March 31, 2025 • 38 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, Mike Williams remembers his best friend and uncle (who was just one year older than him) as a "gun guy", and a Vietnam veteran who survived a harrowing night in the jungle after a helicopter crash. Here's Mike with the story of Dan Reeves.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
Up next, a story from a listener, Michael Williams. Michael
is the author of the Boys of Milo, a collection
of stories from those who served in Vietnam from his
small hometown of seven hundred and sixty four in Iowa,
(00:33):
and our showways heard on who the great iHeart stick
in the middle of this Country in Des Moines, Iowa.
Today he shares the story of someone close to him,
one of his best friends.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Take it away, Michael, You'll find no statistics on the
crime rate in Milo. Milo employed no policeman, and our
biggest fear was that some lady witnessed some wrongdoing and
would call her mother. That's who dialed out the punishment
our parents. We had just one phone in the house
(01:08):
and our connection was a party line.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
I remember our.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Phone number had just three digits six one J, no dial,
no push button, and certainly no voice activated calls. To
make a call, I'd simply pick up the phone. I
told the operator I wanted to talk to Grandma. She
knew and made the connections. There were no street signs
or house numbers, keys were left in car ignition overnight.
(01:31):
Residents didn't lock their doors. Dogs didn't even bark because
they knew your scent and would just run up wag
their tails wanting a scratch of the air.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Everyone knew everyone, and that was good.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Even the nineteen eighty nine Kevin Costner movie Field of
Dreams touched on the wonderment of the ideal setting. In
the movie Shoeless, Joe Jackson emerged from the cornfield, and
then Joe asked, is this Heaven, to which Ray Concella,
the character portrayed by Costner, answered, Nah, it's Iowa. Call
(02:07):
it what you like, But for me it was Utopia
or Heaven on Earth or Shangri Law. It was all
the goodness gathered in one place, and it was called
Milo heaven on Earth. There was a kid from Milo
who lived about two city blocks directly west of me.
(02:27):
I knew him well, oh so very well. As preteens.
We were both members of our local boy Scout Troupe
one thirty six. He delivered the daily newspaper to the
north side of Milo, where I handled the south side paper.
Out In high school, he was the wing back on
the football team while I played halfback. We ran together
on the school track team. As the opening and final
(02:48):
leg of the mile relay. We rolled cornsilk cigarettes and
then smoked them in the secrecy of his garage. We'd
get into fistfights and then afterwards would either stay overnight
at his house or mine. We were more than real
good friends. Dan was almost like a brother, but no,
he wasn't my brother. Dan was my uncle. He was
(03:09):
less than a year older than I was, so we
grew up together. I stood up with him as the
best man when he first got married, and he was
my choice as my groomm and when I got married. However,
that didn't happen because in August nineteen sixty nine, Dan
became just one of already five hundred and forty three
thousand troops in Vietnam. Dan found himself at Camp Coriel.
(03:39):
As he stepped into the company's orderly room so that
his presence there would be documented, he heard two UI
helicopters lift off. As the orderly room sergeant introduced himself
and began to process Dan into Camp Coriel, a huge
explosion interrupted their conversation. Come on, Reeves, he says, time
to get your feet wet. And the sergeant ran outside
(04:01):
and jumped into a jeep. As they raced towards the
down Huey, they saw that it had just cleared the
base perimeter fence and crashed into, of all places, a church.
When they pulled up near the church, Dan saw the
door gunner and the crew chief as they jumped away
from the Yui. They hadn't been airborne long enough to
even snap on their safety harness, and they jumped out
(04:21):
immediately upon impact. The jeep came to a stop about
twenty yards in front of the church. A Vietnamese man
hurriedly ran in front of the christ site with the
door gunner's M sixty machine gun balanced over his shoulders.
He stumbled several times as he kept a twenty three
pound weapon in a tight grip by the barrel. As
he headed for the nearby village. The sergeant spoke, as
(04:44):
if in conversation with himself that no good son of
a gun stealing our weapon. Stop stop, I said, he shouted.
Then he pulled out his forty five caliber handgun and
fired four shots at the fleeing man. He turned to
Dan and said, go get that machine gun. He won't
be doing that anymore. Dan was still seated in the
(05:06):
passenger seat of the jeep, glassy eyed at what had
just witnessed. Dan stuttered slightly in that holy crap, man,
why did you And before it could even finish the sentence,
the sergeant piped in, welcome to Noam, reeves, It's just
another day in this arm.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Path of a hell whole country.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Once settled in in his duty station, Dan became the
gun guy for the one hundred and fifty fifth Assault
Helicopter Company Falcon Gun Platoon. We were about two hundred
and fifty to three hundred troops assigned to Camp Coreo,
which is a small air base that sported a few
Air Force Cessna one seventy two's T fours Mescaleros as
(05:49):
observation aircraft and about forty uh one h Huey helicopters.
A good portion of those choppers were armed gun ships
that flew patrol every day called slicks, and ferried troops
in and out of combat zones were served as medevac
extrication helicopters. The Vietcong assaulted Camp Coriel on a regular
(06:13):
basis with mortar rounds several days per week during the
early morning hours the base would get hit. Dan said,
for almost a year, I slept with one eye open
and never got a full night's rest. It didn't take
a medical degree in psychotherapy for me to understand why
Dan slept with a loaded pistol in his bed for
(06:34):
years after the war ended. It freaked his wife out.
But like many Vietnam veterans, Dan fought the war over
and over and over again.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
And you've been listening to a listener Michael Williams tell
the story of Dan Reeves, his best friend and his uncle.
And this isn't just a best friend. We are lucky
if we have a person like this in our life
that we're not married to. May we want to be
married to our best friend, but that extra friend who
you've done life with, your whole life like this very rare,
(07:11):
very beautiful, and everything changes when his best friend ends
up in the one hundred and fifty fifth Assault Helicopter
Company in Vietnam. When we come back. More of the
story of Dan Reeves as told by his best friend,
Michael Williams. Here on Our American Story. This is Lee Hbib,
(07:34):
host of our American Stories. Every day on this show
we tell stories of history, faith business, love, loss, and
your stories. Send us your story small or large to
our email oas at Ouramerican Stories dot com. That's oas
at Ouramerican Stories dot Com. We'd love to hear them
(07:54):
and put them on the air. Our audience loves them too.
And we returned to our American Stories and with the
story of Dan Reeves as told by his nephew and
(08:15):
best friend, Michael Williams. When we last left off, Dan
had been drafted and found himself in the jungles of Vietnam.
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Two months had passed. At cat coriel On, a familiar
face showed up. A guy by the name of Rigoberto Rodriguez,
who went to gun school with Dan back in Maryland,
greeted him. He was in the same aircraft armum repair course.
The two faces behind Dan. They were buddies back in
the States. They went to class together, socialized after class,
(08:49):
had a few beers in pizza on occasion. Dan's wife
Carolyn and Rodriguez's wife Tina, even hung out together when
the guys were in class. Rigoberto, Dan called him Rego
was a soldier of slight build maybe one hundred and
fifty pounds. I didn't concern Dan. What did bother him
was how naive he seemed to be in the midst
of so much peril. Like a big brother, Dan took
(09:12):
him under his wing and gave him instructions, not about
gun repair, but common sense survival tactics. Went on guard duty,
Never turn your back on the perimeter wire, never fall asleep,
and on watch. Boys, have your weapon within reach. Oys,
be cognizant of the closest bunker. Keep your eyes open
and think. Think about what if this?
Speaker 3 (09:31):
What if that?
Speaker 2 (09:32):
How am I going to react? Where am I going
to go? When things go south? Quickly? Always Two days later,
another mortar attack. Dan grabbed his car bean and scrambled
through the bunker, with explosion on both sides of the compound.
