Stories '68-'69

BE SURE TO READ JAMES HUSKEY’S EARLIER STORY FIRST (A 18 YEAR OLD FARM BOY ARRIVES TO THE 359th) THIS PICK’S UP WHERE IT LEAVES OFF. Ahh!!! Finally!!! looking forward to the ride back to the Company area for a hot shower, hot breakfast and some sack time. Again these ideas bring a laugh from…

Arriving in Vietnam in January 1968 was a surreal experience. There was a sense of urgency for sure. Landing at Cam Ranh Bay, then on to Qui Nhon. Only to be put on a deuce & a half ton truck packed with replacements going to An Khe all in two days. Commotion on the An…

I went through Cam Ranh Bay in 1968 and was assigned to the 359th Trans Co which was in the process of moving from An Khe to Pleiku. I still remember the jeep the 240th QM Bn XO sent to pick me up at the airport in Quin Nhon. I had his flac jacket and…

In December 1968, I had just extended my enlistment, which Lt Dedge and the 1/Sgt had talked me into doing and I would get the job of unit mail clerk. The day before my extension leave was to begin, my tanker broke down in Kontum. The following morning all road traffic was halted due to enemy activity…

SSG Rapold and I were TDY with the 3rd platoon, with 20 trucks with trailers, 2 gun trucks (Brutus & Head Hunter), & a gun jeep. We were to haul from Quin Nhon to An Khe with as many trips as we could make. But sometimes we went from An Khe to Quin Nhon to Plieku…

On 11 feb 1969 I was on convoy to Pla Gerang. I went to the 4TH ID checkpoint to meet my escort to the Oasis. We left about 8 and had not gone more than a mile, when the two M.P. jeep’s ran off and left me. I kept going by myself. I got to the…

John Dodd was a career soldier and had begun his second tour in Vietnam December 1968. He was assigned to the 359th Transportation Company. The 359th had just transfered from An Khe to Pleiku in November and December 1968, and was attached to the 124th Transportation Battalion. It had been attached to the 240th Quartermaster…

THE BIRTH OF BRUTUS I am CW3RET Louis Brittingham, formerly the Maintenance Warrant of the 359th in 1968-9. During my tenure as maintence tech/officer of the 359th, it was my custom to occasionally ride the convoy to experience what the men and epuipment had to endure and to enhance the maintence precepts for convoy operation’s.…

When I got to Pleiku in April 1968 Brutus had a gunner named Prescott. Brutus was equiped with a 50 Cal machine gun on the front and two M60 machine gun’s on the back. A few month’s after I got there Prescott and I went to the air force base next to us and struck…

The gun truck Brutus was not done when I seen it. It was started and had the spare tire boxes started. When I started helping the fabricator at the motor pool, when it was just north of Camp Schimdt. If I remember you had to walk through a path between two compounds to get to…

I was the gunner on the day Prescott as NCOIC of Brutus got thirty some confirmed kills just east of An Khe. The date was late Aug. The 2nd platoon suffered one wounded, blown out of the gun truck by an RPG, and then shot in the back with a pistol by a VC in sandals…

These stories are written around a series of e-mails between James Huskey, and John Porter. James to John:  Yeah I do remember you. You questioned my ancestry I beleave! Something about only a moron could blow 2 head gaskets in one week. From James: First story: A mortar hit on the front of my tanker…