Vietnam - Doc Hampton fragged "Top"

[protect freedom impeach bush now]

http://www.oz.net/~vvawai/sw/sw31/pgs_25-34/doc_hampton.html


Richard Boyle was working as a reporter in Vietnam for the Overseas Weekly when troops from the 25th Division at Cu Chi told him the story of Doc (Sp4 Enoch) Hampton. He wrote of it in his book Flower of the Dragon. The following material is taken from his report.

Doc Hampton


"Doc was our friend, everybody liked Doc. He was a real good medic." They talked about Doc for a while, then they told me about the other man, Sfc. Clarence Lowder, whom they called "Top." Things started to get bad, they said, when Top came into the unit as the new "first-shirt." "He treated us like machines," said one GI. "I'm not a robot, I'm a human being." Instead of loading supplies on a truck, Top would make the men walk and carry the stuff all the way. He like to belittle men in front of others. "He had no respect for people," Sp4 Benn said.

Top once ordered a private to dig a 6 foot ditch. The soldier dug a 6 foot peace symbol in the ground. "That really blew Top's mind, said Hanusy. After that, Top worked on the Pfc almost constantly for 6 weeks. The Pfc got stoned every night and dreamed about killing Top. Finally, the Pfc cracked and was shipped out.

...skip....

It was just about this time that the Black GIs in Top's units were beginning to tell themselves that if they had to die, they wanted to die for a cause of their own choice. To many of them the lifer sergeant was more of an enemy than the Asian peasant soldier outside the wire. There was also a different kind of white soldier in the unit, like the private who dug the 6 foot peace symbol. Young white soldiers smoked grass, wore beads, and flashed the peace sign as a standard greeting. In the evenings, black and white troops would get together, blow grass and rap. "The lifers are more afraid of what's in this camp than what's outside it." ......At the mess hall one evening, Doc said that Top had "his thing," the book and the law, and that he, Doc, had his-an M-16. .....Hanusey, the clerk, was working in the orderly room when Doc came through the doorway. "His face was cold, stone cold," Hanusey said. The barrel of Doc's M-16 was pointed downward, his feet planted firmly apart. Slowly he raised the barrel and fired a full clip into Top. Then Doc walked out.


more..................

[LoneStarLiberal]

1. Stuff Happens in War

When NCOs and officers take liberties with the soldiers under their command, they ought to be prepared to face the music.