It was no relay race on the high school track team.
(09:52):
It was a run for his life. He dove into
the bunker and cowered down as the mortars continued. Suddenly,
Rego shows up. Last man in Dan said, what took
you so long to get here? You're a dead man
if you pussy foots your way here. Remember that I
got caught up in my sleeping bag. What your stupid
sleeping bag held you up. You have no time to
(10:14):
weigh screwing around with a stupid sleeping bag zipper and
humbly regal mumble okay, okay.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Three days passed. It was two o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
The familiar thud noise filled the air, and then another
and then another boom, boom boom. The explosions pounded the camp.
Dan began a sprint from his hoops to the nearest bunker.
As he ran, he saw his buddy Rodriguez already near
the bunker. Rodriguez had been that signed his first guard
(10:48):
duty that very night, station outside the bunker. As Dan approached,
he saw him on a cot outside the bunker, struggling
to fully get out of his zipped up sleeping bag.
I'd been asleep again. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity,
he kicked free and dove headfirst into the sand bag
(11:09):
entryway of the bunker, just as the more exploded some
ten yards away. Only his upper torso safely made it
into the entryway. Blood was everywhere. Rigo was hit and
hit bad. As Dan related, I picked him up to
put him on the stretcher. I got one arm under
(11:29):
his shoulder, my other arm reached below his hips. I
couldn't pick him up.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
His hips and.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Legs were like a jack rabbit that had been shot
at close range. Of the Shotgain just mangled and masked
something terrible. Rigo had been in Vietnam seven days. The
motors thoughts raced through Dan's mind. He thought of his
wife's buddy Tina, back in Maryland, and then he remembered
an envelope that Rego gave him the first day they
(11:56):
met at Camp Careelle. He told Dan, if anything happens
to me, send this letter to my wife.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
My god, Dan thought.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Dan jogged down to the flight line just as the
medevac helicopter lifted off with reg on board. The medics
were still there. Dan asked, is he going to make it?
The senior medic shook his head and said he's alive
when they took off. If they get him to the
field hospital quickly, he has a chance. He's lost a
lot of blood. The other madic looked at Dan and said,
(12:29):
you're hit too, buddy. Let's go over the camp dispensary.
Dan's adrenaline was still pumping. He reached to his side
and fell. For any wounds, he said, I don't think
I'm hit. You're soaked in blood. Soldier is dripping all
over your shorts. Let me walk you over for a
quick checkup. He wasn't hit. His GI issued boxer shorts
were totally saturated, dripping with the blood of his buddy Rodriguez.
(12:57):
Months later, while still in Vietnam, Dan received a letter
from Rego's wife. He was in a wheelchair as a
result of his injuries, unable to walk. He would be
that way for the rest of his life. Dan told me,
I don't know how many times a flashback of that
night awoke me from my sleep over the last forty years.
I thought maybe there was something I could do to
(13:19):
change the outcome.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
It haunts me.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
It's a reality I can't escape that's burned in my brain.
No twenty one year old kid should ever carry Daily
the choppers returned from missions, taking on more AMMO and
fuel before immediately heading back out. The turntime was relatively
short and there was a constant hurriedness on the ground.
(13:43):
The choppers served as a lifeline to the troops in
the field, and any time not in the air was
time wasted. Dan checked the mini guns for any maintenance
problems and reloaded both amal bins with two thousand rounds
of the seven point sixty two cartridges, as well as
two thousand rounds for the M sixty machine gun used
by the door gunners. It was just another ordinary day
(14:03):
in Vietnam, where one could say. As Dan approached one
particular inbound gunship he noticed a door gun or slumped forward.
As he got closer. It became obvious that he was injured,
shot in the elbow, hit by ground far and no
condition to go airborne anytime soon. Dan refilled the animal boxes,
(14:23):
checked the guns, and he was ready for lift off again.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
The pilot turned to Dan and yelled.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Hey, Reeves, get in. I need a door gunner. You're
only guy available who knows how to operate that AM sixty. Hurry,
there's guys in trouble. We need to get there quickly.
Without so much as giving the second thought, Dan jumped
on board once again. At airborne, however, he began to
think to himself, nobody knows I'm on this aircraft as
a door gunner other than the pilot. I'm not qualified
(14:51):
for flight duty. What in the heck am I doing?
As they made their initial approach Dan's eyes widened. It
looked as though tiny black ants were running up the
mountain right into the open field. He leaned out the door,
pointed them to sixty machine gun down and began firing.
And so it went for thirty minutes. On the backside,
(15:13):
Dan peered down and could not believe his eyes. There
were more Viet Cong coming from the timberline, rushing up
the mountains, But to his disbelief, the Vcs stopped for
a second, then picked up the weapon from a dead
VC who had been killed. Those soldiers were going into battle,
and not everyone was armed. They had waited for a
(15:34):
comrade to get killed, then advanced and retrieved their weapon
to fight on Holy crap, batman, Dan thought. As Hu
he made a final pass, Dan saw out the corner
of his eye a group of about four or five
Viatcong soldiers that ran into a small thicket of bamboo
trees that still offered some cover. He radioed the trailing
(15:55):
gunship about their location. Two rocks fired simultaneously from each
side of Huey so as not to throw the gunship
off balance. No doubt one rock would have been enough,
but either way, the entire thicket was deliberated. When they
landed back at Camp Coriel, the first duty of the
day was to again service the guns. Dan's muscles were
(16:18):
taught and his heart pumped as he had just finished
another quarter ball run on the first leg of a
mile relay back in high school. The pilot, a warrant
officer who who himself looked as though he too was
right out of high school and yet to get his
first shave, walk past.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Dan said, hell of a nice job, Breeze. Glad to
have you on board.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
A few days past, thoughts flash through Dan's mind. What
happened earlier in the week was dangerous. That wasn't what
he signed up for, but admittedly it provided a tremendous rush.
Dan was in country for less than six months and
decided to volunteer for flight duty as a shotgun writer.
(17:02):
Not every day, however, just part time would be a
better fit. Just being harm's way, two or three days
per week would be good enough. As the saying went,
the lifespan of a door gunner in Vietnam was about
five minutes.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
And we're listening to a listener of this show. Michael
Williams share the story of his friend, best friend and
uncle Dan Reeves and his service in Vietnam, And we
learned that Dan had a friend named Rego Rodriguez in
Vietnam for only seven days. And what happens is his
friend is well injured, beyond repair, alive but paralyzed for
(17:43):
the rest of his life and sent back home. And
those of the costs of war. When we come back,
more of Michael Williams's story about his pal and uncle
Dan Reeves here on our American Stories. And we returned
(18:09):
to our American stories and with the story of Dan
Reeves as told by his nephew and best friend, Michael Williams,
author of The Boys of Milo. When we last left off,
Dan had by circumstance become a door gunner on a
Yui helicopter and had decided that he changed his career
path to be more in the line of danger. He
(18:32):
was seeking a rush and more.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
It was the early morning of nineteen seventy Dana woke
at six am sharp from the night that was free
of mortar attacks. He reached up and cranked the volume
knob on his single speaker sony radio that hung by
a bungee cord suspended against the plywood ball near his cot.
(18:56):
Good morning Vietnam, it shouted to him. Yes, he preferred
that wake up call to the traditional revenuely common at
state side military installations, and no he didn't jump out
of his cotton salute and standard attention. Dan headed to
the small miss howl, grabbed a quick cup of coffee,
loaded up with sugar, piled some powdered eggs on a
slice of toast, and topped it off with some ketchup
and a dash or two of hot sauce. He ate
(19:18):
while he walked to the gunship park on the AM
two matting on the airfield. What he didn't know then
was that today would be no ordinary day. Indeed, it
would not. On the headset, the pilot told the crew
that they were headed for Cordons, about thirty clicks to
the south, where some ground troops needed air cover before
crossing a river to an area where some VC had
(19:41):
been reported by T forty one Mescalario the day before.
