Item #: 180775116113
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Deep in the middle of Vietnam, the murderous Vietcong soldiers trapped a platoon of soldiers. They had been surrounded for fifteen days, from July 12th to today, July 27th, the middle of rainy season. It was a typical morning since July 12th 1963… there was rain, there was sadness, and they kept trying to radio headquarters but there was no response.
There were more men dead at the front of the tower than alive in it. Just as it started to go quiet and become almost peaceful with the trees and the drops of rain on the roof, it was all disrupted with a loud boom and the sergeant yelling out, “Attack! Every man to his position!”
There were more men dead at the front of the tower than alive in it. Just as it started to go quiet and become almost peaceful with the trees and the drops of rain on the roof, it was all disrupted with a loud boom and the sergeant yelling out, “Attack! Every man to his position!”
Their positions were simply windows or holes in the walls. There were so many gun shots that the men were getting used to it; it started to sound like a silent echo to them. The blood was flying as the lines of VC fell in the mud. Walter Phillipa was reloading his gun, when out of the comer of his eye he saw blood splatter and he felt warm from head to toe because it was all over him. Phillip Phillipa (his brother) dropped to the floor with two gunshot wounds. He coughed and blood came hopping out like a rabbit. Walter dropped down beside him and yelled, “Phillip, Doctor, Doctor,” but nobody heard him; the guns drowned him out. So he started to drag his brother to the next room; Walter tried to talk to him, to comfort him. But it was really meant to comfort himself mostly and convince himself Phillip was going to be ok. Walter got him to the doctor in the middle room (with the least amount of gun fire on it) and told him, “two shots, one in the chest and one in his lower stomach,” and then went back to the next room.
Everything had stopped. There was no gunfire from either sides, so he stayed in the doorway. Some of the younger men were helping the wounded while the older men were preparing, but for what? The sergeant crawled to the wall then looked out a tiny hole in the wall; his eyes went wide and he yelled, “Bomb, everybody down!” He rolled back from the wall to the other side of the room.
BOOM! The bomb went off and killed five men where it hit the wall. One man tried to get up and run but was shot instantly. Three men near the wall started to crawl away; the floor was bombarded all around them with bomb after bomb, then one was thrown in and landed on all three of them.
Walter was sitting in the doorway, astonished. He was thinking he was never going to get home, so he went to help Phillip so he would feel safe with his older brother. The attack was over; there were ten of the soldiers left. The only one wounded was Phillip and he was in really bad condition; there was no bleeding but he was coming down with pneumonia.
“Here, make a paste with this,” said Walter.
“What is it?” asked the doctor.
“It’s Keen’s mustard,” answered Walter sounding surprised that he didn’t know. “Mix it with some of the flour that’s left and warm water.”
“What do I do with the paste after it’s made?” asked the doctor.
“Put it on his chest,” barked Walter, “How do you not know this?”
“Ok, calm down, I will,” replied the doctor who had started to mix the ingredients together.
| Five Days Later |
“Well boys, I don’t think there is much left for us to do,” said the sergeant sounding depressed. “There isn’t a word from base; we could try to fight out but that hasn’t got us out yet, so I don’t think it will in the future.”
“You will make it home,” said Phillip trying to reassure Walter.
“No, we will make it out. Both of us,” replied Walter. Then he turned to the other eight and said, “we all will make it out. We have to keep our heads set on home.”
“I don’t think we wi…” started the sergeant but he was cut off by the sound of crackling.
“What’s that?” asked Phillip.
“It’s… the radio?” said the sergeant sounding a little puzzled.
“Platoon fifteen, platoon fifteen are you there?” asked the man on the radio.
“Yes -- there are ten of us alive, one has pneumonia,” replied the sergeant.
“There is a 205 Huey Helicopter on route, just stay put for a few minutes and he will be there to get you,” said the man at headquarters.
BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM! The helicopter had started to shoot and bomb the VC soldiers. Then they could hear the VC start to shoot and grenade the Huey.
“Huey to Platoon fifteen, we are taking a lot of fire up here, buy me some time,” said the pilot.
“To your stations men and grab as many weapons you can find,” yelled the sergeant in a demanding voice.
“Hey Walter,” yelled the doctor.
“Yeah,” said Walter as he grabbed two guns off the floor.
“In case I don’t make it, I just wanted you to know that your brother is doing much better and has started walking around in the other room,” said the doctor.
“Thanks,” replied Walter almost with tears of joy in his eyes. But he soon realized that all the other men had run to here station and started to fire at the VC soldiers. As Walter got the window, most of the shots were at the tower and not the Helicopter. Men on the ground started dropping like flies; the men in the tower were all taking bullets but still shooting trying to save the rest of the men. Walter lay down to reload his gun; he looked up and saw the doctor’s head fling back as he dropped to the floor. He saw the sergeant dripping blood but still shooting back. He looked back and there were three men dead on the floor behind him. As he got up he noticed blood underneath him. He was bleeding from the legs. His body was so numb that he hardly noticed. He started to shoot. He usually didn’t look away when he was shooting, but he saw Phillip standing at the far end of the room with two guns. Phillip had to reset his footing every few seconds because the guns kept pushing him back.
Finally what they all wanted to hear was the radio from the helicopter, “We’re here, come load up.” The six men who were left turned and ran as fast as they could to the helicopter. Walter and the sergeant were helping Phillip run to the Huey. Bullets and wood splinters were flying everywhere. Two of the men on the left had been shot and hit with splinters as they fell to the floor. The four who were left had all been wounded, from bullets or from wooden splinters flying around them.
They were just about out of the VC’s firing range when the helicopter started to have trouble.
“We aren’t going to make it! We are taking too much fire,” yelled the pilot. All the men in the Huey turned and started to shoot back. The shots didn’t slow down, so the sergeant jumped out with two guns in his hands. Most of the fire was moved and directed to him. The shots kept hitting him over and over until he hit the ground. The soldiers threw grenades but the chopper was too far, the Huey was out of range.
“Walter we made it,” said Phillip. “I told you we would.”
“I thought we were goners for sure,” replied Walter.
“Well I was if it wasn’t for your magic Keen’s mustard,” said Phillip.
“We spent so much time in the tower that I got bored, so I started to read my manual and it said mustard cures pneumonia, so I thought why not?” Walter explained.
“Well, thank you for saving my life with your mustard,” said Phillip with a saddened voice. “It really helped us out with food too. If more people had read the manual, instead of just eating it then we could have found out it helped cure pneumonia sooner.”
“Yeah that would have been better; maybe more of them would be on this chopper with us,” replied Walter.
“Well let’s get you boys home,” yelled the pilot lifting the mood.
What a great story. Well done!!
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