November, 1969 - March, 1970 (2/9th returned home)
I arrived in RVN straight out of OCS Class 19-69 and was assigned to "A" Battery which was in the Ban Me Thuot area when I arrived, just a couple days after the LZ St George attack. At the time, Pat O'Meara was the Recon and Rick Ericksen was the RTO. B/1/14 was the unit we were attached to and on perimeter duty at LZ Lois, and we then went to pull perimeter security at an airport in BMT. On Thanksgiving we were sent out on what was my first combat assault- happy holidays! I remained as the FO, Rick became the recon and Mike Pskowski was sent out as RTO. The units moved to An Khe around New Years and all of a sudden the world became uphill, followed by downhill and multiple repetitions of the same. In the middle of March, we were attached to another company, possibly B/1/8 as there were some realignments going on due to the deactivation of one of the 4th ID brigades. That little experiment didn't last long as I managed to get a punji stake in my leg, get medevaced, and received orders to report to the Americal Division- all within the space of about 2 hours. That was the end of my FO career.When I arrived in Chu Lai, I became to HHB DivArty Supply and Property Book officer. My own hooch, three hot meals, daily showers, nightly officers club and a beach across the helipad! Being 23 years old, I didn't quite grasp the benefits of that boring existence so I managed to get assigned as an aerial observer for my last 5 months. When my year long tour ended, I was assigned to Ft Dix as a training officer in a basic training unit until I left active duty in July, 1971. After my Army time, I worked for the VA for about six and a half years, and in 1978 became a FBI agent and retired from there in June 2001.