They flew unaccompanied, and if all went as planned, the
grunts would successfully cross the river and the chopper would
be back at Camp Coreol in slightly more than an hour.
About ten minutes into the flight and before the altitude
safety thresho of three thousand feet. Trouble began. Zoop, zop, zoop.
(20:05):
Four rounds of small arms fire hit the aircraft. The
crew chiefs shouted over the headset.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
Do you think one's that came from I think it
came from work. Two or three o' clark was saying,
need to see anything.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Dan yelled, I see smoke. We're hit. I think they
got the transmission.
Speaker 4 (20:20):
My crap, I'm starting to lousion. We're going down.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Hang on.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Dan stuck his head out the door. He looked down
and saw nothing, nothing but trees, nowhere a spot for
a hard landing. If they fell into the tree tops,
the helicopter would flip and most likely explode. His heart
pounded as if we're about to jump out of his chest.
Speaker 4 (20:45):
I see a spot, small coloring below over there, over there,
for God's saying it. Man, there's no bigger than a
picnic table. Can you make it? It's all what we got,
It's all we got.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Dear Jesus, help me get this bird down, the pilot begged.
He glanced at his gaze, and the raid of descent
was slightly over seven hundred feet per minute and increasing.
Hold on, hold, on baby. As he talked to the
Huey brace brace, the tail of the gunship clipped the
branch of Hopia trees about forty feet in the air
and tipped sharply forward, but to Huey dropped straight down
(21:24):
and hit the ground with a huge stud.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Jesus put them on the picnic table.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Moans and groans filled the flight deck. Then unfastened his
monkey harness. He was bruised but uninjured. Hey, Hey, let's
get the hell out of here. He jumped out of
the side door and looked back for the three others
to follow. Nobody moved. The pilot appeared to have a
broken back, the coal pilot had a broken leg, and
the crew chief suffered a broken arm and some rib injuries.
(21:59):
Dan did a quick kreage assessmin. He first helped the
crew chief with the broken arm and the ribs out
of the Huey and told him to make his way
into the jungle. He went to the rotorhead and tried
to grab the pilot and pull him out, but he
screamed out in agony.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
I can't move, I can't move it all.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
He went to the other side and asked the coal
pilot if he could walk, I don't think so. My
legs broke pretty bad. Dan eased him out through the
cool pilot's left arm over his shoulder, and together they
limped into the jungle where the crew chief had stopped
some twenty yards into a thick wooded area. Dan spoke
out loud, how am I going to get that pilot?
(22:36):
I can't even touch him? And he shouts out in pain.
The crew chief told him leave him in the seat,
take the whole seat out of the chopper. Dan went
back to the down chopper. Dan easily found the release
pin for the pilot's seat. The pilot cried out in
pain again, damn it, You're gonna have to suck it up.
You're either going to burn to death if this thing
catches on fire, or the VC will find you and
(22:57):
shoot you with one steady lift. Dam He raised the
seat with the pilot still harnessed in, and carried him
to where the other two men awaited. Dan's mind raised
one thousand miles an hour. Our goose is cooked. I've
got three guys here who need medical help. The radio's out,
(23:20):
nobody knows we're here, and I expect the VC will
paying us a visit. Soon, the copilot chimed in, I
let command posts know on the radio that we were
going down before we chrish. They know we're out here somewhere,
Dan said, Let's pray they find us. Soon hours went by,
night set in nothing. He sat next to the pilot
(23:42):
with the forty five handgun cocked ready to fire. His
hands shook like that of an old man. Scared was
not the right word to describe the emotions at night.
There were no words, no words to even remotely express
the fear generated with each heartbeat. I don't think once.
I just stared off in the jungle, looking for any
(24:04):
sort of movement or sign that the VC were coming.
Was today the day that he and the other three
would meet their maker? Hopefully not. Jesus found them a
landing spot, put them on the ground alive. They all
quietly prayed, Dear God, please help us. Several more hours
passed and it was total darkness. The pilot's injury seemed
(24:25):
to worsen. His moans increased and became louder and more frequent.
Dan put his hands over the pilot's mouth to keep
him quiet, knowing that the noise would give away the position.
I damned or suffogated the guy that night. He moaned
almost with every breath, and I had to shut him up.
Then the crew chief mentioned, I think there's some morphine
(24:48):
in the medical kit that's still in the huey. If
he had some of that, it might keep him more comfortable.
Dan thought about it for a few minutes. Was it
worth the trip back to the huey? And with his
movement and give away the position, the things kept on
as they had been. The pilot's morning would do that anyway,
Like a snake slithering toward an unsuspecting prey, Dan quietly
(25:10):
crawled by the light of the moon and made his
way to the down huey. He grabbed the medical kit
and again crawled back to their hiding place. He popped
the cover on the small canvas bag. What the heck,
nothing but bandages, rotten, stinking, no good bandages. The drug
users at Camp Coriel had ransacked the medical kit and
(25:30):
stole the morphine.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
For their drug abbot. So they waited for daylight.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
Fingers crossed, hammer cocked, eyes wide open, and the pilot
continued to moan, Oh Lord, here are prayers. As the
early light of dawn creeped in a heavy fog surrounded them. Suddenly,
Dan whispered, did you hear that? Did you hear that?
There's something out there? Everyone's sense of sight and sound
(25:56):
peaked instantly. Yeah, I heard it. It's over there. The
crew chief pointed his good arm in the direction of
the helicopter. Here they come. Dan's heart jumped in his throat.
The guy pulled out an orange placard. Yes, an orange placard.
For sure, it was an orange placard. Dan jumped up
(26:16):
and yelled, hey, hey, we're over here. We're over here.
He turned to the helicopter crew behind him and shouted,
there are guys. They're here for us. The orange placard
was the color code used for identification purpose exactly an
instance such as this. The colors rotated from day to day,
and Dan knew that today was orange, his new favorite color.
(26:39):
The gi walked toward Dan. When he got closer, Dan
saw he was a Green Beret and looked as big
as a linebacker on a professional football team.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
For certain, a welcome sight. We'll get you guys out of.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Here in no time, the Green bray told him. We
have a couple of choppers in route to lift you
guys out.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
Of here.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I'm okay, Dan said, I don't need at it back,
just some clean underwear. Last night was kind of iffy.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
And you're listening to Michael Williams, author of The Boys
of Milo, tell the story of his best friend and uncle,
Dan Reeves. The story continues here on our American Stories,
(27:37):
and we returned to our American Stories and the final
portion of our story on Dan Reeves telling the story
is Michael Williams, Dan's nephew and best friend. When we
last left off, Dan had survived a harrowing night in
the jungle after his UI helicopter crashed. Let's return to
the story.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Word filtered down that Camp Coreol could possibly be the
target of attack by North Vietnamese regulars. As a result,
the base was put on high alert. Dan got the
call that put him on one of the guard towers
for an overnight watch. Staying focused and scanning the horizon
for unusual movement was difficult. Boring might be a better word,
(28:23):
but in the words of a battle seasoned veteran, nothing
was a good thing. Suddenly Dan saw a movement running
towards the building that housed the base generator. Three figures
raced closer and crosser. Dan released the safety of his
M fourteen, drew his weapon down and fired off three
quick rounds. He dropped one North Vietnamese regular just yards
(28:48):
from the generator building.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
The other two ran inside.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Within seconds, the base alarm sounded, then the mortars began
to fall. The third mortar exploded right at the base
of the tower and splintered one leg of the guard tower. Gradually,
under the weight of the sand bags, the tower began
to tip and in slow motion fell downward. Dan jumped
as it fell, and when it hit the ground, he
rolled like a paratrooper on a bad joeman. As he
(29:14):
looked up, he saw the canine handlers turn their dogs
loose and sent them into the generator building. They didn't bark,
they didn't growl, and within a minute the two dogs
egsited the building and ran.
