there. City. She won the Sherwood smashed through the German lines, Not in that kind of place. Anyhow, Anderson aware for fiction in 1906 halting their desperate drive toward I'm a country boy and I missed the and 1987. Her work has appeared in Antwerp and preparing the way for mountains and the small towns." CrescentReview, Homewords, the Allied advance to the Rhine. Except for three years working at a Mississippi Arts and Iefters and Simmons frequently came under Chevrolet assembly plant9 in Flint, Now and Then. Now and Then/19 PROFILES

College campus in East Tennessee. "I think it was eight or nine," a ten- north and Colombia, South America tative voice answers from the back of to the south. The countries include the hall. Belize (British Honduras), Guatemala, "Wrong," Evans barks. It was a Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, David Evans million and a half. One and one-half Costa Rica and Panama. Most were U.S. Marines million "ietnamese women were killed colonized in the 17th Century by in Nan. Spain with the exception, of course, 1969 to 1971 More murmurs from the students. of British Honduras. In the beginning Overseas assignment: They really don't know whether or each of the countries was supported not to believe him. Most of the by large plantations that were run by Vietnam students have already surmised that slave labor. Today most of these this lean young man had a bone to countries are poor and the big planta- December, 1970. Quangtri pick. And they were still in diapers on tions have been replaced by large Province, Vietnam. the day Evans was nearly blown away foreign interests. Today David Evans, 18, of in a jungle ambush. Most of what The average income in Nicaragua is Charleston, West Virginia, will lose his they've heard about the war in Viet- $870 per year. The average per legs to a flying mass of enemy steel in nam is what they've read in books or capita income in El Salvador is $710. a jungle ambush. seen in Rambo movies. Many of those living in Central The average Viet Cong ambush Hot damn! Rambo movies. Another America go to bed at night hungry. lasts about 14 secondsjust long sore spot with David Evans. "Hunger is a form of terrorism," enough for the enemy to empty a "You know what Sly (Sylvester) Evans says. "Revolution and civil war Russian-made AK-47 automatic rifle. Stallone was doing during the Viet- are battles between the 'haves' and The victims see little except flashes of nam War?" he asks. the 'have-nots.'" light deep in the snake-infested More murmuring from the audience The "haves," according to Evans, jungle. That is, if they live long of students. are the U.S. corporations who have enough to see anything. "He was a gym teacher at a girls' interests in CentrAmerica (such as Today seven men out of a nine school in Switzerland, on a 4-F defer- The United Fruit Company) and the man patrol will lie dead on the ment from the draft. How could he heads of the native governments who molding jungle floor. Barely alive, know anything about Vietnam?" keep them in operation. David Evans has walked on his own The draft? Oh, yes. The draft. The "The same thing happened in Viet- two legs for the last time. students know about the draft. That's nam at the beginning of that war," when you have to join the Army even Evans says. "The United States He has seen what war can do, he if you don't want to. But the students government knew Ho Chi Minh walks on artificial legs. His experience are young with no point of reference. would never allow the big U.S. cor- has made him compassionate and The draft ;s as foreign to them as porations to continue their operations given him purpose. Now 35 years old Civil War bounties are to their if he should take over the govern- and living in Elk View, West Virginia, parents. But things may not always be ment. So American troops were sent David Evans works fitting prosthetic so serene and that is what Evans says in to protect American interests. The arms and legs on those who have lost he is speaking to further American same thing will happen in Central limbs His experience in war has also involvement in an area of the world America if things go on the way they inspired him to become an outspoken which could turn into another Viet- have been." critic of U.S. foreign policy in Central nam and another draft. Economics is the reason, Evans America. These activities have Evans was 17 when he enlisted in says, that the U.S. presently supports -brought him to his work directing the the Marine Corps in 1969. "I was the Contras rather than the Sandinista prosthetic program of Medical Aid for apolitical at the time," he says. But government under President Daniel El Salvador, a non-prefi4 group that two months after being shipped to Ortega in Nicaragua. He says living provides medical aid to war victims of Vietnam he concluded that the conditions for Nicaraguans have ac- that revolution-slashed portion of the American presence thcre was wrong. tually improved under the Sandinista world. And in the months following his government, but at some expense to When Evans is not fitting artificial wound, he strengthened his resolve. American interests. "The charge that limbs to victims of war, he travels But he quickly adds that his newly- Nicaragua is actually a Communist across America speaking out in op- formed opinions of American foreign country is untrue. Nicaragua is a position to U.S. foreign policy in policy did not make him socialist country and the United States Central America. There are many anti-American. dominates every Central American reasons he believes America should "I still believed in the old axiom: country except Nicaragua." back off. A chilling repeat of the Viet- My country, right or wrong, my coun- Evans detests what he calls the nam War is one of those reasons. try." `Reagan-Rambo' mentality; a militant view that he feels permeates America "How many women were killed in What most Americans know as today. Evans says he is a Vietnam?" David Evans asks his au- Central America is a strip of seven humanitarian and not a militarist. But dience of students on the Milligan countries bordered by Mexico on the he does not call for a total pullout 20/Now and Then 23 PROFILES from Cer:tral America. "I believe the how to work and how to survive, I United States should remain in Cen- guess that helped me a lot." she tral America to administer Geneva Jenkins reflects. "Learning how to make do humanitarian aid, contingent on peace with what you have, that helped too." talks," he says. U.S. Army After briefly attending a three-room 1941 to 1947 grammar school in nearby Jones David Evans shows slides of his Cove, Jenkins, with the help of Central American patients to the Overseas assignment: Presbyterian Home Mission Workers, students at Milligan College. The color Philippines won a scholarship to the Asheville, images are murky and out of focus; North Carolina, Normal School and clearly the work of an amateur On April 29, 1942, two seaplanes was a boarding student there from the photographer. But the tragedy of the floated on a lake on the southern second through the -12th grade. After victims shows through clearly. Philippine island of Mindanao and graduation, the young woman re- There is a 15-year-old girl with only prepared for take-off. The two aircraft sived her nurse's training at Knox- a stump, where a shapely leg used to had made the increasingly hazardous ville General Hospital. She stayed on be. flight over thousands of miles of as an employee for a year. There she There is a farmer who lost both a Japanese territory from Australia in gained experience in caring for pa- leg and an arm. But this is not his order to evacuate 24 U.S. Army tients with contagious diseases, ex- only tragedy. His entire family was nurses from Corregidor, a tiny island perience that proved valuable during wiped out in a bombing raid. in Mani! Bay where the United her time in the tropics of the Philip- And there is a little girlperhaps States made its last unsuccessful stand pines. eight or nine years oldwith no arms against the Japanese. The day before, In 1941, Jenkins was a Red Cross at all. the nurses and crew had flown from nurse. Red Cross nurses gave their Then the lights go out. There is a Corregidor to Mindanao where they services in times of disaster and also major power failure over the entire had spent the night. Now they were were among the first to be called-into areaeven in Johnson City. Evans about to depart on the long trip back service in time of war. And so it hap- continues his talk for perhaps ten to Australia and safety. Among the 12 pened that six months before the minutes more in the darkness. Then nurses on the first plane scheduled to American entry into World War II, he suggests the gathering break up. take off was First Lieutenant Geneva Jenkins was drafted into the Army One student looks at the other and Jenkins, a 31 yeaL old Tennessee and stationed at Sternberg Hospital in slyly says, "Maybe Rambo pulled the native. Manila. Shortly after the attack on switch." As Jenkins' craft started to gain Pearl Harbor in December, she was speed, it hit a rock protruding out of sent to the Bataan Peninsula across After the jungle ambush in the lake's surface, puncturing a hole the Manila Bay from the capital city. December. 1970, David Evans was in the seaplane's body. The nurse and As the Japanese overran Bataan the taken to the hospital ship 'Sanctuary' her colleagues escaped by climbing beginning of April, Jenkins and other where both his mangled legs were out onto the wing of the plane. Five American troops were evacuated to removed by surgeons. During his long minutes later the craft sank. "We were the island of Corregidor where they recovery he was thinking how lucky lucky to get out," recalls Jenkins. stayed until that aborted flight to he was to be alive. In May, 1971, he Meanwhile, the second craft, loaded Australia. received his prosthetic legs at the to capacity, took off. On that plane After Japanese troops captured the Philadelphia Naval Hospital. He was was Jenkins' older sister, Ressa. marooned nurses on Mindanao in lucky again. "I had no trouble The 12 stranded nurses sought May of 1942, the soldiers took their learning to walk again," he says. refuge for a time with Filipino nurses prisoners by freighter down to Davao, But he also had plenty of time to in a hospital on the island and nur- a port city on the island. There think about the Vietnam War and its tured hopes that another American Jerkins' two chief memories are of victims. And the more he thought, plane would come and rescue them. sleeping on the floor of a schoolhouse the more he disagreed with America's But no plane appeared, presumably and of the odd sensation of being ac- actions in Vietnam. And then, 15 because it had become impossible to companied by an armed Japanese years later, in El Salvador. fly over so much enemy territory. soldier on a shopping expedition. In He knew he wanted to do Along with her fellow nurses, Jenkins September, the nurses were something. There were the victims to was captured by the Japanese and transporter;. again by freighter, back care for and his feeling of deja vu spent nearly three years as a prisoner up to Manila. "No provisions were concerning American foreign policy in of war. made for us," says Jenkins. "No beds Central America also haunted him. Geneva Jenkins was one of 13 or anything, no place to take a bath." Medical Aid for El Salvador has given children born to John and Caldona Once in Manila, Geneva and the him the opportunity to be both a Jenkins, a couple descended in part other nurses were detained with humanitarian and a political activist. from the Cherokee, who lived on a civilians. mostly women and children, 20-acre farm in Sevier County. It was at the 16th century campus of the Ed Price not a financially secure childhood, but University of Santo Tomas. the skills she acquired proved useful Jenkins reports that compared with during her time as a POW. "Knowing 24 Now and Then/21 PROFILES

