Jerry Martin was born in Illinois, grew up in Louisiana, and has lived in Virginia for many years. But he will always be at heart from Louisiana. While at LSU, he enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserves and afterwards went to the basic officer’s class at Quantico, Virginia. He accepted a regular commission in the Marines, went to language school to learn Vietnamese, did a stint as a recruiting officer in New Orleans, got married, then deployed to I Corps in Vietnam just after the Tet Offensive in 1968. He describes how he ended up commanding a platoon in Company F, 2d Battalion, 3d Marine Regiment immediately following the battle of Battle of Foxtrot Ridge, at which all but one of the lieutenants in the company had been wounded or killed. He talks of the greatness and heroism of the men with which he served, and describes his time as a company commander and an air observer. He remembers souvenirs and booby traps, the Street without Joy
” and Operation NAPOLEON/SALINE, Laos and the Cam Lo River, Bird Dogs and tiger stripes, and friends dying. He recalls ambushes, enemy machine gun positions, the action for which he received a Silver Star, and the wound that earned him a Purple Heart.
Key Words: LSU, Reserve Platoon Leaders Class, Reserves, private, Quantico, Basic Officer's class, language school, Tet Offensive, 1st Marine Regiment, Hue City, recruiting duty, New Orleans, Louisiana, Tulane University, M16 rifle, medevac, Camp Pendleton, California, Da Nang, Khe Sanh, LZ Hawk, Fox Company, Battle of Foxtrot Ridge, Operation NAPOLEON/SALINE, Battle of Dai Do, combat company, company commander, Cam Lo resettlement village, I Corps, DMZ, NVA, Cam Lo River, Route 9, Seabee rock crusher, Mustang, air observer, Bird Dog airplanes, Red Cross, chaplain, Civic Action Program, VC, Regional Forces, My Loc, FOB 3, 5th Special Forces, CIDG, tiger stripes, Luc Luong Dac Biet, ARVN, MARS call, MASH unit, Phu Bai, cellulitis, Sea Tiger newspaper, Stars and Stripes Pacific edition, 3d Marine Division, Operation DEWEY CANYON, Los Angeles, LAX, Manassas, Virginia, VFW, 2d Marine Division, Marine Barracks Las Vegas, Nevada, Headquarters Marine Corps, Washington, DC, Mutter's Ridge, command detonated Claymore
Key Names: Jack Kelly, Bill Green, Major Lee, Captain Terry Terrebonne, Colonel English, Gunnery Sergeant Larsen, First Lieutenant Jim Jones, radio operator Gentry, Harris, Doc Bean, Lieutenant Colonel Jack Davis, Archibald Van Winkle, Richard Nixon, Bobby Kennedy, Uncle Bob, Karl Marlantes, Ken Burns, Dr. Martin Luther King, Private First Class Jones, Jan Scruggs, Muriel “Max” Grooms, Dale Luster