Speaker 3 (29:24):
To their handlers.
Speaker 2 (29:25):
Blood dripped from their mouths. Dan got up and asked,
did they get him? You bet you They did, fired
back one of the handlers. They ripped out their throats
before they knew what happened. All this happened within five minutes,
as if in afterthought. Dan remembered the two other gis
that were in the guard towers with him when it fell.
He hadn't seen or heard from them since that last
(29:45):
mortar hit. He limped over to the down tower and
shattered out. There was no answer. Sure enough, two bodies
were buried in the busted boards and sand bags. The
sand bags had turned into hardened seament after a month's
months of exposure to the elements. They crushed the two
who failed to jump upon impact on the thirty foot
(30:07):
fall to the ground. Several days passed Dan's mind races
if he thought what would be next? Would they be
back in greater force? There wasn't a whole lot of
regular infantry assigned to Camp coriol to provide a fighting force,
mostly a few hundred guys. There were pilots, mechanics, harm them,
repair cooks, fabrication people, and assortment of support personnel. However,
(30:30):
when the alarm sounded, all grabbed their small arms weapons
and did what soldiers do in times of war improvise.
The next few days Dan spent on a scavenger hunt
as he lined up very side of the need for
his special project. He ventured down to the flight line
and tossed his idea out to the guys who worked
on the T forty one mescalarios. Sure enough, they were
(30:52):
on board with his brainstorm and made available what items
he needed. Then back to the fab shop with a
rough sketch drawn on paper of what he needed, welded
together parts here, parts there, and in a short time
his idea became reality. The final product was a spare
minigun from one of the Huey gunships, which mounted on
(31:13):
a swivel and placed the trop of tripod about four
feet high. It took five guys to put this new
high powered jerry rigged weapon into place. Two guys carried
the minigun, one guy carried the batteries, one guy carried
the seven point six to two ammunition, and the fifth
guy carried the tripod. The mini gun fired two thousand
(31:33):
rounds a minute and had some serious kick with the
tripod with stand. The fierce punishment from the gun's recoil
was yet to be answered. A couple of weeks had
passed and Dan almost forgot about his tripod mounted minigun.
It had yet to be baptized by fire and remained
inside the gun shop. And while the chow hal keeping
his intake of saltpeter at acceptable levels, one of the
(31:55):
guys from the fab shop quizzed him, have you got
your gun ready to go? I think so, but I
haven't fired in the field yet. Well, the latest briefing
from the commander said we might be in line for
another assault on Camp Coreel. Did you hear that? Well,
let's set it up for the day after Marrow and
see how it goes. Deuteronomy twenty sixteen through seventeen says,
(32:18):
but in the cities of these people that the Lord
your God has giving you for inherence, you shall save
alive nothing that breathes, but you shall devote them to
complete destruction. That very night, chaos broke out a Camp Coreel.
Within five minutes the crew had the gun in place.
Two flares fired off in the distance lit up the sky.
(32:42):
Dan got his first clear view of what was coming.
Dozens and dozens of North Vietnamese troop raced toward Camp Coreel,
approaching the Constantina wire that surrounded the camp. Dan knelt
frozen behind the tripod in dis belief of the site.
The fab sergeant firm. They wrapped him on the helmet
with the end of the Screwbrion shouted, kill him, raeves,
(33:04):
kill him now. Dan fought for words to come out
of his mouth, but his first attempts was nothing but
a mere whisper. He took a deep breath, and with
a guttural shout, yelled everyone down, Everyone down now. Dan
made one pass from right to left across the field
of fire with them in again. Another pass from left
(33:26):
to right followed, and then back again the other direction.
Four thousand rounds fired in little more than two minutes,
and then all was quiet, not a sound anywhere. Within
a couple of hours, the sun slowly creeped into the sky,
giving first glimpse of the field of fire. Everyone squinted
(33:49):
peering out of their bunkers into the perimeter wire. There
were bodies everywhere, stretched out for about a hundred yards
clear back to the grove of rubber trees. The South
Vietnamese dragged bodies off the wire and into a pile
for removal. Dan stopped counting bodies at seventy. As they
worked away further out into the rubber trees, the muffled
(34:11):
sound of a forty five caliber pistol popped, and then another,
and a few minutes later yet another. There were wounded
North Vietnamese regulars who had taken refuge among the rubber trees.
The South Vietnamese took no prisoners. There was no mercy.
About an hour later, in the early morning, before the
(34:32):
heat became too stifling, three deuce and a half trucks
arrived and the South Vietnamese Army regulars began loading corpses
for disposal. Yeah, three truckloads of dead bodies. Before the
last truck pulled away. The base commander came down to
the area just outside the bunker. What the blankety blank,
he barked, Who's responsible for this? Nobody said a word,
(34:58):
but instead all eyes turned towards Dan. Matthew twenty five,
verse twenty one says, well done, good and faithful servant.
You have been faithful with a few things. I will
put you in charge of many things. Come and share
(35:19):
your master's happiness. Specialist five. Dan reeves discharge from active
duty on March twenty eighth, nineteen seventy one. The affects
him his fighting in the war haunted him for nearly
fifty years. After the war, Dan retired as a printing
(35:42):
press operator and lived in Hartford, Iowa, and would often
call me when stressed about one thing or another. In
his words, you want to go to the rifle range
and decompress. Guns had been a part of his life
for well over fifty years, from the time we were
old enough to go rabbit hunting alone and trump the
brush to scare up a few cottontails. Guns became a
(36:02):
fixation for him, Bolstered by his expertise in repairing them
and his time in the military, would regularly hop in
his car and head to Banner Pitt's rifle range and
far off a few hundred rounds. Despite our failing eyesight,
we still joked with each other who had the better aim.
I talked with him multiple times during our short rise
(36:24):
together about what was.
Speaker 3 (36:25):
On his mind.
Speaker 2 (36:27):
I knew Dan had been receiving counseling for some time
from the Veterans Hospital, as well as medication to keep
him on an even keel. However, as well as I
knew dapper Dan, I never dreamed in a million years
how the stress not awaited him over the years. Dan
left Vietnam in nineteen seventy, but like so many other
(36:47):
young men who served there, Vietnam never left him. Nearly
fifty years after he left Bamy to it, the war
finally ended for him on June twenty second, twenty nineteen,
when he took his own life with a handgun. I
don't think of Dan as just another statistic of the
war that yet he was. In Shakespeare's played Julius Caesar,
(37:12):
Mark Anthony speaks of the death of Caesar. He said,
the evil that men do live after them, but the
good is oft entered.
Speaker 3 (37:20):
With their bones.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Thus the evil of war that Dan experienced is easily remembered,
but let us not forget the good that he brought forth.
Speaker 1 (37:32):
And a terrific job on the production editing and storytelling
by our own Monte Montgomery. A special thanks to Michael
Williams for telling such a bold, beautiful story about his friend,
his uncle, Dan Reeves, and what a.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
Story it was.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
And in nineteen seventy he was released from Vietnam, but
Vietnam was never released from him, It never left him.