other military POWs in the Philip- her mainstays during her internment. No one knows what being a POW is pines, the Army nurse conditions As the war wore on, food was in like unless you have experienced it were "much better." Still, their short supply. The prisoners, says yourself." Still, she argues with physical conditions were spartan. The Jenkins, lived on lice and a kind of feeling, "They should have retired Tennessee first lieutenant shared a dried fish with a scent that reminded every one of us. We were in no room with about 50 other prisoners. the Tennesseean of skunk. "The last physical condition to go back to work. "You, had no privacy," she recalls. year we had very little food. If it had Every, one of us. It affected our health "We had beds in there, makeshift lasted a few mote months, I wouldn't and our life. Three years, starving and beds. We had showers. You had to be living," she'states matter-of-factly. under such conditions. They should take showers with everybody, no "At the end, !Km only got one cup of have retired every one of us." privacy. And no hot water. But it was rice twice a day. That was all." The In 1947 she did retire on disability in the tropics, it was warm, so that American POWs were freed as U.S. as her severe and chronic bronchitis was OK," she concludes. troops under General MacArthur re- worsened. After caring for her father Most military prisoners in the Philip- took Manila in mid-February of 1945. back in Tennessee for two years, pines were treated brutally. The Army "I shook hands with him," Jenkins Jenkins returned to the warmer nurse speculates that she escaped reports. At the time, the five foot four climate of Los Angeles, and con- sttah cruelty largely because of her and a half inch woman weighed only sidered furthering her nursing studies profession. "The Japanese didn't 88 pounds. "Now I couldn't get my at a local university. But her Molest us or bother us. They leg into the clothes I wore," she respiratory problems prevented her respected us because we were nurses. jokes. from enrolling. Today, 76-year old They respect nurses in their country," After her release, she continued Geneva Jenkins, a generous woman she explains. "Even on the road trips, nursing for the United States military with a sense of humor, still lives in they never bothered us. The in Manila for a few weeks until relief Los Angeles. In 1983, she finally Japanese soldiers used to ask us to arrived. During that period, the received recognition for her wartime do something for their ailments. We Japanese shelled the university. The service once again when she and told them we have no medicine." hospital where Jenkins was working about 30 other nurses who were Nevertheless the prisoners often lived that day escaped the attack un- former POWs were invited to the in fear. They especially dreaded other scathed. But her living quarters sus- White House. She flew first class to detainees' escape attempts. "Wewere tained se )us damage. Many of the Washington, was met by an honor scared," she admits. "The Japanese recently released civilian POWs guard, and spoke with both President could come in any time of the night perished. "They killed many of the Reagan and Senator Howard Baker. and search us and make us get out of people and blew their arms and legs "Going through that experience bed if anyone jumped over the wall off," she says quietly. makes you understand many things," around the university." Finally, on February 28 Jenkins Jenkins remarks. "It makes you ap- All the prisoners had assigned jobs, was sent stateside. Almost imme- preciate what you have and under- tasks such as growing vegetablesor diately she suffered an attack of bron- stand people that don't have things." cleaning. Jenkins', not surprisingly, chitis and was hospitalized in North She discounts any lasting emotional was at the hospital tending to civilian Carolina. After her discharge from the effects of her traumatic wartime ex- prisoners suffering mainly from hospital, she was granted two weeks perience. She insists, "We're normal. tropical diseases such as malaria. leave and the Army sent her to stay The experience didn't bother us. No, Once she had to care for a high- at the Grove Park Inn in Asheville. it doesn't bother me. It's like a bad ranking Japanese officer. "I had to The former POW had a chauffeured dream." But she allows that take care of him. I didn't like itone car and each day had flowers and "everybody didn't take it the same bit," she asserts. "But what could I fruit delivered to her room. To the way. It still bothers them." And she do?" The American nurses worked Normal School graduate, it was a acknowledges that personally, "I don't long hours, doing their best despite dream come true. In her student want to relive it.I want to forget it, the considerable difficulties inherent in days, she says, "We used to walk try to live in the present." working in the tropics during wartime. over and look at the place. And I Knowing what she knows now, Medicines and supplies became in- wished someday I'd be able to stay would she have chosen to go into the creasingly hard to obtain. Andonce, there." service? "I think so," she answers. Jenkins recollects, she was ordered to Such pampering came to an abrupt "That was quite an experience. I report for duty the day after a end when she was ordered to report wouldn't want to have it again," she. typhoon. Taking care to dodge the for work ar a military hospital in San stresses with a laut:4- "But I wouldn't poisonous snakes, she waded to the Francisco. Her military superiors and want to miss having it. hospital through water up to her co-workers knew of her wartime hi- "That experience," she points out waist. carceration, but "it made no dif- simply, "that was my life." Often when her shift was over, she ference," she states. "They told us, borrowed a book from the University 'that's all over now. And you'resup- Jane Harris Woodside library. "I did much reading. That posed to carry on.' Nobody cared." In helped to pass the time a little, to an understatement, she terms such an Folklorist Jane Woodside is re- forget all about the problems." Her attitude as "unhelpful," but adds searching traditional crafts in reading and her faith, she says, were philosophically, "That's the way it is. Appalachia. 22/Now and Then 25 Joe divorced his wife three years after his discharge. freeing her for normality. having no desire left and no way to satisfy it,u.'. en if he had. Learning to walk The Other again was the hardest, but he uses his hooks like some finely programmed robot. Looking at the Purple Heart in its dark walnut frame, he wonders why that booby trap Vietnam Vet waited so long to blowonly three short weeks to go three damn weeks when he walked-into that son-of-a-bitch. It had been hell being a grunt, still was. A stunted Susan Roper grunt at that. now. Instead of a 60 pound rucksack and all the weapons he could carry, he lugs around a plastic Mike sits and stares at stark green wails, waiting prosthetic and metal hands and tries hard to stay busy. for the orderly to leave the room so he can rip off his clothes and feel free. His wounded mind never The other Vietnam vet questions why he came home in one heals. like the sores in his nose as he blows and piece, why he paid no higher price for our defeat. All blows, a stench of death never leaving his nostrils. those mortar rounds he fired left him slightly deaf, but Between blinks, he counts bodies, padding the total sometimes when smelling the rice his wife cooks, he can for the brass, as the roar of the bulldozer deafens hear those pots rattling at dusk as the South Vietnamese him, jerking his body with each load of dirt pushed soldiers stoked up their cook fires, bringing terror to in the ditch. His family quit visiting, his curses their allies and attention from the enemy, and he shivers. too much to bear. A Silver Star sits on a dresser, He and his closest buddies exchanged Christmas cards for tarnished brown, and he doesn't even remember what the first few years, but they dwindled until the last one it stands for or how to wish or how to say a prayer. was returned, "Addressee Unknown." A Bronze Star lies packed away somewhere in the attic. Perhaps one day. he The other vet sleeps soundly, dreaming of bluefish will show it to his grandson and try to explain to him running in the surf, catching them two at a time. why it is important for a man Occasionally, a nightmare creeps in. notifying him to be as good a soldier as he can. to leave for another tour, but dawn brings a peace for my husband and end to that war before it is begun. Standing under a hot shower for a half an hour or more, he Susan Roper is a graduate student and teaching assistant estimates the water bill, remembering how, after in the English Department at ETSU. thirty days in the field, he used to say he'd give a month's pay for just such iuxury. He checks to make sure his wife has stored a hefty supply of toilet paper in the linen closet, unable to forget there was only one small packet in his C-rations.

David lives on Food Stamps, and his kids on Welfare, while he visits the VA three times a week and goes on a pilgrimage to D.C. each Spring to touch the cold black granite. Staining the concrete with his tears, he reads names he doesn't recognize but he knows are parts of himself left somewhere in Southeast Asia. Watching TV until it goes off the air, he sucks down cigarettes and beer, never succeeding in getting drunk, or stoned, even when he smokes all the dope his friends sometimes bring over. Wearing his jungle fatigues, he cleans his stolen M-16 each night, caressing it like a lover, while his wife sleeps alone in their bed.

The other vet works nine to five, mows the lawn every Saturday and teaches Sunday School to those his senior. He and his wife go camping-and as they drink hot cocoa I- by firelight, he talks about lonely watches on Whiskey =, Mountain and the waiting; how he.marked oi his short- 2 timer's calendar.day by day the last three months of his duty; and how he tried to stay sane L'fantasizing about I the real world with guys in his squad. Crawling into a single sleeping bag, they make love past midnight. When he falls asleep, he knows his life was sustained by God; Sp4 Mervin Miller, Venn, Pennsylvania, First Engineering Battalion, by fudge and cookies sent from home, by stacks of letters First Infantry Division, searches for Vietcong or VC supplies in a tunnel every mail call from Momma, Daddy, sisters, and brother. c plex southwest of Lai Khe, January 3, 1969. Being a "tunnel rat" we. one i.f the most dangerous jobs in Vietnam.

j Now andThen/23 3111

Carson H. Whitehead, a Spanish American War veteran, (third left) is a member of the honor guard at the funeral of assassinated President William McKinley. 1901. A native of Butler. Tenlessee, Whitehead had 15 children. One daughter. Sara Sellers and all of his seven sons served in the military.

Sgt. Sara Sellers, one of only 12 female chief master sergeants in the Air Force, meets President Lyndon Baines Johnson at White House ceremony honoring the first Congressional Medal of Honor winner of Vietnam, 1965.

Above: Bert Allen at Cu Chi Base Camp, Cu Chi, Vietnam, Fall 1969. Identity card of David Punter in German Right: Bob (.illy near Cu Chi. Viet- prisoner of war camp, Stalag Luft III, nam, 1968, with his monkey, Sagan, Germany. 1944, and David .4" Punter during a more cheerful time, at a Whiskey. nightclub in New York. 24/Now and Then i.

7111114tSiga. ***4. 41At1.. Bert Allen examines a silk map of Vietnam. Johnson City. Tennessee, 1987. Sara Sellers spent 30 years in the military, then returned to her home of Carter County. Tennessee. She is now a senior at ETSU, majoring in political science. She is also the First Vice President of the Carter County Republican Women, shown here at a meeting presenting a cake to guest speaker, Mark Reynolds. WJHL-TV weatherman, 1987.

Volunteer Vietnam veteran rap group leaders for the Alcohol Treatment Unit of the Veterans Administration Medical Center at Mountain Home receive outstanding service awards at a dinner in their honor. 1987. From Louise and David Punier at an ex- Prisoners of War left to right, psychologist John Flake, center director Jonathan Fitts, meeting. Johnson City. Tennessee. 1987. psychologist Steve Giles and volunteers James Hale. Bob Lilly. Glen Lewis. Charles Guiterrez.

You haven't lived until you have almost died, for those who have fought for it, Bob Gillooly, Johnson City, Tennessee, found this poem life has a special meaning that the protected will neverwritten on a napkin in the enlisted men's club of the 25th know. Grunt '69-70 Infantry at Camp Frenzell Jones, Vietnam.

