Page 93 - The History of Veterans at Highland Springs

DON ROSS
HIGHLAND SPRINGS RESIDENT, ARMY
My Military service started the summer of 1966 as I transferred from a junior college to a four-year university, and several of my credits didn’t make the same move. I was listed as a part-time student even before fall classes. A week later a letter arrived that began, “Greetings from the President of The United States...” I was being drafted into military service. Within two months, I was assigned to Fort Campbell, Kentucky for Basic Training, then to Fort Sill, Oklahoma for Advanced Training for Field Artillery. Six months later, on July 19, 1967, I found myself on a commercial jet on my way to Viet Nam. I was assigned to Headquarters Battery of the 6/14th, a 175 mm gun and 8’ howitzer self-propelled artillery unit. After a two-day trip by convoy to DakTo, we were stationed at the new airfield, which had been constructed several months earlier. Our task was to provide intelligence and support for our troops at the airport and the local South Vietnamese Army called “ARVN” in the area. I was there at the Battle of DakTo in November 1967 and during the TET Offensive in January 1968 that was to be the North Vietnamese Army’s most dangerous assault of the Viet Nam War. On July 19th, 1968, I finished my year’s tour of duty in Viet Nam and for the military. As the jet plane lifted off the ground at the Cam Ranh Airport, there was not a dry eye on the plane. The thrill for the men and women that just went through the worst year of their lives could lift up their heads and be proud to say, “I did my duty to my country, The United States of America.” Over the year in Viet Nam, I had lost over 30 pounds due to little amounts of food and little to no sleep. As I arrived at my local city airport, there were no bands, no cheering people with “Welcome Home signs”, just my devoted Mother and Father, there to share their love and tears of joy and later, a cold beer at home with Dad. Now, after some 53 years, my memories are still as vivid as if it all just happened only yesterday. I can still see the village people, all the children in the streets, my fellow GIs at my side, the smell of battle and the taste of death all around us. Sometimes we forget just how lucky we citizens are to live where we live here in the United States and to enjoy the safety of our loved ones around us, unlike many places around the world, where people don’t know if they will see another day.
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