In June of twenty nineteen, Dan would take his life
with a handgun. As regrettably and tragically too many of
our soldiers still do the story of Dan Reeves hear
(38:13):
on our American Stories
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
Up next, a story from a listener, Michael Williams. Michael
is the author of the Boys of Milo, a collection
of stories from those who served in Vietnam from his
small hometown of seven hundred and sixty four in Iowa,
(00:33):
and our showways heard on who the great iHeart stick
in the middle of this Country in Des Moines, Iowa.
Today he shares the story of someone close to him,
one of his best friends.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Take it away, Michael, You'll find no statistics on the
crime rate in Milo. Milo employed no policeman, and our
biggest fear was that some lady witnessed some wrongdoing and
would call her mother. That's who dialed out the punishment
our parents. We had just one phone in the house
(01:08):
and our connection was a party line.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
I remember our.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Phone number had just three digits six one J, no dial,
no push button, and certainly no voice activated calls. To
make a call, I'd simply pick up the phone. I
told the operator I wanted to talk to Grandma. She
knew and made the connections. There were no street signs
or house numbers, keys were left in car ignition overnight.
(01:31):
Residents didn't lock their doors. Dogs didn't even bark because
they knew your scent and would just run up wag
their tails wanting a scratch of the air.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Everyone knew everyone, and that was good.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Even the nineteen eighty nine Kevin Costner movie Field of
Dreams touched on the wonderment of the ideal setting. In
the movie Shoeless, Joe Jackson emerged from the cornfield, and
then Joe asked, is this Heaven, to which Ray Concella,
the character portrayed by Costner, answered, Nah, it's Iowa. Call
(02:07):
it what you like, But for me it was Utopia
or Heaven on Earth or Shangri Law. It was all
the goodness gathered in one place, and it was called
Milo heaven on Earth. There was a kid from Milo
who lived about two city blocks directly west of me.
(02:27):
I knew him well, oh so very well. As preteens.
We were both members of our local boy Scout Troupe
one thirty six. He delivered the daily newspaper to the
north side of Milo, where I handled the south side paper.
Out In high school, he was the wing back on
the football team while I played halfback. We ran together
on the school track team. As the opening and final
(02:48):
leg of the mile relay. We rolled cornsilk cigarettes and
then smoked them in the secrecy of his garage. We'd
get into fistfights and then afterwards would either stay overnight
at his house or mine. We were more than real
good friends. Dan was almost like a brother, but no,
he wasn't my brother. Dan was my uncle. He was
(03:09):
less than a year older than I was, so we
grew up together. I stood up with him as the
best man when he first got married, and he was
my choice as my groomm and when I got married. However,
that didn't happen because in August nineteen sixty nine, Dan
became just one of already five hundred and forty three
thousand troops in Vietnam. Dan found himself at Camp Coriel.
(03:39):
As he stepped into the company's orderly room so that
his presence there would be documented, he heard two UI
helicopters lift off. As the orderly room sergeant introduced himself
and began to process Dan into Camp Coriel, a huge
explosion interrupted their conversation. Come on, Reeves, he says, time
to get your feet wet. And the sergeant ran outside
(04:01):
and jumped into a jeep. As they raced towards the
down Huey, they saw that it had just cleared the
base perimeter fence and crashed into, of all places, a church.
When they pulled up near the church, Dan saw the
door gunner and the crew chief as they jumped away
from the Yui. They hadn't been airborne long enough to
even snap on their safety harness, and they jumped out
(04:21):
immediately upon impact. The jeep came to a stop about
twenty yards in front of the church. A Vietnamese man
hurriedly ran in front of the christ site with the
door gunner's M sixty machine gun balanced over his shoulders.
He stumbled several times as he kept a twenty three
pound weapon in a tight grip by the barrel. As
he headed for the nearby village. The sergeant spoke, as
(04:44):
if in conversation with himself that no good son of
a gun stealing our weapon. Stop stop, I said, he shouted.
Then he pulled out his forty five caliber handgun and
fired four shots at the fleeing man. He turned to
Dan and said, go get that machine gun. He won't
be doing that anymore. Dan was still seated in the
(05:06):
passenger seat of the jeep, glassy eyed at what had
just witnessed. Dan stuttered slightly in that holy crap, man,
why did you And before it could even finish the sentence,
the sergeant piped in, welcome to Noam, reeves, It's just
another day in this arm.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Path of a hell whole country.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Once settled in in his duty station, Dan became the
gun guy for the one hundred and fifty fifth Assault
Helicopter Company Falcon Gun Platoon. We were about two hundred
and fifty to three hundred troops assigned to Camp Coreo,
which is a small air base that sported a few
Air Force Cessna one seventy two's T fours Mescaleros as
(05:49):
observation aircraft and about forty uh one h Huey helicopters.
A good portion of those choppers were armed gun ships
that flew patrol every day called slicks, and ferried troops
in and out of combat zones were served as medevac
extrication helicopters. The Vietcong assaulted Camp Coriel on a regular
(06:13):
basis with mortar rounds several days per week during the
early morning hours the base would get hit. Dan said,
for almost a year, I slept with one eye open
and never got a full night's rest. It didn't take
a medical degree in psychotherapy for me to understand why
Dan slept with a loaded pistol in his bed for
(06:34):
years after the war ended. It freaked his wife out.
But like many Vietnam veterans, Dan fought the war over
and over and over again.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
And you've been listening to a listener Michael Williams tell
the story of Dan Reeves, his best friend and his uncle.
And this isn't just a best friend. We are lucky
if we have a person like this in our life
that we're not married to. May we want to be
married to our best friend, but that extra friend who
you've done life with, your whole life like this very rare,
(07:11):
very beautiful, and everything changes when his best friend ends
up in the one hundred and fifty fifth Assault Helicopter
Company in Vietnam. When we come back. More of the
story of Dan Reeves as told by his best friend,
Michael Williams. Here on Our American Story. This is Lee Hbib,
(07:34):
host of our American Stories. Every day on this show
we tell stories of history, faith business, love, loss, and
your stories. Send us your story small or large to
our email oas at Ouramerican Stories dot com. That's oas
at Ouramerican Stories dot Com. We'd love to hear them
(07:54):
and put them on the air. Our audience loves them too.
And we returned to our American Stories and with the
story of Dan Reeves as told by his nephew and
(08:15):
best friend, Michael Williams. When we last left off, Dan
had been drafted and found himself in the jungles of Vietnam.
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Two months had passed. At cat coriel On, a familiar
face showed up. A guy by the name of Rigoberto Rodriguez,
who went to gun school with Dan back in Maryland,
greeted him. He was in the same aircraft armum repair course.
The two faces behind Dan. They were buddies back in
the States. They went to class together, socialized after class,
(08:49):
had a few beers in pizza on occasion. Dan's wife
Carolyn and Rodriguez's wife Tina, even hung out together when
the guys were in class. Rigoberto, Dan called him Rego
was a soldier of slight build maybe one hundred and
fifty pounds. I didn't concern Dan. What did bother him
was how naive he seemed to be in the midst
of so much peril. Like a big brother, Dan took
(09:12):
him under his wing and gave him instructions, not about
gun repair, but common sense survival tactics. Went on guard duty,
Never turn your back on the perimeter wire, never fall asleep,
and on watch. Boys, have your weapon within reach. Oys,
be cognizant of the closest bunker. Keep your eyes open
and think. Think about what if this?
Speaker 3 (09:31):
What if that?
Speaker 2 (09:32):
How am I going to react? Where am I going
to go? When things go south? Quickly? Always Two days later,
another mortar attack. Dan grabbed his car bean and scrambled
through the bunker, with explosion on both sides of the compound.
It was no relay race on the high school track team.
