Besides the young casualties and deaths, what caused me added stress was the perception some men had of nurses. People that worked with me knew my values. They knew I believed in no sex outside of marriage. I would go out to the dinner with married friends, but that was all. I respected their wives at home. So, it really hurt me when one day a surgeon approached me at a party. He said he had an “open marriage.” I asked who his wife was sleeping with that night. His hands came inches away from slapping my face. When I told him how insulted I was, he called me naïve. When I refused to go to bed with him a second time, he said I must be a lesbian. I told him I was not going to sleep with him to prove I was not. To say I was glad to see him return to the States is an understatement.
Another time, five casualties arrived in the OR. We were told it was a “frag a friend.” A term I did not understand and thank heaven was not common. A group of GIs stopped in Da Nang on their way to R&R in Hawaii. Someone rolled a grenade into the room where they were sleeping. I was still new to ’Nam and used to make post-op rounds to see how our patients were doing. After three months in country, I did not routinely do post-op rounds because it was too sad. When I stopped in ICU, one of the nurses was trying to reach the R&R center in Hawaii to inform wives and others their loved ones had been injured. Then I went to the ward to check up on those less critical. It was there I heard what happened. It was terrible. They wanted to injure the lieutenant who ordered them to go back to an area where they had previously lost some friends. They were sad to hear a favorite sergeant died and were not sad to hear the lieutenant was critically wounded. Being upset, I said, “I don’t know why I came here when we’re killing our own men.” One GI said, “You came here to get laid, like all the nurses.”
With all of this going on, it’s easy to forget the decent men who respected and protected me; my corpsmen, dust-off crews and, to my surprise, some men in the Air Force. One day, a few of my friends wanted to have Chinese food at the Air Force Base in Da Nang. After enjoying our dinner and conversation, we asked for the bill. We were told it was taken care of by the four gentlemen at another table. When we approached their table to say thank you, they stood up and said thank you to us for taking care of the wounded. There were no strings attached. It was exactly what I needed at that time.
In Da Nang I’d go to the officer’s club to listen to music and occasionally dance to “Proud Mary” or We’ve Got to Get Out of This Place.” I did sneak into the NCO club a few times. In Quang Tri there was only one club, which was good. After a bad or good day, everyone who wanted to, could go there. There were talented people who would play guitars and sometimes we’d sing along.
My drugs of choice in ’Nam were M&Ms and Coca Cola. Sometimes, I’d find my favorite drink, Grape Nehi, a kind of soda pop. I roller skated, played volleyball and board games, and read books. However, I never saw a complete movie. I went to the beach to swim, but could never learn to surf. My beach activities stopped after I saw water snakes. Sometimes on my day off, I’d hop a ride to visit a little orphan at the China Beach Orphanage.
Twice I made it out to the Navy Hospital Ship, USS Sanctuary. On my first visit, the Navy nurses gave us Army nurses a tour of the ship. I was surprised to see hammock-like beds stacked one above another. The well trained Navy corpsmen impressed me. After our tour we were invited to stay for lunch. I couldn’t eat much because of the ship’s movement. Some of the Navy nurses laughed because they said the ship was in port and it was not even moving. I grew to respect the Navy nurses as I listened to how strict the rules were and how confining it was on the ship. As I returned to land, I appreciated the people I worked with even more. I realized it was a wise decision not to join the Navy.
Many nights I would fall asleep listening to my reel-to-reel tape recorder. I enjoyed songs by Peter, Paul and Mary; James Taylor; Neil Diamond and songs on a special tape given to me by my corpsmen.
I took the war very personally as I saw how the terrible injuries would have a lifelong impact on the GIs, their parents, wives and children. When off duty, I remember just sitting, talking and crying with other nurses. When in my mind, things seemed really bad, I would remind myself I had it better than those who experienced the Holocaust. Since comfort came from my faith, I attended a few chapel services. Usually though I had my devotions and prayed privately inside my hooch.
