The Road to Here

   Now, I need to drop backwards in time by 15 to 18 years. I was married to a girl for four years who had 4 kids of her own.
 I would sometimes mention John John and how someday I wanted to find out his real name. One day she offered to write
 our senator and ask him for the information. I gave her the information, she wrote the senator and a couple weeks later we
 got a reply. The senator said all I had to do was write the national archives and request copies of the S/2 S/3 daily staff
 journals or duty officers log, DA form 1 nov. 62 1594. I didn't know the name or date of the event I was looking for. I wrote
 the archives and requested Journals for the time period of Dec. 20 1967 through January 30, 1968. I had to start somewhere.

 

   Two or three weeks later I received a package in the mail from the archives. I read several pages and then found Sgt. Paul
 Maddox's name. I couldn't handle any more. I put the journals away for five years or more. The next time I opened up the
 journals I had filed for and received a 30% service connected disability from the VA. I had promised myself that if the VA
 approved my claim I would become a lifetime member of the Americal assoc., the Old Guard assoc. and the DAV assoc. I
 saw Les Hines name in the ADVA news letter. I contacted Les and asked if he had any S/2 S/3 journals because I could not
 afford to buy them from the archives. Les didn't know what I was talking about so the first chance I had I went to a Mailbox
 store in Boise Idaho and had them copy my 1,500 pages so I could send them to les. He claimed he had not seen the journals
 before and didn't have any more info for me. I faded away again and for several years.

 

   Several years later, about 1999, Don Fox contacted Les Hines looking for people from the 4/3. Les gave Don my address
 and he wrote me. During his hand written introduction, Don Fox, Charlie 1/1, told me about getting wounded. I recognized
 the event because I crawled over to him and called a dustoff. I wrote a letter back adding details he had left out like, there
 was a hooch over to the left and a tree line to our right front. We felt each other out. He wrote another letter about another
 event and I added details for that like, when we  got to the body another squad had removed the gooks ear. Later this event
 would become a story,  "Fast Walkers",  in  buffgrunt.com. I told C 1/1 about the staff journals because he wanted to get a
 copy of journals for his event on April 22,  1968. I then  told C 1/1 about John John and my search for his real name. C 1/1
 replied in a letter that he knew all the names of the people involved in the John John event because it was his squad and his
 platoon and the event was three days before he was gut shot. C 1/1 told me who John John was, I cried for a week.

 

   C1/1 would later get divorced and turn from a person who would not say shit if he had a mouth full to someone who wrote me
 fuck you letters. I ignored the letters because he had found John John. I later wrote the VA several fuck you letters and helped
 C 1/1 go from a 70 to 100% rating. People from C 4/3 contacted me about a reunion in 2001 in Chicago. After the reunion I
 drove to the wall and left mementos. then I went to NC to see C 1/1. This was about seven days before the two towers happened.

 

  Jump to 2005.

   I am retired and reconnected to the ADVA and C 4/3. The ADVA , Les Hines and Bruce Flaherty are gathering the Staff
 Journals for all 46 months the 4/3 was in Vietnam. It seems like everyone is wanting to take credit for finding the S/2 S/3
 daily staff journals when in fact they were in the archives all the time and a senator told me about them years before. Bruce
 Flaherty was  sending copies of the journals to everyone who requested them. Most everyone was using the journals for their
 own purposes  which include writing a book or documenting events during their tour. I received a complete set from Bruce
 and started to develop the SITREP's. I may be the only person who has read all 11,000 pages of the staff journals twice.

   Dave Curtin AKA Finder,  from C 4/3 was building a website. I start sending him info from the journals in what is now the
 SITREP format. I also send him the dead list. I get an e-mail from Harold Titus, AKA The preacher. I work the story up,
 get permission  and send, "Preacher and the rice bowl",  to Finder. I also give Finder, M & M or Monumental moments
 to post in his website. I was real unhappy with finders work. He was more interested in selling hats and T-shirts than honoring
 my dead. When he posted my dead list in alphabetical order I blew a cork. At that moment I decided to build a site to honor
 my dead in a unique and respectful way.