(09:52):
It was a run for his life. He dove into
the bunker and cowered down as the mortars continued. Suddenly,
Rego shows up. Last man in Dan said, what took
you so long to get here? You're a dead man
if you pussy foots your way here. Remember that I
got caught up in my sleeping bag. What your stupid
sleeping bag held you up. You have no time to
(10:14):
weigh screwing around with a stupid sleeping bag zipper and
humbly regal mumble okay, okay.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Three days passed. It was two o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
The familiar thud noise filled the air, and then another
and then another boom, boom boom. The explosions pounded the camp.
Dan began a sprint from his hoops to the nearest bunker.
As he ran, he saw his buddy Rodriguez already near
the bunker. Rodriguez had been that signed his first guard
(10:48):
duty that very night, station outside the bunker. As Dan approached,
he saw him on a cot outside the bunker, struggling
to fully get out of his zipped up sleeping bag.
I'd been asleep again. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity,
he kicked free and dove headfirst into the sand bag
(11:09):
entryway of the bunker, just as the more exploded some
ten yards away. Only his upper torso safely made it
into the entryway. Blood was everywhere. Rigo was hit and
hit bad. As Dan related, I picked him up to
put him on the stretcher. I got one arm under
(11:29):
his shoulder, my other arm reached below his hips. I
couldn't pick him up.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
His hips and.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Legs were like a jack rabbit that had been shot
at close range. Of the Shotgain just mangled and masked
something terrible. Rigo had been in Vietnam seven days. The
motors thoughts raced through Dan's mind. He thought of his
wife's buddy Tina, back in Maryland, and then he remembered
an envelope that Rego gave him the first day they
(11:56):
met at Camp Careelle. He told Dan, if anything happens
to me, send this letter to my wife.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
My god, Dan thought.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Dan jogged down to the flight line just as the
medevac helicopter lifted off with reg on board. The medics
were still there. Dan asked, is he going to make it?
The senior medic shook his head and said he's alive
when they took off. If they get him to the
field hospital quickly, he has a chance. He's lost a
lot of blood. The other madic looked at Dan and said,
(12:29):
you're hit too, buddy. Let's go over the camp dispensary.
Dan's adrenaline was still pumping. He reached to his side
and fell. For any wounds, he said, I don't think
I'm hit. You're soaked in blood. Soldier is dripping all
over your shorts. Let me walk you over for a
quick checkup. He wasn't hit. His GI issued boxer shorts
were totally saturated, dripping with the blood of his buddy Rodriguez.
(12:57):
Months later, while still in Vietnam, Dan received a letter
from Rego's wife. He was in a wheelchair as a
result of his injuries, unable to walk. He would be
that way for the rest of his life. Dan told me,
I don't know how many times a flashback of that
night awoke me from my sleep over the last forty years.
I thought maybe there was something I could do to
(13:19):
change the outcome.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
It haunts me.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
It's a reality I can't escape that's burned in my brain.
No twenty one year old kid should ever carry Daily
the choppers returned from missions, taking on more AMMO and
fuel before immediately heading back out. The turntime was relatively
short and there was a constant hurriedness on the ground.
(13:43):
The choppers served as a lifeline to the troops in
the field, and any time not in the air was
time wasted. Dan checked the mini guns for any maintenance
problems and reloaded both amal bins with two thousand rounds
of the seven point sixty two cartridges, as well as
two thousand rounds for the M sixty machine gun used
by the door gunners. It was just another ordinary day
(14:03):
in Vietnam, where one could say. As Dan approached one
particular inbound gunship he noticed a door gun or slumped forward.
As he got closer. It became obvious that he was injured,
shot in the elbow, hit by ground far and no
condition to go airborne anytime soon. Dan refilled the animal boxes,
(14:23):
checked the guns, and he was ready for lift off again.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
The pilot turned to Dan and yelled.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Hey, Reeves, get in. I need a door gunner. You're
only guy available who knows how to operate that AM sixty. Hurry,
there's guys in trouble. We need to get there quickly.
Without so much as giving the second thought, Dan jumped
on board once again. At airborne, however, he began to
think to himself, nobody knows I'm on this aircraft as
a door gunner other than the pilot. I'm not qualified
(14:51):
for flight duty. What in the heck am I doing?
As they made their initial approach Dan's eyes widened. It
looked as though tiny black ants were running up the
mountain right into the open field. He leaned out the door,
pointed them to sixty machine gun down and began firing.
And so it went for thirty minutes. On the backside,
(15:13):
Dan peered down and could not believe his eyes. There
were more Viet Cong coming from the timberline, rushing up
the mountains, But to his disbelief, the Vcs stopped for
a second, then picked up the weapon from a dead
VC who had been killed. Those soldiers were going into battle,
and not everyone was armed. They had waited for a
(15:34):
comrade to get killed, then advanced and retrieved their weapon
to fight on Holy crap, batman, Dan thought. As Hu
he made a final pass, Dan saw out the corner
of his eye a group of about four or five
Viatcong soldiers that ran into a small thicket of bamboo
trees that still offered some cover. He radioed the trailing
(15:55):
gunship about their location. Two rocks fired simultaneously from each
side of Huey so as not to throw the gunship
off balance. No doubt one rock would have been enough,
but either way, the entire thicket was deliberated. When they
landed back at Camp Coriel, the first duty of the
day was to again service the guns. Dan's muscles were
(16:18):
taught and his heart pumped as he had just finished
another quarter ball run on the first leg of a
mile relay back in high school. The pilot, a warrant
officer who who himself looked as though he too was
right out of high school and yet to get his
first shave, walk past.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Dan said, hell of a nice job, Breeze. Glad to
have you on board.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
A few days past, thoughts flash through Dan's mind. What
happened earlier in the week was dangerous. That wasn't what
he signed up for, but admittedly it provided a tremendous rush.
Dan was in country for less than six months and
decided to volunteer for flight duty as a shotgun writer.
(17:02):
Not every day, however, just part time would be a
better fit. Just being harm's way, two or three days
per week would be good enough. As the saying went,
the lifespan of a door gunner in Vietnam was about
five minutes.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
And we're listening to a listener of this show. Michael
Williams share the story of his friend, best friend and
uncle Dan Reeves and his service in Vietnam, And we
learned that Dan had a friend named Rego Rodriguez in
Vietnam for only seven days. And what happens is his
friend is well injured, beyond repair, alive but paralyzed for
(17:43):
the rest of his life and sent back home. And
those of the costs of war. When we come back,
more of Michael Williams's story about his pal and uncle
Dan Reeves here on our American Stories. And we returned
(18:09):
to our American stories and with the story of Dan
Reeves as told by his nephew and best friend, Michael Williams,
author of The Boys of Milo. When we last left off,
Dan had by circumstance become a door gunner on a
Yui helicopter and had decided that he changed his career
path to be more in the line of danger. He
(18:32):
was seeking a rush and more.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
It was the early morning of nineteen seventy Dana woke
at six am sharp from the night that was free
of mortar attacks. He reached up and cranked the volume
knob on his single speaker sony radio that hung by
a bungee cord suspended against the plywood ball near his cot.
(18:56):
Good morning Vietnam, it shouted to him. Yes, he preferred
that wake up call to the traditional revenuely common at
state side military installations, and no he didn't jump out
of his cotton salute and standard attention. Dan headed to
the small miss howl, grabbed a quick cup of coffee,
loaded up with sugar, piled some powdered eggs on a
slice of toast, and topped it off with some ketchup
and a dash or two of hot sauce. He ate
(19:18):
while he walked to the gunship park on the AM
two matting on the airfield. What he didn't know then
was that today would be no ordinary day. Indeed, it
would not. On the headset, the pilot told the crew
that they were headed for Cordons, about thirty clicks to
the south, where some ground troops needed air cover before
crossing a river to an area where some VC had
(19:41):
been reported by T forty one Mescalario the day before.
