Article published in THE MESSENGER

by S. Wayne Gregory

Ex Marine, Sgt., 3-7 K Co., Purple Heart

November/December 1999

The article was submitted to The Messenger

Dear Mr. Chupp:

Enclosed is a letter my son wrote for a book and pictures of a very sad day in the lives of Sam and Peggy Hanson, the Brinsons, Gregorys and hundreds of others in De Leon in 1968 as PFC L. R. Hanson’s body was laid to rest in the De Leon Cemetery.

We read so many times in your Monitor, dedications and memories and your tributes to the Veterans of all wars.  I thought you might like this Vietnam story for your paper as November 11 is Veteran’s Day.  Sgt. Gregory and PFC Hanson were both born and raised in De Leon.

Thank you,

Mary R. Gregory

    The only thing that mattered in Vietnam was that special day, after spending your tour in combat, when you were pulled back to the rear and went back to the real world.  For some that day never came.  A Marine grunt couldn’t afford to mull over the fate of a comrade, much less the heartbreak of loved ones left behind.  Our own fate or demise was just over the next mountain or down the next trail.  A year after my separation from active duty the Vietnam experience came full circle for this Marine.  I experienced the pain at home of loss and despair by war.

    Despite being separated from active duty I remained a reservist in the USMC.  Upon arriving home (living with parents).  One day in Glendale, California I learned that a cousin had been killed in Vietnam.  Lowell Hanson (USMC) from Stephenville, Texas.  The death of another Marine in Vietnam didn’t emote much emotion because I was accustomed to it.  Through communication back home it was requested I be the Marine escort of Lowell’s body home.  I put on my dress blues, received my orders, and flew to Terminal Island, a transferring station in the San Francisco Bay area for KIAs during  the war.

    The orders were to stay with the Marine’s body until burial.  Simplest orders I ever received, but emotionally the most difficult.  I spent the night on Terminal Island.  Late that afternoon I remember looking out over the choppy waters and realizing this would be the unexpected destination for many.  Back home the hard way.  No parades, home cooked meal or family reunions but a one way ticket to grieving loved ones.

   The next morning I escorted the body to the San Francisco airport.  I boarded the plane and gazed out the window at the flag draped casket being loaded in the cargo section.  I observed the passengers doing the same and wondered bitterly if the war had interrupted their lives as it had mine.  On the flight to Dallas I contemplated the reaction of family members and what I should say---if anything.  There were really no words to soften such a loss.  As a squad leader in Vietnam the words were easier on paper, “Good Marine, fought hard, he’ll be missed, he loved you.”  Now face to face, much tougher to express such a loss.

   Lowell Hanson had a sister, but was the only son of a farming family in central Texas.  They knew nothing about a place called Vietnam.  They only wanted him to grow up on the central Texas landscape and raise a family himself.  This war came out of nowhere and he, like so many young men, joined the Marines similar to his forefathers in previous wars.  Visions of returning a hero or at least a respected serviceman must have been entrenched in his mind like it was for all of us. But now this, retuning in a closed casket that couldn’t be opened because of the severity of wounds.  Broken hearts and lives of his parents and those who loved him.  This was reality.

   I climbed down from the airplane and followed the casket to a warehouse adjacent to the Dallas airport.  I was apprehensive and nervous and saw only warehouse workers and airport personnel.  At the end of the terminal I saw a dried up old cowboy who resembled by grandfather.  I approached him and saw his eyes red from days of crying and grief.  The only words spoken “Did you bring my boy home?”  The pain he was feeling shot through me, however I stood there representing the USMC, my country and everything that Lowell had died for, so I remained composed and did so for the next several days.  I rode back to Stephenville with Mr. Hanson behind the hearse.  A man heartbroken, confused, mad and bitter all at the same time.  I felt I must keep the sanctity and dignity intact in keeping the allegiance with which all  Marines are joined together for better or worse.  I stood by the mother and father in the days to come as a whole town said goodbye.  I stood by a father who demanded the casket be opened one last time so he could say good-bye and by his mother who was presented the flag at the grave side.  This was a family who would never recover.

   I realized that when young men die in war the suffering is only the beginning.