Now and Then/25 Green Fields Turned Red by a soldier

You cannot buy the return of my without the eyes of the brass looking thing that I am pushing and pulling patronage with your final acceptance over their shoulders all the time, but into the back of the chopper. of a black granite wall. they paid for this isolation from the I had been taught how to fly an brass by having to try to sleep in the UH-1D in the event that no one of The heat would always wake me heat of the day. One or the other was command was left to get her down. up long before time dictated I must going to get you, the brass or the Fritz had bone fragments from the rise. You could feel the weight of the heat. Don't forget about Charlie. CP's skull driven into his left shoulder hot humidity in the same manner that and neck and was losing blood at an you feel the weight of water when * * * alarming rate. I would ride left seat in you dive 10 feet down. My home was Fifteen klicks north of Camp the event that he could no longer eight six foot poles with a relatively Carroll, and there you sit with the maintain consciousness. We had ex- waterproofed tarpaulin stretched over gray matter blown from the cranial tracted a LRRP (Long Range the top of each pole and one eight cavity which had stored it and all that Reconnaissance Patrol) and were foot pole pushing up the center. The you were. If only your wife and flying with a heavy stick. sides were of mosquito netting with a children could see you now. Sorry. Fritz got us back to Camp Carroll door made of regenerated supply but your flak vest and armor around before losing consciousnesswt.,ch crates. This gave the four occupants a your co-pilot's throne did you no saved me from testing if I really could 16 by 16 foot living area. The floor service. A command from the pilot, fly an overloaded chopper with half was plywood just laid over the red Fritz, calls me forward over the the hydraulics shot away and who dirt and the furnishingsad personal headset. The cockpit is a bloody knew what other damage. The med belongings were as unruly kept as that mess. There are the CP's brains, hair, techs were there to meet us as were of a five year old's room. pieces of skin and bone, and some the crash trucks. Now why do you It was impossible to stay in the other unidentifiables plastered to the suppose they sent the crash trucks out shelter during sunup hours as the gauges, ceiling and the left side of to meet us? After helping to get Fritz temperature would reach 20 to 30 Fritz. I am to remove what is left of out of the cockpit and onto a degrees above that of the outside, the CP, which is slumped-over the stretcher, I looked around for the CP. which ran in the one hundred and cyclic and armament control stick, teens. Those that worked at night had Sculpture. "Soldier." by Tom Rascon. team and clear the faces of the gauges of leader of the Vietnam Veterans Readjustment the privilege of doing their jobs what used to be the essence of this Counseling Center in Charleston. West Virginia. and a Vietnam veteran. 26/Now and Then 2v GREEN FIELDS

There were literally hundreds and Home was no relief. This offered hundreds of VC fleeing the area any more pressure than I had ever re- way they could. This wasn't a village ceived in Nam. All the questions, the but a large swampy area. I don't whispering behind my back, the little know if they ran out of ammunition jeers and off-color remarks. I could or what, but we were taking very little not sleep and the food gave me the fire at that point and we were just runs. Everyone walked arouna with killing everyone. Cheshire cat grins pasted on and it It turned into a_carnival shoot. They was too damned cold in the house. were defenseless. There were four Every time someone would move in light fire teams working the area and the house at night, I would imme- hundreds of VC were being mowed diately come alert and reach for my down. Bodies were floating weapon, which was not there. I felt everywhere. The mass color of the like a caged animal that could no swampy area had now tumed red. longer react on its natural instincts. I Caught up in the moment, I was, in fact, out of my elem,t. remember thinking this insane After two weeks of this hell, I thought: "I am God and retribution is reported to the Air Force base that here; now; in the form of my M-60 would be my home for the remainder and the Miniguns that I take care of of my enlistment. But it would seem and the rockets that we are firing." It that the only place on this earth that I was 7. slaughter. No better than lining could feel comfortable and at ease people up on the edge of a ditch and with myself was the Nam. I asked to shooting them in the back of the be assigned to my old unit and return head. I was doing this enthusiastically. to Vietnam. They granted my request You begin at a point to understand willingly and off I went for my second how genocide takes place. A lot of tour in the same place that I had the people we were killing in the wanted to leave with so much The Marine LRRPs had thrown him morning were the same people who eagerness. out because there was no room for were killing us at night. I tried to ra- him. The lack of his body weight had tionalize that most of the people we * * * also helped us get an otherwise were wasting were the enemy. But I heavily overweight ship home. could appreciate, in a dark sort of Oh, sweet Jesus, I'm back. I am He had cnly been in-country for way, that you can take anybody, back to kill your children and I shall two weeks and with us for one. That given the right circumstances, and kill you if you present yourself in my is why he was a nameless lost soul. turn him into a wholesale killer. That's line of fire. You son-of-a-bitch, why He will only be remembered as the what I was. I did it; I did it without do you make a person like me? I will CP to me. To others he will be any tone of conviction or moral at- be the instrument of your demise as remembered as daddy. After titude. My country, which in my Buddha said, "that which you reap unloading the LRRPs, I boarded ship youth's mind was by the people, for will become the guiding force in the number three for the return flight to the people and of the people under end of your days." I know the end of retrieve the body of the CP. The area the guiding eyes of their God and all my days will be filled with the souls of was still under total enemy concentra- that is moral and right, had turned all who perished at my hand. They tion and made it impossible for the me into an unfeeling wholesale killing will stand beside my dying bed and retrieval. When we were able to get machine. killing God's children in the bid me farewell to the hell that I most into the area some eight hours later, name of that same God. deserve. I have been damned for my there was no sign of the CP or the actions and the blood will never wash Viet Cong. Hence, one more name is * * * from my hands. You send your god- impersonally added to the missing in damned ghost to my bed every night action list for the anxious review of On the same day I had been to remind me of the atrocities I have loved Ones Lack in the world. I standing at the heart of hell where committed. wonder what the VC would want with anything goes and then in a phone Why do we, the remnants of the the body of a dead American pilot, if line at the L A. Airport trying to get a honor of a land so far away, a land in fact the VC did remove the body. call through to home. There were so detached from the culture that He could have become the entree of people standing behind me in the line weaned me and all like me, and a a tiger's daily meal, or the gory and were getting impatient of me people that find the daily acceptance trophy to be exhibited at the front of trying to find my change. I ran from of torn bodies justified by 20th cen- a VC victory parade. the line without making the call and tury killing technology, wish for the when I reached a cab, I threw up. rest that only our own death can pre- * * * What was happening to me? sent to us in our need? Oh sweet 30i Now and Then/27 GREEN FIELDS

trembling lip muttered a prayer to rugaied but that was used for both Buddha. The children clung to their the enlisted personnel and officers. mothers in hopes that safety would be Our unit was close and we did not anointed to them as their fathers knelt endeavor to follow the rules in the with their elbows lashed together usual non-fraternizing ways of the behind their backs, dislocating their military establishment. We ate, drank shoulders. The America!, truth had and partied together, which also come to their village aboard the great made us a top-notch combat Init. war machines with 44 foot spinning The military machine could have blades atop. taken lessons on motivation from our It was not their wish that the VC unit and our CO. But the military is had used their village to cache their A run by bureaucrats taking orders from supplies of tyranny nor was it their more bureaucrats and we all know wish that their lives must be disrupted what a bunch of dickheads for a cause that they neither bureaucrats are. understood nor cared about. But it would be them that would pay the dr * * * ultimate price for just being there and having no control over those who It was a warm June day with the trampled their rice crops into the air filled with the sweet fragrance of mud. dogwood blossoms and the sounds of Tears filled the eyes of them all as a small Southwestern Virginia town they witnessed the burning of their coming alive. A mixed extravaganza village, their home for generations. of sounds filled my consciousness Each but was torched with no regard bringing pictures of water sprinkle.,. to the livestock within that always wetting well-manicured lawns, the dis-lived under the same roof as their tant popping of Mr. Goodman's out- proud owners. The village was laid of-tune lawn mower struggling to waste in the span of a few minutes. A death, come to me. I look for you in rotate its dull blade through the f °w minutes to obliterate that which my desires. You are all that is left for crabgrass. the echo of the mourning had endured time and monsoon for me to find my peace in. Come quick dove that had greeted me each over a century. please. the years have erased noth. g summer morning since I could "Where are these damned VC?" I but burned the wrath in more deeply. recollect. heard yelled over the sound of You fucking God, I need out. There must be a storm coming as I thatched huts burning and pigs I go back to that land in order to can hear the distant rumble of screaming from a burning death. find the end. I have to die there. I thunder echoing off the valley moun- Chiggers was holding his .45 to the have to die. Can't you people see tains. The storm is coming closer also;back of the head of the first Viet- what the hell I am talking about? the rumble has turned into separate namese male in a long line of the Can't any of you people see what any whumps as each bolt strikes. The same. "Where are your brothers, you of us are feeling or talking about? storm seems to be moving in more goddamned slope?" he yelled again You bunch of blind motherfuckers quickly than any I have witnessed until his temper broke and the old that judge me will find your throat at before. man lost his head in an explosion like my hands and your death in my eyes. My thoughts are suddenly broken shooting a watermelon with a hollow I hate you all.I hate myself, I hate. as I hear my name called over and point. The old man's daughter burst hate. hate. Fuck all of you. over. I open my eyes and see Fritz from her position with horror in her I am going back and let the bitter staring me in the face. Outside are eyes only to be cut in half by Stubs' angels of my being free on all that the sounds of artillery and mortar ex- 50 Cal. confronts me. It is too late to save plosions which sound like thunder in The killing had begun again as it this soul. I shall turn it loose on its the near distance and Fritz is calling always did and would not stop until maker and his people so maybe he for me to come on. "We have a nothing was left alive to tell the story will think twice before making one as surveillance piare down, we gotta of the coming of the Great American me again. go. Saviors. As always, the bodies and parts were thrown into a pile and * * * * * * burned with JP-4. We had lost the VC, the VC had lost a cache, and My first stop was the Club to see all The fear in their eyes radiated as the villagers lost all. of my friends that were nc,t out on the glow from the fires of hell itself. operations. The Club was a cor- Not one cry for mercy or one * * * 28/Now and Then 31 GREEN FIELDS