The 18th Surgical Hospital had quite a history in Vietnam. By August 1968, when the hospital returned to Quang Tri, female nurses were reassigned. There was also a 40-bed children’s hospital that was previously located at Dong Ha (Company D. 3rd Marine Battalion). The thing I loved about the 18th Surgical Hospital was it was a small unit. There were only nine female nurses.
Some of my memories from Quang Tri include the day choppers landed both sides of the hospital and we received 75 wounded in 15 minutes, young men who could not see, hear, speak or breathe. Everyone worked hard, the cooks provided nourishment, and it seemed to me the grave crew quietly went about their duties.
Logo for the 18th Surgical Hospital, Quang Tri.
One day I flew down to Da Nang to see a child in the orphanage. On the way back, I missed my flight at Phu Bai. Due to troop movement, all other air traffic was stopped. So, a nice young man from the control tower got his mattress so I could sleep on the side of the tarmac. He had offered me his hooch, but I was uncomfortable with that arrangement.
In the morning, I called Quang Tri to have a friend cover for me until I could make it back. She said there were no casualties at that time. I don’t know how it happened but I heard a click and Colonel Johnson said, “Lieutenant Breed, do you know there is a war going on?” By the tone of her voice, I knew I was in serious trouble. I took the first jeep I could. Even though I was smelly and had bad breath, I took a ride with some Marines. As we drove through Hue, a beautiful city, I said I wished I had my camera. I’m not sure what camp they stopped at. All I know is when they dropped me off at the gate, I took the next available jeep.
The driver was an ROK Marine (Republic of Korea) who said he was going to Quang Tri. Suddenly he stopped the jeep and reached into the glove compartment. (Is he going to rape me? How much was I worth as a POW? I was bigger than he was. Could I outrun him? What about land mines?) When I saw him pull out some candy, I started to laugh. I thought of what my mother always said, “Do not go with strangers that offer you candy.” He became highly offended at my nervous laughter and told me to get out of the jeep. As he drove off, leaving me in the middle of rice paddies, I was really scared for the first time in ’Nam.
Then I heard the sound of trucks coming in my direction and I didn’t know what to do. Although I feared land mines, I stepped down into the rice paddy. Nothing happened. The first truck that passed me was full of Vietnamese soldiers. The second truck skidded to a stop shortly after it passed me and one of the two American GIs in the truck yelled, “Ma’am, do you know where you are? Where are you going?” I told them I wanted to go to the 18th Surgical in Quang Tri. As I hopped into the back of the truck, I could still hear swearing followed by “Ma’am” as they drove off. I wish I knew their names so I could thank them—to me they were angels! Colonel Johnson didn’t reprimand me because shortly after I returned we received casualties.
One day a wounded pilot landed on our helipad. I don’t know how he made it as he had a large blood loss and was having seizures. I hung blood for his case. On the way back to my hooch, I stopped at the chapel to pray. Because I didn’t want another young man to go home and not recognize his family, I pleaded with God to let him die that night. The next morning Dr. Neuman, who knew I was upset by this case, had the pilot do math problems to prove there was no brain damage. To me, it was like God said, “Mary, you never decide who lives or dies in this war. You are here to do the best you can and that’s all.”
If anything good comes out of war, it’s the increase in medical knowledge. Knowledge of septic shock, ARDS (acute respiratory distress syndrome/Da Nang lung) and PTSD (post-traumatic stress dis
order) are a few from ’Nam. However, healthy young men die, in body and spirit. Vietnam showed me how a diverse group of people could work closely together as a team.
One day, as I was roller skating back into the compound, Colonel Johnson sent a jeep to bring me to her office. I figured she was displeased with me since I was being escorted. To my surprise, she appeared to have been crying. Out of nowhere a man from the Red Cross informed me my Dad had died. He had no details and repeatedly asked if I wanted to go home. I thought it was a foolish question. Of course I wanted to go home.
