Personal Narrative-Home

That night we had no idea what hit us, a flash shot off from the right; my close friend colonel Robertson fell down beside me dead. I quickly dragged him to the medic in a vain attempt to save his life; there was no hope for a dead man to come alive. Now there were only thirteen of us left, thirteen out of twenty-four. We all thought we were going to die. I saw an orange glow off in the distance wondering what it could be. Suddenly, a loud whistle fills the air and an explosion lights the sky like fireworks sending shrapnel raining down on us. I felt a sharp pain in my arm as I looked around at the damage, “two more” I thought to myself. Now we’re down to 11, ironic. June 15, 1975, the day of reckoning our squadron leader, Manny, called

At first our bodies weren’t used to early rising, muscles straining from the harsh training and strange environment. Manny said we should get used to it in about a week or so, I felt like a week would be way to long. Three hours later the bugle sounds telling us to begin morning routines. Me and a couple of guys headed out to the left forest and started scouting around. After about five hours we got a call on our radio; it said group three found a road. We quickly scrambled back the way we came. After meeting up with the others, we decided to split into groups of two instead of four and go scout. Soon after departing we heard a sound down the road and quickly scrambled behind some cover. A half-track drove past us heading west. After a bit more observing we headed back to

Something seemed different; I felt like we were being watched. After about five minutes we heard a rustle far off, we stopped to make sure all of us were still here. Manny counted twenty-three. Our hearts started racing; someone asked, “Where is Robertson?” I felt my heart sink. We all started looking around and found him with his leg stuck in a plant. Relieved we began going back to the compound when a muffled shot rang out; someone by me dropped down with a massive hole in his head and blood flowing on the ground. We all ducked for cover as another shot sung its song and landed its mark on Private Peter. Manny yelled a retreat as another man dropped face first into the ground; we didn’t bother seeing if he was alive. After making back to camp we did a head count of twenty-one men. Tonight we paid tribute to our fellow soldiers who fell today. It was a sad time for us