hear a muffled laugh born from some stainging out to the ground. I then lay sick joke, or a prayer from the lips of on my side showing the guts coming one who knows that this night will out of me in hopes that the VC give him his death. would think me dead and pass me The first mortar hit the command by. post with deadly accuracy. It would As they approached, they rum- seem that the VC had measured and maged through the belongings of all mapped the compound with great that lay dead and shot all that still precision. The second mortar came in hung onto life. Then came my turn. and leveled the dispensary. People One kicked me onto my back with a were screaming and running in all foot punt to the gut. The Marine's directions. There were bodies and guts I had borrowed splattered all parts scattered all over the compound over him and I heard him cuss from and we had only taken two hits so his bad luck. He took me for dead, far. removed my boots for himself and left Fritz was churning up the chopper me be. Somewhere in my 'possum and screaming over the explosion state I passed out. noise for all to get their asses on I came to with the sound of board pronto. I swung in behind my English-speaking people screaming M-60 without having time to get my and yelling orders around me. My helmet. I would have to go through arm had a sanitary napkin tightly this thing with no head protection nor laced offer my wound and a young communications from Fritz. But we med tech pumping morphine into my had done this so many times before other arm. He looked at me and said, that we needed no chatter to coor- "You're a lucky son of a bitch, boy, dinate moves. the only lucky son of a bitch in this The compound- below was a mass town." of fire, sparks, and shrapnel, inter- mingled with the living and the dead. * * * I could hear the repeated ping of bullets hitting our air frame. We I looked over the torn earth and hadn't cleared the perimeter when the beheld fallen comrades with their con- torted, gray faces showing only the It was in my 18th month and ten- chopper seemed to come apart with a loud explosion. I felt myself hurling expressions of their last thoughts ir. sions were extremely high at the life.I became acutely aware of that special forces compound outside Khe through space and thought that I must already be dead. I'm flying. I landed strange mournful peace that had San h, a camp called Lang Vei. always followed battles and in its Everyone in camp was on watch with 'n a muddy area from a 20 foot fall and realized that I was still alive. The stillness Ifelt so alone. Only the touch many an eye red from hours of of a faint breeze gave any life to the peering through starlight starbright. chopper lay some 50 meters from me engulfed in fire along with Fritz and setting as if the ghosts of all that had The 3rd Air Force and all its accom- fallen were still lingering on in hopes paniment were holed up close to the all else that had been on board. My God, after all this time, Fritz had that this was just a bad dream and choppers so we could be off in a they would soon be returned to their second's notice. Word was out that a bought it. I landed on the perimeter. I had mortal temples. VC battalion was in the area and had And among the carnage I saw the the demise of our-life forces on their landed in no man's land where no help would be available. My arm had radiant blossom of a lone flower that minds. had survived by the grace of some The hour was 0330 and the jungle been cut by something in the explosion and was cut half off. I was lost miracle. So little life among so was an eerie quiet. Never before had much death. The tears and sorrows I witnessed the absence of all the bleeding out with no med tech to help. I was also growing faint from that were yet to come over all of you, sounds of the jungle. This left my my comrades, Ifelt their approach as mind to accept the fact that an the loss of blood. Looking up and toward the jungle, I could see a wall you would feel the approach of the awesome death mach...e was close, a midsummer's storm. So many souls death machine that eve. 'he critters of VC approaching from all sides. Jesus, 1 hope 1 die before they get to cast to oblivion in such a short in- of the jungle had a fearful. for tei /al. There must have been a to the point of vacating the area, me. I grabbed a sling off a dead Marine tremor in the harmonious jell of the leaving behind only those who hid in universe. How could this not be felt? I the compound. anu tied a tourniquet above my wound in order to stop what re- surely was standing at the gates of In the dead quiet, the heat's weight hell. could be felt along with the ever- mained of my blood from pouring out. I noticed that the dead Marine To inject reason to this defied all present humidity. This made waiting justification, just men killing other for one's death even that much more had his guts blown out and scattered around his, body. I grabbed the guts men on a grander scale. There were agonizing. Every so often you could and shoved them into my shirt, half no tears, no feelings, just the 32 Now and Then/29 GREEN FIELDS presence of the flower and one lone soul still embodied in its biological form. And when it was over, nothing was gained but the spilling of young ". 21 blood. What would these gallant fallen The day before yesterday, ones have been? In what ways would when we were young and eager, they have altered the future if they and 'thought we knew, had been granted further life? The we never questioned ethics.. ; saddest words of tongue or pen. to The wiser men were at the top, know the things that might have or so we thought. 1,5:1 been. And the dream still comes as it has Yesterday, . always every night for the past 18 when we were still young and eager, years. When all others find rest in we did question ethics. their sleep. I find the darkness of a and many of us were forced to run away. dungeon. The dungeon was dark with The wiser men were not necessarily at the top, only the sound of dripping water only the definers of ethics. adding to the already two foot depth that was my floor and sleeping a:aa. Today; The body was encaged but the soul when we are no longer young, was unmanageable and free to and our eagerness is in doubt, wonder. On this day. at this particular many of us live In dread and fear: time. at this very instant. I gave in to A new batch of sour cream the demon. The demon is still in con- may be rising to the top. trol today as it was then and the demon rules me. You fucking people Milton E. Tober do not understand. Fuck you and all that you are. I shall be the bitter angel of my soul and loose it on you and Milt Tober is a graduate and former employee of ETSU. your destiny. Kill me, kill me. kill me He served in Vietnam when U.S. military personnel were you sons-of-bitches. still advisers there. He and his family recently moved to * * * St. Louis. It has been 18 years and all that has transpired since then is as much a shame as those 18 months in the Nam. Broken marriages. drugs. the law. VA after VA with shrink after shrink. - . You cannot buy thereturn ofmy patronage with yourfinal acceptance ofa black granite wall. Vietnam is still alive for I am still alive. I shall not let it rest nor let those of you that wonder rest. And .41 after my death. I shall come to you in your dreams as those of my past come to me now in mine. I will keep it alive with every fiber of my being. And some day. maybe, we will all understand. f KEEP ALERT Thomas Rollins 4- 4 This is an excerpt from a longer autobiographical work. The unabridged version of this story is Watercolor by Jerold McComas. Chesapeake. Ohio. who served in the available upon request from First Air Cavalry in the Republic of Vietnam in 1968. Now and Then. 33 30/Now and Then - "The Effects ofThese TimesWe Had..." Prisoners of War 42 Years Later Bert Allen

While anyone who lives or works with veterans could guess that the hardship of ' 3 a prisoner'of warwould cause long-lasting physical and emo tional damage, the effects have not often beenstudiedor measured. The study described here breaks new Entrance to prisoner of war camp Stalag VII A. Moosburg.Germany.1943. "Prisoner of War Assembly Area." Sign reads. ground in gathering such information. The results were even more dramatic the Social Sciences Area at Milligan and research with veterans and than the researchers expected. my Ed. College and I began meeting to service in Vietnam. discuss veterans' issues. We sensed On one particularly productive day. In the summer of 1985. Steve the importance of the subject because Steve mentioned a new assignment Giles, 'Chief of Psychology Service at we knew that our own relationships for him at the VA the Mountain Home Veterans Ad- was to serve as a with the military had an effecton our liaison to former prisoners ofwar in ministration Medical Center in lives generallywith Bob's serviceas the area. That was a serendipitous Johnson City, Bob Hall, chairman of a reserve chaplain, Steve's experience comment, resulting in a continuing in-

12/25/44 Diary ofa Prisoner of War Marched for three days Food: half loaf of broom bread. One spoon of jam John R. Clark for two days. 12/28/44 Put on train John R. Clark of Elizabethton, Tennessee Bombed by our own was a 20 .' year old staff sergeant in the Army when hewas cap- planes. 12/29/44 tured by the Germans on December 21, 1944.The Arrived at Camp 4-B Searched raud soldier managed to keep hiddena Bible and a small pad 'social belongings taken. :K. of paper and the stub ofa pencil on which he kept a except for New Tarstia=.;:* diary. After liberation he transcribed andannotated it. ment. I hid it. 01/01/45 Arrived at Camp 8-A New Year's Day at to Approximate Garlitz. LICE. Date . Event Comment 02/14/45 Typical day and typical Living conditions: food: Lights on- 5:00 Heat - very littlez. 3/06/43 Enlisted U.S. Army Good physical condition a.m. Tea at 5:30 a.m. Bed - stack bunks, Weight 151. Count at 7:30 a.m. three deep boards six 10 Cup of grass soup at 10/13/44 Overseas 106 Infantry .r eight inches apart, no Member Company F. 10:00 a.m. Two slices of Division mattress, no bedding. 422 Regiment, Third bread at 1:00 p.m. Cup of squad leader. Weight tea at 4:30 p.m. 198. Lights out at 7:00 p.m. 12/10/44 Engaged in combat near 02/14/45 Left Camp 8-A, Gorlitz St. Vith. Belgium Start of march, group of 1,200. 12/21/44 Captured near St. Vith Marched three days and 02/15/45 Arrived at Reichenbach Marched 30 kilometers nights. No food. (19 miles) stayed in barn. 12/24/44 Locked in box cars Strafed by U.S. planes: Food: cup of grass soup, six killed, 47 wounded. quarter loaf of black No medical attention. bread.

Now and Then/31 POWs

experiences on the men's lives after- 4AAdLi ai'' ward. Through civic groups, churches an..1 service organizations, we asked for volunteers, and in the summer of 1986 we (and students from Milligan) IV conducted the interviews. The results suggested that the problems of former POWs are far more 3r J'i ; -r! \04 severe than had yet been established. 1 t 'AT ..: Their careers and their physical and 9; i 1, emotional health have been ir-

.2 reparably damaged. Yet we also sl found tremendous strength in their marriages, in their faith and in their caring for their fellow former POWs. American Gls in prisoner of war camp. Nuremburg. Germany, 1943. These strengths are all the more ad- mirable when looking at our volvement for all of us with the lives former POWs in East Tennessee and findingsthe results are staggering. of former POWs. Southwest Virginia: 350-400 former Among the former POWs, 71 per- We began examining research POWs reside within a 75-mile radius cent indir-ated that they suffered from about American and foreign former of Johnson City. a disability which was directly at- POWs. The few studies that existed We developed an extensive ques- tributable to their military experience. suggested that the POW experience tionnaire requesting information about Only 7 percent of the other veterans left the veteran with physical and family, education, vocational and reported a disability. Former POWs emotional problems more severe than medical history, emotional history, reported that they were ill much more persons of a similar age. outlook on life and recollections of the frequently than the other veterans and We developed a method through past. Our strategy involved surveying non-veterans Fully one quarter of the which the lives of former POWs from four separate groups. former POWs of former POWs were ill more than 30 the Southern Appalachian region World War II, combat veterans of days during the year prior to the could be examined. We were par- World War II. noncombat veterans of study The average length of time ticularly interested this group because World War II and non-veterans of reported ill during the same time by Appalachian natives have been more World War II. The four groups came the other groups was less than two likely to see combat thaii those from from similar age ranges and social and days The POWs also reported much other areas of the country(see"More economic backgrounds. Only their ex- more use of medication than the than Our Share of Heroes" in this periences in time of war set them other groups. issue). The significance of this group apart from eachother.In this way, Among the former POWs, one-third isalso demonstrated by the number of we could determine the effect of war have sought counseling for a nervous

02/16/45 Marched to Bautzen, Total of 226 to Konigsbluck, Klotzche kilometers (140 miles) 03/09/45 Marched to Erfurt, 115 kilometers (76 miles) 02/27/45 Meissen, Lommatzsch, to Gotha, Schlotheim, In Silberhauien, stole an DOb'eln, Leisnig, Bombed as we 03/13/45 Silberhausen, and egg for my soup. .Bad Lausick, Boma, marched through Dinglestadt Wolkwitz, Meuselwitz. Meuselwitz. 03/14/45 Marched to 19 kilometers (12 miles) 02/28/45 Marched to Eisenberg 28 kilometers (17 miles) Wingerode Stayed here for three Prisoner got out of line, days. lived on sugar shot through hand, beets - stole the'beets wrapped with rags, no and chop and cooked: medical attention. 03/17/45 Marched to Worbis 53 kilotheters.(33 miles) 03/01/45 Marched to Jena. 54 kilometers (35 miles) to Ostarode and ? Stayed In brickyard with to Mellingen and Weimar Stayed in Weimar three 03/19/45 Russian'POWs. My boUte 03/05/45 days. Lined up to be were stolen and I shot bepuse one of our marched without shoes In group "s'lle a chicken. cold weather. They shot three prisoners 03/20/45 Marched to Duderstadt .36 kilometers (22 miles) the night before for to and Schwiegerhausen No shoes. Got out of fine stealing from a garden. 03/21/45 for - water, dog turned 03/08/45 Marched to Umbich 30 kilometers119 miles) looie-on Group split into two 03/22/45 Marched to Stuffellburg 22 kilometers.(14 miles). groups of 550 each. No shoes. Got new shoes. Received one'fifth of Red in Stuffenburg,-no socks. Cross food parcel.

