Page 90 - Senior Link Magazine Fall 2025 - Online Magazine
P. 90
by Larry Williams
in San Diego. After eight weeks We were hit by artillery from
of basic, eight weeks of Advanced overhead. Everyone took off for the
Infantry Training and four weeks bunker. I felt something on my hip.
of BITS (Back in the Saddle training There was a piece of metal sticking
covers professionalism, policies, out. I was sent to the battalion aid
procedures, and safe operations), station in the field. The surgeon
I went home on leave. I received took the shrapnel out and asked,
orders for the Naval Air Station ‘Do you want this?’ I said no, and
in Millington, TN. The Navy he pitched it in the trash can. I was
was on the north side, and the sent for “light duty” at Dong Ha.
Marines were on the south side. The first sergeant put me in the
The Marines didn’t have a job for mail room picking up (not-so-light)
me, so they sent me to the Navy to 60-pound bags of mail.
get a job. I walked into their office
and was asked where I was from. “My hip didn’t heal properly, but
When I said Texas, a woman asked the Navy Corpsman said I needed
if I could ride a horse. I told her to get back out into the field, but
I was born on a horse. So, I was since I also had malaria, I was
assigned to be a cowboy. For a year sent to Cam Ranh Bay Air Force
his is the story of how Roy and a half, I wore jeans, boots, and Hospital. After my hospital stay,
Britton Gideon became a a cowboy hat and took care of ten I was sent to “in country R and
Tfighting Marine. Roy was horses. R.” My sergeant there needed
born in Houston in 1946 to Burl and me to drive a ‘skimmer’(a 16-foot
Betty Gideon, but their marriage “Eventually, a Marine Corporal
only lasted until 1954 when the came looking for me. I was put in a
couple divorced. Betty moved Roy staging battalion and put on a plane
and his sister to Sherman where she headed for Vietnam. We stopped
had relatives. in Hawaii and Okinawa, then on to
Da Nang. I was assigned to the 3rd
After graduating from Sherman Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment,
High School in 1966. “My buddy 3rd Marine Division called the
said, ‘Let’s join the service,’ so we 3/3/3 and the ‘Fighting Third.’ In
went down to the recruiting office. December 1967, we were sent to
A Marine recruiter met us in the the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) and
hallway and said, ‘What do you then to the LZ (Landing Zone).
want to do?’ I said, ‘I want to fight!’ We landed between Gio Linh and
He said, ‘Then you’re in the right Con Thien at A3 base during an
place.’ So, I joined the Marines on incoming rocket attack, so I jumped
July 28, 1966. into a nearby slit trench, and a piece
of shrapnel hit the dirt about an
“I took basic training at the MCRD inch from my nose. On March 31,
(Marine Corps Recruiting Depot)
1967, I was with a squad on patrol.
90 Lubbock Senior Link