They flew unaccompanied, and if all went as planned, the
grunts would successfully cross the river and the chopper would
be back at Camp Coreol in slightly more than an hour.
About ten minutes into the flight and before the altitude
safety thresho of three thousand feet. Trouble began. Zoop, zop, zoop.
(20:05):
Four rounds of small arms fire hit the aircraft. The
crew chiefs shouted over the headset.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
Do you think one's that came from I think it
came from work. Two or three o' clark was saying,
need to see anything.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Dan yelled, I see smoke. We're hit. I think they
got the transmission.
Speaker 4 (20:20):
My crap, I'm starting to lousion. We're going down.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Hang on.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Dan stuck his head out the door. He looked down
and saw nothing, nothing but trees, nowhere a spot for
a hard landing. If they fell into the tree tops,
the helicopter would flip and most likely explode. His heart
pounded as if we're about to jump out of his chest.
Speaker 4 (20:45):
I see a spot, small coloring below over there, over there,
for God's saying it. Man, there's no bigger than a
picnic table. Can you make it? It's all what we got,
It's all we got.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Dear Jesus, help me get this bird down, the pilot begged.
He glanced at his gaze, and the raid of descent
was slightly over seven hundred feet per minute and increasing.
Hold on, hold, on baby. As he talked to the
Huey brace brace, the tail of the gunship clipped the
branch of Hopia trees about forty feet in the air
and tipped sharply forward, but to Huey dropped straight down
(21:24):
and hit the ground with a huge stud.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Jesus put them on the picnic table.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Moans and groans filled the flight deck. Then unfastened his
monkey harness. He was bruised but uninjured. Hey, Hey, let's
get the hell out of here. He jumped out of
the side door and looked back for the three others
to follow. Nobody moved. The pilot appeared to have a
broken back, the coal pilot had a broken leg, and
the crew chief suffered a broken arm and some rib injuries.
(21:59):
Dan did a quick kreage assessmin. He first helped the
crew chief with the broken arm and the ribs out
of the Huey and told him to make his way
into the jungle. He went to the rotorhead and tried
to grab the pilot and pull him out, but he
screamed out in agony.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
I can't move, I can't move it all.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
He went to the other side and asked the coal
pilot if he could walk, I don't think so. My
legs broke pretty bad. Dan eased him out through the
cool pilot's left arm over his shoulder, and together they
limped into the jungle where the crew chief had stopped
some twenty yards into a thick wooded area. Dan spoke
out loud, how am I going to get that pilot?
(22:36):
I can't even touch him? And he shouts out in pain.
The crew chief told him leave him in the seat,
take the whole seat out of the chopper. Dan went
back to the down chopper. Dan easily found the release
pin for the pilot's seat. The pilot cried out in
pain again, damn it, You're gonna have to suck it up.
You're either going to burn to death if this thing
catches on fire, or the VC will find you and
(22:57):
shoot you with one steady lift. Dam He raised the
seat with the pilot still harnessed in, and carried him
to where the other two men awaited. Dan's mind raised
one thousand miles an hour. Our goose is cooked. I've
got three guys here who need medical help. The radio's out,
(23:20):
nobody knows we're here, and I expect the VC will
paying us a visit. Soon, the copilot chimed in, I
let command posts know on the radio that we were
going down before we chrish. They know we're out here somewhere,
Dan said, Let's pray they find us. Soon hours went by,
night set in nothing. He sat next to the pilot
(23:42):
with the forty five handgun cocked ready to fire. His
hands shook like that of an old man. Scared was
not the right word to describe the emotions at night.
There were no words, no words to even remotely express
the fear generated with each heartbeat. I don't think once.
I just stared off in the jungle, looking for any
(24:04):
sort of movement or sign that the VC were coming.
Was today the day that he and the other three
would meet their maker? Hopefully not. Jesus found them a
landing spot, put them on the ground alive. They all
quietly prayed, Dear God, please help us. Several more hours
passed and it was total darkness. The pilot's injury seemed
(24:25):
to worsen. His moans increased and became louder and more frequent.
Dan put his hands over the pilot's mouth to keep
him quiet, knowing that the noise would give away the position.
I damned or suffogated the guy that night. He moaned
almost with every breath, and I had to shut him up.
Then the crew chief mentioned, I think there's some morphine
(24:48):
in the medical kit that's still in the huey. If
he had some of that, it might keep him more comfortable.
Dan thought about it for a few minutes. Was it
worth the trip back to the huey? And with his
movement and give away the position, the things kept on
as they had been. The pilot's morning would do that anyway,
Like a snake slithering toward an unsuspecting prey, Dan quietly
(25:10):
crawled by the light of the moon and made his
way to the down huey. He grabbed the medical kit
and again crawled back to their hiding place. He popped
the cover on the small canvas bag. What the heck,
nothing but bandages, rotten, stinking, no good bandages. The drug
users at Camp Coriel had ransacked the medical kit and
(25:30):
stole the morphine.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
For their drug abbot. So they waited for daylight.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
Fingers crossed, hammer cocked, eyes wide open, and the pilot
continued to moan, Oh Lord, here are prayers. As the
early light of dawn creeped in a heavy fog surrounded them. Suddenly,
Dan whispered, did you hear that? Did you hear that?
There's something out there? Everyone's sense of sight and sound
(25:56):
peaked instantly. Yeah, I heard it. It's over there. The
crew chief pointed his good arm in the direction of
the helicopter. Here they come. Dan's heart jumped in his throat.
The guy pulled out an orange placard. Yes, an orange placard.
For sure, it was an orange placard. Dan jumped up
(26:16):
and yelled, hey, hey, we're over here. We're over here.
He turned to the helicopter crew behind him and shouted,
there are guys. They're here for us. The orange placard
was the color code used for identification purpose exactly an
instance such as this. The colors rotated from day to day,
and Dan knew that today was orange, his new favorite color.
(26:39):
The gi walked toward Dan. When he got closer, Dan
saw he was a Green Beret and looked as big
as a linebacker on a professional football team.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
For certain, a welcome sight. We'll get you guys out of.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Here in no time, the Green bray told him. We
have a couple of choppers in route to lift you
guys out.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
Of here.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I'm okay, Dan said, I don't need at it back,
just some clean underwear. Last night was kind of iffy.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
And you're listening to Michael Williams, author of The Boys
of Milo, tell the story of his best friend and uncle,
Dan Reeves. The story continues here on our American Stories,
(27:37):
and we returned to our American Stories and the final
portion of our story on Dan Reeves telling the story
is Michael Williams, Dan's nephew and best friend. When we
last left off, Dan had survived a harrowing night in
the jungle after his UI helicopter crashed. Let's return to
the story.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Word filtered down that Camp Coreol could possibly be the
target of attack by North Vietnamese regulars. As a result,
the base was put on high alert. Dan got the
call that put him on one of the guard towers
for an overnight watch. Staying focused and scanning the horizon
for unusual movement was difficult. Boring might be a better word,
(28:23):
but in the words of a battle seasoned veteran, nothing
was a good thing. Suddenly Dan saw a movement running
towards the building that housed the base generator. Three figures
raced closer and crosser. Dan released the safety of his
M fourteen, drew his weapon down and fired off three
quick rounds. He dropped one North Vietnamese regular just yards
(28:48):
from the generator building.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
The other two ran inside.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Within seconds, the base alarm sounded, then the mortars began
to fall. The third mortar exploded right at the base
of the tower and splintered one leg of the guard tower. Gradually,
under the weight of the sand bags, the tower began
to tip and in slow motion fell downward. Dan jumped
as it fell, and when it hit the ground, he
rolled like a paratrooper on a bad joeman. As he
(29:14):
looked up, he saw the canine handlers turn their dogs
loose and sent them into the generator building. They didn't bark,
they didn't growl, and within a minute the two dogs
egsited the building and ran.