32/Now and Then 3 5 POWs condition. None of the subjects in the been dramatically different than the in war and its aftermath. Interviews other categories reported using coun- lives of other veterans or civilians. suggested that they often found it im- seling for nervous conditions. Striking differences are apparent possible to reveal their experiences Sleep presented significant problems throughout their post-war life. even to their closest loved ones. The for the former POWs. None of the The POW experience presented wives of these men seemed as in- other subjects described such prob- stressors and degradations unlike te-ested and intrigued by the results as lems. Some specific complaints were those experienced by other veterans their husbands were. The wives nightmares, insomnia, and dreams of or by non-veterans. Lack of proper reported that their husbands had suc- former military experience. diet, proper shelter or permanent :essfully hidden this part of their lives Two thirds of the former POWs social relationships combined with the from them. These men hold much never finished high school, compared prospect of death at any time certainly emotion inside and are careful to to one-quarter of the other veterans. carried a long-term effect, considering keep it that way. However, the In fact, two-thirds of the other that the time of the collection and research became a way of describing veterans reported that they finished analyses of the data was 42 years the POW experience directly to an in- college and went beyond. Approx- after repatriation. terviewer yet indirectly to wives and imately one half of the other veterans Poignantly, participation in this other loved ones. reported that they used the GI Bill study was the first time that a number The POWs' responses to an open- educational benefits. Only one-quarter of these men had provided informa- ended question at the end of the in- of the former POWs used these same tion to anyone about their experiences benefits. Combat and noncombat veterans both reported significantly higher levels of earnings than did the former POWs. Sixty-nine percent of these veterans reported their 1985 income greater than $20,000. Only 40% percent of the former POWs reported income that high. There were a few items that members of all the groups had in common. Most reported themselves to tt' be non-smokers and rather temperate users of alcoholic. Most had also been married for a long period of time. The vast majority of all groups said they were Protestants. However, the study clearly shows that the lives of former POWs have Liberation by Patton's Army of prisoners of war, Moosburg, Germany, April 29, 1945.

04 / 14 / 45 FlOWn ,back to Camp Stayed for two weeks,, 03/23/45.Marched to Seesen 25 kibmeters (16 mile's) to Lucky Strike, Le Haim, had-dysentery, lived.On SOte feet. 04/16/45 Fiance. paregoric. All the fillings 'fell out of my teeth. ,72,kiloineteri, (45, miles) 03/24/45 Marched to,Lutter am Weight 127. to *Pdge,'IMmeiodei 04/19/45 ,Praunschweig. :aitention,Stityed.iri 05/13/45 Arrived in New York Sent to Fort McPherson, Braiimchwetg;, Bombed. Georgia.

04/11/45Marched to Kai* 05/ 15/45 Honie sFloeprt.65 days ate and Waxired Ifsi?*.4.41*4; ihiarClv July, 1945, Miatn1,-Olorida Here for two weeks. Slept and ate and laid in the sun. 04/12/45;Miuthed`to-fihOcla-

. ,Afi.e.04.e,,I.par.John. Clark, returned, to ,ElliabethtOn . He de,nt' Rooseiiek,Ode- first',.iriartiedd fellow .Happy Valley High School graduate in:Sforeh-4 946. Pcirk, sold-life .instirance 01/1*454010 to HSraingen afor Aan:36;yeiii,s. Now retirectfrom,that,business, :!.the!** he; does` sOile:.reri*Ielirig: of farm with a at 10:00.a:m::Stooped fe,',i4),heP &Of cattleranddoes;'Zicleon Work,",which he ,says iiihe.most.iirip,ortant facet of his life right now. He ikothlialt70 k;64, ,lias4Wo;grtityrf sons and three grandchildren. He `iiiith.ritheri,being a POWasa bad experience, but now, feels4ike a,dream.4'n 36 Now and Then/33 POWs

these former POWs display. The men there. They didn't brief us before are also quite supportive of one we went down on what we another. They are more open about should expect; and they cer- themselves, their shortcomings and tainly didn't tell us what we'd their fears than other older men seem put our wives through the next to be. They have much to teach us. few years. You know, these Photographs of these men at the wives, well they've earned their time orincarceration more than 40 medal too. The nightmares or years ago are startling. These were 20 drinkinghyper-reactionsin year old aircraft commanders. These retrospect, you know where they were 20 year old soldiers imprisoned came from. But they didn't tell by an enemy forcc away from all that us what to expect or how to was familiar. These were young men cope with it. If we'd had the forced to make munitions for the debriefing or psychotherapy they enemy in factories attacked by their have now, maybe a lot of lives own forces. These were young men would have been different. 0 who were forced to remove bodies The data we have compiled show from bombed out areas of Germany's how extensively time as POWs has af- cities. fected the lives of a group of men Pvt. Douglas Profltt, Athol, Kentucky, 100th David Purner, a former POW and a from a particular culturethe Division, U.S. 7th Army, Bad Ord, being freed from long imprisonment in a Nazi camp, smiling Johnson City resident, said in an oral Southern Appalachians. It is important as he signs evacuation papers. A U.S. task force history: in thinking about services and com- raced deep into enemy lines, accomplishing the We had problems with the in- munity support in the region. It is also mission of freeing 6,000 American and British prisoners, Germany, April 4, 1945. tense cold at times, but when important to think about former we got down to Nuremberg the POWs in other parts of the country. terview were enlightening. They in- filth was just indescribablea More research about World War II cluded: "If I could have had compas- real hellhole. We didn't realize POWs could only be good, even at sionate psychotherapy in 1945 (along the effects of these times we this late date. Studying veterans of with my wife) our lives would have had. They didn't know about it. World War 11 POW camps will also been greatly enhanced," "The Later they came to realize about give us some productive ideas about memories of lice, ticks, etc., still post traumatic stress. A thing caring for the few survivors of POW bother me. Because of the conditions will lie dormant for years and camps of Korea and Vietnam. in the POW camp...The effects were then something will tick it off. not life-hindering, but the memories Physical wounds healthey scar * * * are not good," "Have full appreciation but they heal. Psychological of life itself. Self-reliance, compassion wounds, I don't think ever heal. Drs. Allen and Giles presented their for suffering. More tolerant of You hit something that ticks 'em findings at the American Psychological people," "Made me distrust my off and they break wide open. Association meeting in New York in friends and neighbors who selected It's there...it will always be August of 1987. me to die for them." Data are unemotional. With them 'WV we can describe groups of people and make all individuals look the same by talking about averages. Yet, the POWs we came to know are unique individuals. We were aware that some of the men have wives who attend each gathering of the 'POWs, yet other POWs attend without their mates. This has made Steve and me wonder about the levels of support sought and received from wives as well as the general caliber of family relations of the group. The men had much in common. All of the men and their wives demonstrate a strong faith in God. The men are quite patriotic. After t. having worked with groups of if Vietnam veterans who distrust government, we have been amazed at the Author of the POW John R. Clark of Elizabethton, Tennessee and Bert Allen at an ex-POW devotion to their government which. meeting, Johnson City. 1987. 34/Now and Then Veterans of Appalachia Remember the Worldat War Colin Baxter

During the past three years, about the dreary monotony of "C" fighting for a hill in an "insignificant students of Modern Military History at rations, rank fear and boredom. One battle." Neither has he forgotten the East Tennessee State University have former Naval officer describes names of the men he knew, nor their interviewed scores of World War II "steaming for days and days across wartime home addresses. veterans from Upper East Tennessee, the Pacific, punctuated by short and Veterans describe their basic capturing with their tape recorders deadly action." They remember the training with remarks such as. vivid oral descriptions of military life. humor, too. A Tennessee veteran of -Thought they was going to kill me." By their willingness to answer ques- the 99th Infantry Division. and "It seemed like forever." When tions about their wartime experiences. predominantly a Pennsylvania and one inductee was handed a wooden which in some cases involves re- Ohio outfit. maintains that he could rifle. he exclaimed. "No way we can opening old psychological wounds, not understand the "Yanks" and they win this war!" Whatever the level of veterans provide a source-,)f historical could not understand him for the training, whether basic. advanced or information just as important as duration of the war. Tragic scenes specialized. the veterans generally documentary evidence Since most of have left indelible scars. the sight of a praise the instruction and credit the these veterans are more than 60 years truckload of dead GIs. a B-24 going military with having given them an old, it is important that their down in flames, the deafening. bone- education. "I was immature when I reminiscences be recorded for shaking blasts of heavy artillery. and went in and mature when I came posterity. as one veteran put it. the "sickly. out," recalls one. In the gathering of oral history. sweet stench of death." One soldier. Overall positive responses are ofveterans are asked about their morale seriously wounded in the leg by fered about leadership. A veteran of during the war, and about typical. Japanese machine gun bullets, the 94th Infantry Division recalls that humorous and tragic experiences. describes a day in New Guinea .0.,en his captain "never asked you to do Describing the typical. many talk his company suffered 77% casualties something that he wouldn't do Five Hundred Miles Behind Enemy Lines Wright Swanay of the 15th Air Force from an Oral History recorded in 1984 by Eddie Carver When the Japanese bombed Pearl civilians hunted me. They never did knew they were after me. There was Harbor I was 21 and single which is spot me...They quit and their voices the farmer with eight men with guns. a fine way to be 1A draft classifica- drifted off in the distance...lt just They went by where I wash cling tion...1 wanted to be a flyer. 1 was tore me all to pieces to think how it but the last man saw me. They put on my 39th Mission when I got shot would affect my family, more so me in a car and drove to a small down...The weather was beautiful, a than the shape 1 was in.I just didn't village...1 would act as if1 couldn't perfect day, mid-summer. The know what it would do to them. For understand them. In the village, an gunners on the ground zeroed in on the first day it just consumed my officer handed me my dog-tags. us and we were buffeted all over the thoughts, more than anything. 1 just They had fallen off when 1 sky. lam proud to say we got our thought to myself here I am a dead parachuted and someone had found bombs away. We were in trouble man. There's just no way i can get them...1 was never so glad to get however and oto-!-vent...1 fell not out of this alive, five huncized miles anything in all my life. They smiled too far and pulled my cord...it was behind enemy lines. 1 didn't have at me since they knew 1 was glad to like hitting a brick wall...the group any dog-tags (which meant he could get them. disappeared in the distance. As 1 got be shot as a spy]. For the next three The town was getting curious. close to the ground 1 could hear a days 1 moved around. Thirst was They would come out and look at little whistling sound. It didn't take killing me. 1 sucked the leaves off me, kids would jab with sticks, spit me long to figure outbulleis trees. On the fifth day, I found a on me, and call me murderer, when I looked down I could see wagon track full of water. I drank gangster. They took me to a barn little figures taking aim at me. I out of that wagon track. And a few and there was my airplane. Not only didn't know anything to do but minutes after that 1 felt someone my dog tags, but my airplane landed swing-a- tittle bit...I drifted away from looking at me. There was a farmer. in the village. On one occasion, them. I hit the ground very fast and He kept looking at me and he went angry civilians, with a rope and a landed in a clearing. I hid in a off.I knew he was going to get noose already made, threatened me. thicket as these armed, angry others. I heard a motor car and Luckily, a truck came up and the