In a daze, as I walked back to my hooch crying, I said goodbye to everyone I met. Friends helped me pack. I don’t know how I slept that night, but I did. The next morning at the airport, Colonel Johnson gave me an envelope filled with money. She said the guys from graves start the collection. I was shocked because I did not know any of them by name.
The money was to be used for the plane trip home because I had to pay my own way from California to Minnesota. Whatever was left was to be given to my Mother. Of course, I started to cry. To this day, that act of kindness can bring tears to my eyes.
I left Da Nang on June 9, 1971, on emergency leave and made it home a few hours before my Dad’s funeral. I received an honorable discharge from the Army on July 15, 1971.
With God’s help, love of family and support of friends, life has been anything but dull since ’Nam. I’ve enjoyed traveling around the world, even returning to Vietnam with Veterans Vietnam Restoration Project. I’ve kept in touch with other veterans through the Vietnam Veterans Association. The Vietnam Women’s Memorial Project brought together a group of nurses from Minnesota and Wisconsin. We’ve become a “sisterhood” and get together at least twice a year. At the 95th Evacuation Hospital Reunion in New Orleans, I saw three of my corpsmen. I have met their lovely wives and always look forward to their yearly Christmas letters. Through the 237th dustoff reunions, I’ve met old friends and met one of our patients.
I will never forget the caring people I met in ’Nam.
Linda Caldwell
I liked science and math when I was in high school. I never really had a burning desire to be a nurse although I had read all the Clara Barton and Florence Nightingale books when I was younger. When I graduated from high school in 1962, the options open to women were very limited. I tell my daughters that you either went into teaching, nursing or became a secretary. If you were very good looking and thin, you could maybe become a stewardess, as they called them in those days. I don’t think my girlfriends in high school really thought about going into medicine or other male-dominated professions. I don’t mean to say that nursing was a second choice or a lesser profession. I just felt it was a good fit for my interests in science and math.
While I’m not Catholic, I attended the University of San Francisco (USF), a Jesuit school with the Sisters of Mercy serving as administrators and primary instructors for the School of Nursing. At the time, the only women students enrolled in the university were in the school of nursing, although shortly after I started they opened up all divisions to women. It was the only college I applied to, so in retrospect, I was lucky to be admitted. I was living in Las Vegas at the time because my Dad was in the Air Force. He was in World War II and when he got out he stayed in the reserves and got recalled during the Korean conflict. We traveled all over; Texas, Tennessee, France, England and then Nevada. I liked the military life; the fact that we had friends all over the world I viewed as a positive factor. As a military “brat” you learn to make friends easily, which I did and still do.
When I first went to University of San Francisco, I didn’t think about going into the military. But a recruiter came to our sophomore class. He talked about this United States Army Student Nurse Program, and how the Army would pay your schooling plus give you a monthly stipend. When you graduated, you owed the Army three years of service. I felt it was a great option to pay for school. Having grown up in the military, I felt I had a good idea what to expect. So, I signed up and have never regretted the decision. There were several of us in my class that did, three or four girls out of a class of about forty. Some went into the Navy, but I decided the Army was my best option.
My parents were very supportive and proud of my going into the military. In December of my senior year I got my commission as a second lieutenant. I got a bump up in my monthly stipend. I think it was $200 a month, which in those days was a fortune! The Army also paid tuition, fees and books. I graduated in May 1966, and I took my state boards in June. In those days, there was no such thing as a computer. We sat for two days in a hotel in San Francisco and took the exams. You could work as a graduate nurse until you received your results, so I worked the 3–11 shift on a surgical unit at St. Mary’s hospital in San Francisco, which is where I did most of my clinical rotations during school.
