Anyone out there remember Nui Kim Son and the old French Fort - spent many a night out there with 3td Tracs

My dad made me take typing in HS so the Corps decided I would be an 0141 (Admin) Spent most of my time with MAG -31 prior to and after RVN in Beaufort, S.C. When I got to RVN in Apr 67 or there abouts I went to the 1stMarDiv. 3rd Tracs was in Chu Lai. Shorly there after we moved to DaNang, inland from Freedom Hill into 1st Tracs old facility. When they left they took everything worth taking. As it turned out, they would need it much more than we did. After several months of the Tracs tearing up the roads someone decided we should be down on the south side of Marble Mountain. SeaBees built us a first class facility there. Ended up working in the Ops Office with a Major named Galligan (I think) which turned out to be interesting. There were about 10 of us sergeants who worked in non 1833 or 2142 billets. We were the ones who stood sgt of the guard and took out the listening post patrols every few nights. It wasn't bad in the compound but we took a lot of harassment fire outside in the ville and around the mountain out near the fort. I know now that charlie could have had us any time we were outside the wire but I guess he had bigger fish to fry. I remember being out at the fort and thinking about the Japanese, then the French, then the RVN and finally us having all been at that old fort. It really makes one think.

When they brought the towers in I was one of the first ones to have to send people up them and it was certainly a novelty. Prior to my leaving a grunt from the DMZ who had been evaced to DaNang was re-assigned to us for guard duties. He was the one who observed the launching of the rockets out in the boonies and then timing how many minutes until impact at the air base. They devised an early warning system where a PFC or LCpl could sound an alert that would wake up everyone at the Marine side of the base. The USAF wasn't interested until one night a fully occupied barracks took a 122 or 140 hit and they lost some people. They were then included included in the alert system. How appropriate, a sh*tbird from the USMC could roust thousands of airdales and air force guys out of their racks. It pissed off some people and they lost equipment but they did not lose people and that is what really counts.

Did we still have the two 20 MM cannons on a couple of tractors when you were there. If so, I can tell you how that came about the next time we communicate. When I returned to Orlando in mid 1970 one of the first prototype P-7's was at the reserve facility. Martin Marietta in Orlando was working on the new weapons system for the new vehicle and I looked with pride on the efforts of H&S Co people in putting together the scavenged 20 MM's that were so successful and led to the bigger weapons on the new vehicle.

Tet 68 was an event that will be forever etched in my feeble brain. I think about it a lot, going out to pick up the decomposing dead NVA and VC and bringing them back so they could be officially counted (?)...

Gotta go, hope to hear from you or others in the future. SEMPER FI