35 Now and Then/35 REMEMBERING himself." A former Marine replies in a technician with the 15th AAF in Italy Sicily and the hedgerow fighting in strong voice that his officers were remembers that on one mission eight Normandy. when he says, "I'd a lot "unbeatable. They would eat. sleep out of 11 planes were lost. In answer rather be back here and five in the and shoot the breeze with them" (the to the question of how he spent any back alley and eat vat of a garbage troops). His battalion commander le. ure time, he says that war is "a can than to be over in that place." He remembered his name 40 years later. seven day-a-week, 24- hour -a -day still dislikes the sound of firecrackers. This particular veteran had survived job." Sometimes he went into nearby Several veterans comment that five of the fiercest amphibious Italian villages. he adds. but the towns fireworks displays meant to welcome landings in the Pacific War, including were usually bombed out and the in their return from war served only as a Saipan, Tinian and Iwo Jima where habitants reduced to begging. With harsh reminder of the deafening noise one man was killed or wounded every the end of the European War. his unit of battle. minute during the first three days on was scheduled to be re trained for the But coming home also meant the the island. He described the Pacific. In his case. and most others uncertainty of finding a new place in "ultimate" morale builder. the raising interviewed. President Truman'sdeci- society. finding a job ant! a house was of the flag on Mount Suribachi. "I was sion to drop the atomic bomb was ap- not easy in the immediate post-war 1,500 yards away. I heard Taps. proved. In the words of one Navy years. And for many. there could be turned my eyes toward Mount veteran. he was "damned glad" to no "coming home" to the farm after Suribachi and saw Old Glory flying." hear about the bomb. the intensity of wartime training an.1 A high price was also paid in the The sense of joy and relief that experience. For during the war years, skies over Europe where the 8th came with the end of the war was it was not uncommon for a soldier Army Air Force alone lost 46,000 summed up by a former rifleman who from rural Tennessee to have traveled men. A former aircraft maintenance survived hand-to-hand combat in in several states for military training as 500 MILES for several days. I never did fill his shirt collar, four on each anything out- except my name, rank, shoulder, and four on his pistol butt. and serial number. He got up on a jeep-and spoke. He Note:Swanay was then transferred had a high-pitched voice. He said to'Stalag Luft 3 in Germany, a that these G-D Germans were going prison camp for Allied flyers, where to pay for everything they had done he stayed for the next six months. to us. This was the camp from which the I continued to watch and wait for famous "Great Escape" had taken my brother. About two hours after I piaci earlier when 73 prisoners had finally left the camp, my brother ar- tunneled to freedom only to be re- rived. We didn't see each other for captured, with 50 executed. Mr. two years, back in Elizabethton. Swanay has laughed at the antics of My wife greeted me on the train Hogan's Heroes but points outthat station in Johnson City, and we the television program was asre- took a cab to Elizabethton. It cost moved from reality as one could $2.50 at that time. Everybody in the Imagine community was at my parents' "German officers were not 'house to greet me. The yard was Aviation cadet Wright S. Swaney at Ellington ;Clinks." With the Russians moving full of people. I really appreciated Houston, Texas in 1943. westward, the POWs were moved that. I had to go into a room to strip guards commandeered the vehicle by the Germans to another camp at down to my shorts to prove to my and me to safety. The mob was Nuremburg..."a camp that wasn't fit mother and grandmother that I .throwing rocks at us...I was very for pigs to live in." Moved yet again wasn't badly wo'.inded. It seemed to glad to get away from that situation. to another camp, at last, on April me like a lot of the parents of my I was then turned over to the 29, 1945, they heard gunfire... friends that I had known bac; gotten German Luftwaffe. ,An officer asked A tank ran up to the camp and a lot older than they should have. me in perfect English what I did in rolled right over the gate. Very They had aged prematurely. The civilian life, and I said I was a touching to me, I could see the war took its toll on them, too. The farmer. "That's all we get," he said, German swastika come down and war didn't just touch the ones who "farmers and students." Later an in- the American flag appeared on the went. It touched many of the people terrogator, very military, very an- flagpole. We cheered and shouted. I backhome. tagonistic, pushed a cardsin front of waited at the camp gate for three me and said "fill that put." The card days because my brother was with * * * obviously wanted military informa- Patton's 3rd Army, and on about Collected as part of Colin Baxter's tion and all I gave them was my the second day, General Pattona course in Modern: Military History at name, rank, and serial number. He very imposing man, big shoulders, ETSU. just blew his stack, threatening 'to ramrod straight, spick-and-span, ar- .have me shot. They put me in rived at:the camp. I counted 24 solitary confinement. Kept me there stars...four on his helmet, four on 36/Now and Then '3! REMEMBERING well as many foreign countries. For these soldiers, going to war also meant going from the provincial to the-exotic, from the pasture and city street to the jungles of New Guinea In REVOLT and the bombed out'buildings of great L:uropean cities, from cultural isolation Against to cultural proliferation. Armed with new skills and a new the Laws perspective, many veterans found in- dustrial opportunity in urban America or took advantage of the GI Bill to of the earn college degrees. Their change in direction and vision on the homefront Universe would be forever altered. Their new vision of America would not. On Joyce Duncan Victory in Europe Dal), 1945, somewhere near Berlin, a GI wrote a,.' home that, "The Germans :Ns well as Aikr the world have seen what a mighty Dr. Emmett Essin is a professor of A vahide of modern warkkre lies helpless but the war machine (America) can really do. history and the Director of Develop. mules carry on. My travels overseas have taught me mental Studies at East Tennessee they pulled trees and enormous cables to appreciate and love America, her State University. He first became infor miles to set up telephone lines; greatness and her goodness. No terested in mules and the military they ventured into areas where no nation nor race of people can com- while completing his dissertation on man nor vehicle could or wanted to pare to America." cavalry horses. He is former chair of go. By the end of the war, over This quote and many others tend to the executive board of the Ap- 59,000 mules had been recruited and support observations made by military palachian Consortium. most had seen foreign soil. At times historians that World War II veterans the mules were more valuable than widely view themselves and America Of all the timeworn cliches in the He cshey bars and silk stockings as In a more positive way than veterans American repertoire, one that most items of trade. of Korea or Vietnam and perhaps of readily springs to mind is "stubborn as In the majority of confrontations, earlier -wars as well. a mule." There are some, however, after the invention of the motorized Some of the World War II veterans like Dr. Emmett Essin, who feel a vehicle, the mule competed directly say they enjoyed the experience, the misty-eyed romance with these can- with commercial trucks and military camaraderie, the warm friendships; tankerous beasts. "The mule," asserts transport. There was little contest, for others the recollection of war has Essin, "is not stubborn. People just Essin says, the mule won. While dead been pushed into the_darkest recesses don't know how to work them. The vehicles littered the roads and ditches of their minds. For yet other, there mule is an invaluable part of of the military arena, the mule was a mixed legacy, as was the case American and Appalachian history, trudged on, unselfishly delivering fuel of a former rifleman of the "Old particularly military history." to his :ompetitors and pulling them Hickory" Division who was miserable The mule was drafted into the from the mire. during the war but on hindsight Army for the first time in the Mexican On December 15, 1956, the last counts his experience as an achieve- War and served nobly (though not two quartermaster mule regiments ment. "We were (like being) in jail, officially) through the Civil War, two were officially phased out at Fort restricted, limited," he says, "buy world wars and the Korean conflict. In Carson, Colorado to be replaced by looking back it was one of the other words "he has been on the the helicopter. Although the mule is greatest times of my life." Like many military payroll for over 125 years," an animal, according to Essin, "con- veterans, it is difficult for him to ex- according to Essin. "Furthermore," he tinually in revolt against the laws of plain this contradiction fully. adds, "there were probably more Ten- the anivers his service to the These veterans of World War II nessee mules than Tennesseans military has betn and will continue to were eyewitnesses to a momentous serviq in World War I." In 1915, be missed. After all, the mule doesn't turning point in history, and their per- some 15,000 of the animals were use gas, he doesn't have mechanical sonal reminiscence: are an invaluable purchased in Columbia, Tenn. and failures, he doesn't balk at at verse contribution to our understanding of shipped to England to serve with the conditions and he doesn't fall 20,000 that war. Their many experiences, British forces in France. Hardly a feet from the sky when he is ailing. placed together, create a far truer week went by that mules weren't front mosaic than that depicted by page news in America's papers. ac- * * * Hollywood or in popular mystique. cording to Essin. Joyce Duncan co-authored Heirs to * * * A neutered cross between the ac;, Misfortune published by Over- and a mare, the mules worked long mountain Press in 1987. She is an Military histortzm Boxier teaches hours for little pay and without com- adjunct faculty member of the English history at ETSU. plaint. They hauled artillery, cannons Department at ETSU. and tanks out of knee-deep mud; 40 Now and Then/37 A Soldier's Wifein the Civil War Mrs. Robert Frank Orr compiled by Nancy Joyner