Speaker 3 (29:24):
To their handlers.
Speaker 2 (29:25):
Blood dripped from their mouths. Dan got up and asked,
did they get him? You bet you They did, fired
back one of the handlers. They ripped out their throats
before they knew what happened. All this happened within five minutes,
as if in afterthought. Dan remembered the two other gis
that were in the guard towers with him when it fell.
He hadn't seen or heard from them since that last
(29:45):
mortar hit. He limped over to the down tower and
shattered out. There was no answer. Sure enough, two bodies
were buried in the busted boards and sand bags. The
sand bags had turned into hardened seament after a month's
months of exposure to the elements. They crushed the two
who failed to jump upon impact on the thirty foot
(30:07):
fall to the ground. Several days passed Dan's mind races
if he thought what would be next? Would they be
back in greater force? There wasn't a whole lot of
regular infantry assigned to Camp coriol to provide a fighting force,
mostly a few hundred guys. There were pilots, mechanics, harm them,
repair cooks, fabrication people, and assortment of support personnel. However,
(30:30):
when the alarm sounded, all grabbed their small arms weapons
and did what soldiers do in times of war improvise.
The next few days Dan spent on a scavenger hunt
as he lined up very side of the need for
his special project. He ventured down to the flight line
and tossed his idea out to the guys who worked
on the T forty one mescalarios. Sure enough, they were
(30:52):
on board with his brainstorm and made available what items
he needed. Then back to the fab shop with a
rough sketch drawn on paper of what he needed, welded
together parts here, parts there, and in a short time
his idea became reality. The final product was a spare
minigun from one of the Huey gunships, which mounted on
(31:13):
a swivel and placed the trop of tripod about four
feet high. It took five guys to put this new
high powered jerry rigged weapon into place. Two guys carried
the minigun, one guy carried the batteries, one guy carried
the seven point six to two ammunition, and the fifth
guy carried the tripod. The mini gun fired two thousand
(31:33):
rounds a minute and had some serious kick with the
tripod with stand. The fierce punishment from the gun's recoil
was yet to be answered. A couple of weeks had
passed and Dan almost forgot about his tripod mounted minigun.
It had yet to be baptized by fire and remained
inside the gun shop. And while the chow hal keeping
his intake of saltpeter at acceptable levels, one of the
(31:55):
guys from the fab shop quizzed him, have you got
your gun ready to go? I think so, but I
haven't fired in the field yet. Well, the latest briefing
from the commander said we might be in line for
another assault on Camp Coreel. Did you hear that? Well,
let's set it up for the day after Marrow and
see how it goes. Deuteronomy twenty sixteen through seventeen says,
(32:18):
but in the cities of these people that the Lord
your God has giving you for inherence, you shall save
alive nothing that breathes, but you shall devote them to
complete destruction. That very night, chaos broke out a Camp Coreel.
Within five minutes the crew had the gun in place.
Two flares fired off in the distance lit up the sky.
(32:42):
Dan got his first clear view of what was coming.
Dozens and dozens of North Vietnamese troop raced toward Camp Coreel,
approaching the Constantina wire that surrounded the camp. Dan knelt
frozen behind the tripod in dis belief of the site.
The fab sergeant firm. They wrapped him on the helmet
with the end of the Screwbrion shouted, kill him, raeves,
(33:04):
kill him now. Dan fought for words to come out
of his mouth, but his first attempts was nothing but
a mere whisper. He took a deep breath, and with
a guttural shout, yelled everyone down, Everyone down now. Dan
made one pass from right to left across the field
of fire with them in again. Another pass from left
(33:26):
to right followed, and then back again the other direction.
Four thousand rounds fired in little more than two minutes,
and then all was quiet, not a sound anywhere. Within
a couple of hours, the sun slowly creeped into the sky,
giving first glimpse of the field of fire. Everyone squinted
(33:49):
peering out of their bunkers into the perimeter wire. There
were bodies everywhere, stretched out for about a hundred yards
clear back to the grove of rubber trees. The South
Vietnamese dragged bodies off the wire and into a pile
for removal. Dan stopped counting bodies at seventy. As they
worked away further out into the rubber trees, the muffled
(34:11):
sound of a forty five caliber pistol popped, and then another,
and a few minutes later yet another. There were wounded
North Vietnamese regulars who had taken refuge among the rubber trees.
The South Vietnamese took no prisoners. There was no mercy.
About an hour later, in the early morning, before the
(34:32):
heat became too stifling, three deuce and a half trucks
arrived and the South Vietnamese Army regulars began loading corpses
for disposal. Yeah, three truckloads of dead bodies. Before the
last truck pulled away. The base commander came down to
the area just outside the bunker. What the blankety blank,
he barked, Who's responsible for this? Nobody said a word,
(34:58):
but instead all eyes turned towards Dan. Matthew twenty five,
verse twenty one says, well done, good and faithful servant.
You have been faithful with a few things. I will
put you in charge of many things. Come and share
(35:19):
your master's happiness. Specialist five. Dan reeves discharge from active
duty on March twenty eighth, nineteen seventy one. The affects
him his fighting in the war haunted him for nearly
fifty years. After the war, Dan retired as a printing
(35:42):
press operator and lived in Hartford, Iowa, and would often
call me when stressed about one thing or another. In
his words, you want to go to the rifle range
and decompress. Guns had been a part of his life
for well over fifty years, from the time we were
old enough to go rabbit hunting alone and trump the
brush to scare up a few cottontails. Guns became a
(36:02):
fixation for him, Bolstered by his expertise in repairing them
and his time in the military, would regularly hop in
his car and head to Banner Pitt's rifle range and
far off a few hundred rounds. Despite our failing eyesight,
we still joked with each other who had the better aim.
I talked with him multiple times during our short rise
(36:24):
together about what was.
Speaker 3 (36:25):
On his mind.
Speaker 2 (36:27):
I knew Dan had been receiving counseling for some time
from the Veterans Hospital, as well as medication to keep
him on an even keel. However, as well as I
knew dapper Dan, I never dreamed in a million years
how the stress not awaited him over the years. Dan
left Vietnam in nineteen seventy, but like so many other
(36:47):
young men who served there, Vietnam never left him. Nearly
fifty years after he left Bamy to it, the war
finally ended for him on June twenty second, twenty nineteen,
when he took his own life with a handgun. I
don't think of Dan as just another statistic of the
war that yet he was. In Shakespeare's played Julius Caesar,
(37:12):
Mark Anthony speaks of the death of Caesar. He said,
the evil that men do live after them, but the
good is oft entered.
Speaker 3 (37:20):
With their bones.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Thus the evil of war that Dan experienced is easily remembered,
but let us not forget the good that he brought forth.
Speaker 1 (37:32):
And a terrific job on the production editing and storytelling
by our own Monte Montgomery. A special thanks to Michael
Williams for telling such a bold, beautiful story about his friend,
his uncle, Dan Reeves, and what a.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
Story it was.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
And in nineteen seventy he was released from Vietnam, but
Vietnam was never released from him, It never left him.
In June of twenty nineteen, Dan would take his life
with a handgun. As regrettably and tragically too many of
our soldiers still do the story of Dan Reeves hear
(38:13):
on our American Stories
Host
Lee Habeeb
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