In August, I got my results, and shortly thereafter, I received my orders to report to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas. I had to fly from San Francisco to Los Angeles and then to San Antonio. My flight left LA late in the afternoon and by the time we got to San Antonio it was around eight P.M. They fed everybody on the plane. When they got to my row I asked the flight attendant, “Don’t I get a meal?” She said, “Oh no, you’re military. You don’t get a meal.” I arrived in San Antonio really furious. I never did hear the rationale for that decision. I think I went to bed hungry that night. It was my first experience with discrimination against the military, which was something I’d never seen or heard during the time I was an Air Force dependent. I was in San Antonio for six weeks of basic training at the Medical Field Service School, the Army equivalent of boot camp for medical professionals.
In San Antonio I had a blast. There were nurses from all over the country. We went to classes during the day, learning military protocols, how hospitals were run, how to wear the uniform, how to march, and even how to shoot a .45 pistol. All the various branches of Army medicine went there for basic training; Army medical corps, nurse corps, and medical service corps (MSCs). We worked hard during the day, trying to learn “the Army way,” and we partied at night. I still keep in touch with one of the women I met there and we’ve gotten together a few times since our days at “Ft. Sam.”
Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., was my first choice for a duty station after basic training and I was happy when I received orders to go there. I’d never spent any time on the East Coast, so it was fun to see a different part of the U.S., especially to be in our nation’s capitol. I was assigned to a female medical ward, which was somewhat disappointing as I thought I’d be taking care of soldiers, not dependents. But I learned a tremendous amount and I actually enjoyed it very much. It was my first real work as a nurse and it was there that I learned how to start IVs and other basic nursing skills that we hadn’t been allowed to do in school. I had a patient who’d been admitted with vague symptoms and no real diagnosis. She’d been with us a few days and was on every four hour neurologic checks. When I checked on her, one of her pupils had been “blown,” just like in a textbook. I called the doctor and she was rushed to x-ray. That was in the days before CAT scans or MRIs, of course. I don’t remember what the doctors found, but I felt good about my contributions to her care.
After a few months I was restless and felt I needed more in terms of learning experiences. Everyone except the head nurse rotated shifts; days, evenings, nights, and of course, weekends. My supervisor, a major, was a neat gal. She transferred me to the male neurosurgery ward. I loved it and felt I was really in my element! It was very hard work, but very satisfying. The patients were wonderful and made it all worthwhile. They’d tell you stories about being in Vietnam and that’s when I started thinking, “I really need to go to Vietnam and see what this is all about.”
We would occasionally get VIP visitors since our ward was a high visibility unit with 98 percent of the patients being returning Vietnam veterans. The guys, especially the guys on the Stryker frames who were paraplegics and quadriplegics, were
alert and oriented. They could talk and kibitz. Pearl Bailey came to see the guys one Sunday, as did Mrs. Westmorland, the general’s wife. She was lovely; a very, very nice woman.
We had a good group of nurses and we also had civilian aids, a couple of really great guys who helped us turn the heavy Stryker frames. I remember two older African American gentlemen who worked the 3–11 shift. They definitely kept spirits high for both patients and nurses when they sang “It Takes Two, Baby,” which was very popular in 1967. They were a good group of nurses, corpsmen and aides with a lot of camaraderie. I was put in charge as a backup to the head nurse because in those days there weren’t a lot of nurses with degrees. While the Army didn’t require a degree, I guess they equated more education with more responsibility. I was evening charge and sometimes worked weekends on the day shift as the charge nurse.
I talked to the patients and they would tell me their stories about Vietnam. Some of them were really tragic. Back then a regular tour of duty in Vietnam was a year. You knew when you went you were going to be there for 12 months and then you could come home. That went for anybody, whether you were out in the field as a soldier or in a hospital. One of my patients had gone out with some of his buddies the day before he was to return to the States. He dove off a bridge into the river below and broke his neck, instantly becoming a quadriplegic. It was heartbreaking. We had one kid, the average age of soldiers in Vietnam being 19, who was admitted to our ward as a low-level quad. We all worked hard on his rehab and eventually he walked out of the hospital, albeit on crutches and very slowly. It was just absolutely amazing and we all cried when he left. Obviously, not all the stories from that time were as good as his.
Vietnam War Nurses Page 8