Note: Any war affects both soldiers and civilians, but when a war is fought in one's home territory it is especially disrupting. Mary Middleton Orr has provided a record of the pro- found difference the Civil War made to her family when, in 1864, she, her infant son, her mother, and her nine siblings traveled from Henderson County, North Carolina to Knoxville, Tennessee. They went to join her husband and father, both Union soldiers. The following excerpt is from her memoir of the journey: We were two days going to children." He turned 'round to one of moved twenty miles below Knoxville Asheville. The sun was about an hour his men and said: "John, write a pass and stayed there till the close of the high when we got there, and before for Mrs. Middleton, three grown war. In March, 1865 my husband we had time to think where we were, daughters and eight children." came home sick and stayed until the we-ran right up on the Rebel guards You may guess I felt free when I first of August when he went to his and they halted us. I was scared got our pass. I took it in my hand command and was mustered out, I almost to death, but tried to hold up and felt like a bird let out of a cage. believe, on August 18. my head. I asked-them where Co;. By this time it was near sundown, Then we were free to battle through Palmer was. They pointed to a flight and the next problem was where we life the best we could. All we had of stairs on the left and said his office were going to stay all night. before he started to the war was gone was there. We all strolled up the steps We were two weeks and four days we knew not where. We had to com- and got to the door. There were four on the road. We stayed two days at mence anew with two children. But or five men around in the room, one place near Morristown and the war was over and our life saved, writing. I asked where Col. Palmer washed up our clothes. We all had and we would not complain. We was. They said he would be up in a two suits with us. There were two stayed in Tennessee seven years, and minute. He came and we told our almost babies to carry and our we thought it best to come back to business, that we wanted a pass to go bundles, which made our trip old North Carolina where we had a to Knoxville. Palmer said: "What in wearisome. little piece of land 411 in the woods. the hell do you want to go there for?" My two younger sisters were lively He has built a house and opened a I told him we were going to get and would laugh at Mother and me little farm and is living.on it yet. something to eat. He then asked for looking so sad on the way. I I am the mother of seventeen where our men were; and I thought would get out of heart sometimes and children, of whom eight are dead and we were gone up. I had two brothers almost wish I had not started. Then, nine are living. My health is gone in the crowd, twelve and fourteen the thought of living in the Con- down until I am not able to work years old and large for their age; and federacy and being in dread of my much; and sitting about and studying the Confederates had already taken life, they knowing my husband was over my life I just thought I would the sixteen year old boys, and I was with the Yankees or in the mountains write out a sketch of my war life to let afraid my brothers would be taken. (they did not know which), would the younger generation know a little As I have said, my husband, Robert make me go to the Lord in prayer, of the poor Southern wo.aan's trials F. Orr, ran away from the "Rebs" in asking Him to guard us through, and hardships. the spring; and soon after that, Folk's which I truly believe He did. Then I battalion was captured by the would travel on a day or two in good * * * Yankees. So I told Palmer that Folk's heart with the thought of getting Battalion had been captured in that where we would be protected. From a typescript, "The Experiences of a seizure. So they began to count us. It was the fifth day of September, Soldier's Wife in the Civil War," by Mary The little children, tired out, were all 1864, that we found Father. He then Middleton Orr (1843.1924). The North huddled down on the floor. He took us to Col. John Baxter who Carolina Collection, Pack Memorial Library, counted us over twice and said: "I vouched for our loyalty, which set us Asheville, North Carolina. Used by permission. reckon I will have to let you go; it will all right. take a heap of corn to feed these little In the winter of .1864 my father 38/Now and Then 41 where they could consolidate and use it as a base to invade India proper. The Tamu Road became my "home" for most of 1944, until I Volunteer Workon the Front lines completed my term with the AFS and went back in the news business as a war correspondent for United Press bya Veteran of the (before the "I" was added). The motivation of the volunteers American Field Service was varied, and there were not too many conversations on this subject. Money was not the object. however. Pay was nothing in World War I and in World War II it was $20.00 per McQuown Wright month for the first year of service and $50 per month for those serving more than one year. Unquestionably a few were idealists; Perhaps they could be called arms for self-defense but few AFS some were conscientious objectors; "benign mercenaries." drivers had them. some desired to avoid long periods of They were American Field Serviro Shortly after we arrived, about an boredom in the military and naval volunteers, American civilians who hour after the camp had quieted services (but there inevitably was performed front-line ambulance duties down, sporadic rifle fire could be some of that in the ambulance corps, through the British War Office in both heard, apparently coming from the too); some did not want to sit at World War I and World War II. Lockchao Bridge. This brought us home during the war; and virtually all In World War II, the era with which volunteers to our feet, with anxious wanted to see action. I am most knowledgable, most of the looks at each other in the half-light of And they did. During World War I drivers were persons whose age or the tropical night. Firing began on the a dozen volunteers lost their lives. In small physical defects left them in- perimeters of the camp and some World War II 36 drivers were killed eligible for regular service. Despite sounded in the encampment. And a and 68 wounded and 13 were cap- this, repatriation because of illness few bullets were heard hitting within tured (mostly in the Western Desert was minimal. There were about 2,000 the camp. campaign). In both wars many drivers drivers with some 800 assigned to Suddenly, heavy, constant fire won medals and honors from the Burma when the war ended. broke out. All dove for cover. I can French, British and American That was where I was stationed in remember a tall, heavy fellow from governments. 1944. I was in charge of five St. Louis revealed from flashes of the These hardships were not in vain. American Field Service ambulances firing, parallel to the ground, stretched AFS ambulances carried a half million attached to an Indian Field ambulance out three feet in the air, leaping for a sick and wounded in World War I company with the duty of assigning slit trench. I tumbled in on top of and more than a million in World ambulances where needed in the field him. War II. They were also cited many of operations. I had not yet come Firing continued for what seemed times for increasing morale among the under fire. to be an awful! lq time, but pro- troops. Japanese forces were threatening a bably was not it than two or three Between the wars the AFS raised drive on Imphal as a step to cut the minutes, and then slowed to a stop. funds, promoted exchange students Bengal-Assam railway, vital to ground The ambulance drivers went back to a and established chairs of learning with supply of China. The Tamu Road was fitful sleep. French universities. one of two paved roads from Burma Not one person was hit, all the Following the end of the hostilities to the Imphal plain. more remarkable because the six man of World War II, the AFS again Our convoy had left the Burma malaria control unit was placed on a turned to student exchange programs border at dawn to withdraw to this spur across the road, opposite the en- all over the world. That remains the peak in the Chin Hills in the Indian campment's gate. When the firing function of the service to this.day. state of Manipur, an ancient invasion started, they rushed across the road route from Burma into India. seeking safety within the lines. But the * * * Our peak, similar to the ',p- guards on the gate, thinking they palachians of Upper East Tenrk. zee, were under attack, drove back McQuown Wright was born in Moun- was a half a mile from the Lockchao across the road with heavy fire, for- tain City, Tennessee and educated at Bridge by air, but three miles by the tunately with poor aim. Princeton (class of 1940). He worked twisting road. Although this "non-enemy action" for the Knoxville Journal, the We slept on stretchers, either in the on the Tamu Road ended happily, Chicago City News Bureau and ambulances, or if in an area where at- there were in the next few months Chicago Tribune, and United Press. tack was expected, in an entrench- constant engagements as the second He lives in Mountain City where he ment dug-to hold two stretchers. retreat from Burma took place. The has be..n active with the local The volunteers-were not armed. Japanese were pushing stronger and newspaper and legislature. The Geneva Convention permitted stronger in their drive to Imphal 42 Now and Then/39 ypi

... 4 Preacher Pressley's or Ha Iftiine shows always remind me School of How of once in the MAC terminal john, Clark Air Base. It Used to Be I-spoke-to a man on his knees at the last sink Dave Long washing his face before rising and going home Preacher Pressley is past retirement age in the big bird parked outside and arrives a little later in the winter waiting orders, "Fly away!" because an extra cup of coffee is required before his bones are willing to make the We talked of things, he and I, 100 foot walk from the home he built to things men talk of: the former chicken-coop. It has always Mamma and home and summer; been my belief that his slowness in the hamburgers and real milk; cold months has more to do with the fact babies and parks and school songs. that the first one to arrive gets to build the Then, "Last call." fire, and if he stalls long enough. someone will take care of that chore. Preacher Pressley looks over a meal chest to be He left, dry faced, smiling. repaired. There were no legs, He is known simply as "Pressley" and just padded stumps remembering whether he actually ever mounted a pulpit Army were not wasted for Pressley or at that last field goal. remains his secret. His old coop turned least so it seems to him after having 40 workshop is gorged with the treasure and years to ponder. "I made 50 dollars a trash of broken antique furniture which he month and that was big money after * * * will restore to originality. The contents of working for 7.D cents a day when you the barn are constantly replenished by could get it." he states to give credence to folks from many places. Pressley restores his favorable memories of the military ex- them in his own good time. Seldom does perience. Country boys from Appalachia anyone bother to query price because are not taught to question authority and Knell money is not one of the old man's are not strangers to hardship so that adap- priorities and he is probably the only one tation to a spartan lifestyle came easy for who knows how to do what has to be Pressley. It was dying time: done. The old man has fond memories of his hometown's protesters, His visitors are often other craftsmen years in um:orm and he cannot under- the fleet-of-foot who come to inquire how a particular stand why anyone would question "doing crossing the border, missing part from an antique can be your ditty" because everyone where he and we, with no choice, fabricated so that it cannot be discerned comes from "joins up- in time of was. He in typhoons and rice paddies. from the original_ Frequer tly. the item to still has all of his campaign ribbons and be made has -) other model than that decorations among his possessions. can stored in his memory. More than once he recite his Army serial number and is cer- has been heard to chortle when the owner tain that the doctors at the Veterans Ad- of an antique has not been able to identify ministration Hospital walk with the angels. Tom Frazier which of the table legs is the replacement. Fourteen years ago he had cancer surgery His day is complete when he is able to at the VA Hospita' which he credits with name an article for someone who has no saving his life. * * * idea what he just bought at an auction. Of Now and again. °ressley decides that course, the event always reminds him of a enough work has been done and it is time story or anecdote and you know what is to go fishing. We arrive at a creek where Tom Frazier is, assistant professor of about to happen when you hear the lines are dropped and soon small fish English at Cumberland College in words. '"That reminds me of the time_.." begin to be caught and we promptly throw Williamsburg, Kentucky and is Pressley's view of the world has been them back in. It takes several minutes to author of the syndicated column broadened by a journey across Europe in realize that he could not be enjoying Mountain Movements. He served in World War II and more than 10 years on himself more than if he had lust cooked the. Air Force and saw some of the the road as a long haul truck driver but Moby Dick. The fun is in the doing and last American personnel leave he has remained as quintessentially rural even the fish break even. Southeast Asia. Appalachian in his soul and substance as the moonshine that he once concocted * * * From Sense of Peace. Reprinted by permis- and consumed His time on the road only sion of the author. made his East Tennessee roots reach Dave Long is a social worker in the deeper and today he enjoys life's pan.de domiciliary program at the Mountain at the end of a dirt road within "spithn Home Veterans Administration Medical distance" of where he was born. Center Three years and a few months in the 40/Now and Then 4 poet Robert Penn Warren, historian C. Vann Woodward, civil rights ac- Long Shadows tivist Albert Turner, psychiatrist Robert by Ross Spears Coles, along with a well-balanced 16mm., color, 88:15, 1987. sampling of ordinary folks, Northern Also available on VHS and Southern, black and white. videocassette from Spears' approach is essentially the The James Agee Film Project, same as in his previous documen- 316 East Main Street, taries, The Electric Valley and Agee. Johnson City, Tennessee 37601. Along with vignettes of oral history and unstaged, spontaneous commen- Richard Blaustein tary, Spears makes highly effective and creative use of montages of ar- Though the guns of the Civil War chival photographs, films and TV fell silent more than 120 years ago, footage. There are no purely dramatic the repercussions of what Ross Spears episodes in this film as in Agee, but a calls "the most cataclysmic event in segment featuring historic re- our national history" still reverberate enactment buffs in mock battle at within the American psyche. Evidence Mannassas vividly conveys the power- k of the lasting impact of the great na- ful emotional involvement of many 4 tional conflagration is all around us modern Americans with mythology of Tociie

Mary Lee Settle's impressively ver- eight generations. home she wrote "They say over a satile technique within the five novels 0 Beulah Land (1954), the first of hundred and fifty men were killed by that.make up her Beulah Quintet is the series to be written, is set in West one machine gun...She wanted to say replicated in the impressive variety of Virginia in the years that conclude the `That's what a machine gun does, her uses of war in those novels. Born French and Indian War and anticipate Mother.' " in the last year of World War I, mar- the Revolution, 1755-74. Prominent TheKilling Ground(1985) does not ried to an Englishman in the first year is the description of the Battle of Fort deal with war, although there are of World War II, member of the Duquesne, where George Washington references to protests against Viet- Woman's Auxiliary Air Force in 1942, is seen in a cameo role and Jonathan nam. Yet the central event of that forced to return to the United States Lacey in a major one. But the focus work provides an emblem for the en- from Turkey at the onset of the of this book is not on the battle but tire quintet: Jonathan McKarkle, Cyprian war in 1974, Settle's life has the settling of the area that was to descendant of Jonathan Lacey, is been eddied about by war or the become West Virginia by the veterans killed in a jailhouse brawl by his dis- threat of it. War, its anticipation, its of the battle. tant cousin, of course another descen- aftermath. the battle itself, is theme, KnowNothing(1960) also deals dant of the first Atnerican Jonathan. subject, and metaphor in her books. with a period preceding a major war, One of the most unusual aspects of With the exception of her memoir 1837-1861. Jonathan Catlett, a TheKilling Groundis that the pro- of her years in the Women's Auxiliary descendant of Jonathan Lacey, is a tagonist, Hannah McKarkle, is named Air Force in All theBrave Promises gentleman of privilege whose personal the author of the other four novels of (1966), war is never the principal sub slave accompanies him to the Univer- the quintet. She, like Antigone, (the ject of her books, and the extent to sity of Virginia where debate over myth that Settle has said informs the which it is mentioned varies from one abolition continues. Jonathan spends novels) is trying to "bury" her brother novel to the next, but it is a significant some years in the Missouri Territory, by searching for her roots. What she element in each of them. Because peripherally involved in the literal and finds is the "itch for balance" between war is an "easy" way to make figurative battles among the settlers "the seduction of comfort and com- historical demarcations, and because there. Eventually he prepares to fight pliance and duty" and "the impotent Settle's novels are historically based, for the Conferderacy, as his I--her seduction of the rebels...the feral edge the presence of war in those novels is Lewis joins the army of the North. of what has made us.' This "feral not in itself surprising. The way in This book has been called an Ap- edge" inherent in us all results most c-.nich she treats war is. palachianGone With the Wind,in dramatically and destructively in the War is one means by which the five which the romantic entanglements of large and small wars that shape our novels are connected, and connec- the women are central to the plot, history and Mary Lee Settle's Beulah tions are the overriding theme of the nevertheless, the war's foreboding Quintet. quintet. Johnny Church inPrisons permeates the novel. (1973) fought for Conscience rather TheScapegoat(1980), perhaps the * * * than King during the Civil War in most successful of the novels, England in 1645, and it was cons- theoretically takes place in one day in Nancy Carol Joyner, a native of cience that killed him when he 1912, when a battle between the Asheville, North Carolina, is a pro- opposed Cromwell's tyrannical prac- workers and owners of a West fessor of English at Western Carolina tices foci years later. On the morning Virginia coal mine takes place. The University. She has previously he was iniucted in the army he sired book opens with a description of the published on Mary Lee Settle in an illegitimate child, Jonathan Lacey, Gat ling gun that has been installed on Women Writers of the Comtem- who "would have been typical" of im- the front porch of the Lacey's house. porary South, edited by Peggy migrants to the New World in the late However, one substantial section Whitman Prenshaw (University Press 17th century. Hence, Jonathan deals with the experiences of one of of Mississippi, 1'84) and is working Chu:ch is the presumed progenitor for the daughters who is a nurse in on a book on Appalachian women one of the principal families whose France during the Battle of the writers. fortunes are traced through some Somme in World War I. In a letter

44/Now and Then V.C. G.I.

All blood is red. All the killed are dead.

Mostly soldiers Mostly Oriental An old man Mostly young men.

Issue to each A pine box And rubber bag shroud... The dead ain't proud.

Emphasize kill ratio. Count those still dying. Speculate on those yet to die... so. 79104,7 Mothers, subtract your sons.

D. Crowe

O ri

Marines of Delta Company, First Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, carrying out a wounded buddy after an M-33 grenade booby trap was set off in their position during Operation Taylor Common, 10 miles ncrtheast of An Boa:

Dan Crowe is a veteranofKorea, a resident of Kingsport, Tennessee, and the authorofabookof poems calledPoison Ivy Entangles the Sweet Apple Tree. @ Dan Crowe

Now and Then/45 James E. Whaley, 1950. His daughter, Cathy Whaley, is a student at ETSU and a student assistant for Ap- aor palachianAffairs.

away. I have gone back to that box many times and each time I discover a man I do not know. I hope some- Reticence day he can forgive me but there is part of one letter to his sister that I must share. It reads:

Somewhere in England When I was 27 years old, my had when he first came home, but Sunday 12 Nov. 1944 parents and I were eating dinner for the most part, I know nothing of when out of the clear blue, my that time in his life. ...26 years ago the war was over father commented that, in England, When I asked dad to be inter- andnowone's started.I hopethis the tables had five forks for each viewed for this article, he declined one is the end of wars and there place setting. After I regained my without a second thought, -numbling won't never be anymore and no cc,:nposure and the mashed potatoes somethingabout "a faded memory" lore men will have togo that slid off my fork, I asked two and "all the details mixed' up:" His through with what I have and no million questions. Until that time, I only definite comment was that "the more soldiers will die. Christmas never knew that my dad had been war made a man out of him." is right around the corner and I west of the Mississippi, much less My dad spent World War II in wonder where I will be this year. ,around the world. Company "C" of the Eighteenth-In, One Christmas I spent in a fox- He answered each question that fantry. He enlisted one year before hole in Africa and one here in poured from my wanderlusting con- Pearl Harb,.r. His father died of England. I sure would like to sciousness intimate details about tuberculosis When my dad was nine spend this one at home but that is England, France, Germany and years old and as the oldest of four, almost impossible with about Northern Africa. But to the ultimate it was dad's duty to quit school and 4000 miles of water between me question "what did you do in the take over on the farm and in the and there... war, daddy?" there was no reply. family. And yet, he says, it took a In the ensuing years, I have made war to make a man of him. I do not know what happens to several attempts to get my dad to A few years ago, I walked into the men in wars. All I know is that the talk about the war. Each time, he basement to find dad pouring over a thoughtful, open man who wrote changes the subject, wanders off or box filled with yellowing air mail those letters is not the walled man I pretends not to hear. Occasionally, onionskin and decaying documents, call "daddy." something will click and he will drop mementoes of the years he spent as a bomb into the conversation, like a soldier. He spoke the standing when his friend fell into a snake pit family cadence of "when I am gone, Joyce Duncan or the cold-sweated nightmares he these are yours" and put them

46/Now and Then Guadalcanal Mother of cruelty it was the sorriest scene you could bear witness to paraplegics and amputees balanced on coconut tree logs sunning their phantom limbs on the company street when up comes a brassy jeep throwing purple heart's out the window like they were grape lollipops in the homecoming parades

I'll never forget one man who was missing an arm and a leg saying, tears as-bitter-az-hydrochloric acid melting down his cheeks, "Yeah, that purple heart and a quarter will get me a bun without a hot dog if I ever get home, if I ever get home." Robert Arnow returning from Germany. 1946. Daughter Bob Henry Baber Pat Arnow editsNow and Then. Things He Did- Not Say He did not volunteer the story He did not tell about stepping out and when I asked, he said of the sinking useless plane into "there were better stories," the middle of the biggest ocean, and told no one. By better, a raft he was still trying to inflate he meant funnier, safer for the heart. between him and the bottom, But you went down? I asked again. or hoping someone, not the enemy, "We had to find the Japanese fleet, had heard his critical numbers. it was Midway." He did not say "I was down the rest the day and night." they were desperate. in danger He did not say all the names of losing the Pacific war he thought about for God. He said, or that MacArthur had gone home. "I was glad to see the submarine." He did not say when the orders He did not say when the one that found him came he thought I know my death. finally surfaced in the dawn, "We wer,,,flying off a carrier. huge and dark and dripping They said fly straight and hunt with the right flag painted on it, till we ran out of gas, he began to think of things to do and radio our last position." with children, hikes and camping trips He did not say a man can vomit fear and looking at stars. or what it cost to be alone. for my father. He did not say what would have happened Jo Carson if he'd found the missing fleet. The Japanese encouraged suicide. He did not speak of the distance it took, or how, when he did run out of gas, if the propeller had hit first, the plane could have burrowed nose first into the water, how if a wingtip caught a wave, his neck would have wrenched loose from his body. "They said they'd try to pick us up."

Pierce Carson with his children Jo and Skip.

Bob Henry Baber was shot during a demonstration father's experience in World War 11 inspired ' against the Vietnam war in Los Angeles and spent time "Guadalcanal.- in jail for protesting. He is a widely published poet and works for Appalshop in Whitesburg. Kentucky " s Jo Carson's father was a pilot in the Navy in World War IL Now and Then/47 Gallipoli

Beware of those who swear men's hearts, They call you. Do not go. tender as asparagus shoots, Do not be deceived by bones wrapped in tissue paper are won by bombs or bulletS, or flags folded in triangles. who swear that Glory is the progeny of war, These will not warm your marrow She is not when snow obscures the battlefield.

for war is the idolatry of raw suicide They call you. Do not go. mocking the very spirits For war is but mud and meaningless gristle, in whose name it is incanted shrapnel and guilt. Even its victories groan mean under the tongue Death, my friends, can be called many names: turning saliva and words to lead. senseless, Blind, and Cruel, but Noble, it cannot. To the grave they call you as death himself would Brothers, do not let these generals beckoning with phrases that gleam like sabers make you over in the craven image of corrupt Gods held high to the sun holding cracked mirrors before hollow skulls phrases that blind the eye and pierce the ear to see brute power rape without shame or remorse. Their lieswhich in the senility they have come to believe Do not leave your mothers and fathers march in rows of rhetoric splendor and pomp to stumble insanely through caverns of pitchblack loss while they brush ersatz tears darker than unmined coal, from their blitzkreig eyes. but save yourself for your children and grandchildren. Do not listen. Do not bequeath your youth or old age Beware. These men envy you your youth, for a pot of golden abstractions would deny you the wines they cannot sip and the women they cannot bed. but cast aside these phony hallucinations of rotting cadavers who nickname skeletons dance with ghosts and proclaim dead boys Sons

Bob Henry Baber

48/Now and Then r.

,a,

This armored vehicle was parked in front of the recruiting office of the National Guard in Erwin, Tennessee, in 1985 to inspire residents to enlist. The photo was taken by Rose Mary Huskins, a resident of Erwin and a photography student at ETSU. She'd like to dedicate the picture toher father, Fate Robinson, an honorable veteran of World War 11. -/

41,

Sat. Sidney Nei, of Harlan Count'''. Heatallty:whe viateitattlit'edby theCommunists, with his Uncle Bill McGregor at Ft. Mason docks in California, September 9, 1953.

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