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THIS IS AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF CW4 WILLIAM J AUELL. IT WAS FURNISHED TO THE NIKE HISTORICAL SOCIETY BY HIS SON MICHAEL. THIS AUTOBIOGRAPHY SPANS CW4 AUELL’S MILITARY SERVICE YEARS. None of the contents,
opinions, statements, or positions expressed in this document are the
official position of the Nike Historical Society but solely those of CW4
William J. Auell (deceased).
YOU’RE IN THE ARMY NOW You're in the Army
now, You're not behind the plow, You'll never get rich, You son of a b-----, You’re in the Army now. Recruit William J Auell, RA13303902 reporting Sir! The peace-time military services of 1949 were being
manned by only volunteers. The draft had been suspended shortly after
the end of World War II and all draftees had left the Army or re-enlisted in
the Regular Army. Our war machine was down-sized to the point where
engaging in a major conflict would not assure a victory for the When I served in France from 1952 through 1955 I saw
first hand some of the results of this plan: thousands of electric
refrigerators, washers and dryers rusting in acre after acre of open fields
because no one in the United States Government took the time to consider the
difference in electrical current. The I was assigned to a training company of the 3rd Armored
Division, issued uniforms and equipment, given a haircut of my choice as long
as it was a baldy, and billeted in WWII wooden barracks that were lined up
perpendicular to the street. We soon learned that it was extremely
important to get to the street in a very short time. In order to do
that we had to leave the building via the side door, run down a small path
and 'fall in' on the street. Since we were not fast enough to please
our Platoon Sergeant [a PFC], especially the men that lived on the second
floor, we had to practice in order to get our response time lower. One
evening after dinner we were once again practicing our ‘fall in’ drill when
one of the soldiers fell on the path. A lot of the troops tried to run
around him but apparently some stepped on him breaking both of his
legs. The platoon sergeant was a little more tolerant after that
incident. He should have been court-martialed, but as far we knew,
nothing was ever done. A TASTE OF DISCIPLINE
One of the first things a new soldier does when he or she enters the Army
is getting a medical and dental
examination. I was in pretty good shape except I weighted 230
pounds and needed some dental work. On the day of my dental
appointment I had to get on the ‘sick
book’ and get a ‘sick slip’ from the First
Sergeant,
a grumpy old bird that was seldom seen after his morning coffee in
the mess hall. Thank Goodness. I was standing in
front of his desk and he asked me my
last name, which I spelled for him 3 times and he still didn’t have
it right, so I leaned on his
desk to point out where he was making the mistake,
when all
of a sudden he slammed his fist on the desk top and screamed “You
have your hand on my desk, you dumb S-- of a B----,
that’s 3 days KP”. When he hit the desk I think I
jumped about a foot off the floor. I almost messed my
drawers. I never had anyone yell at me like that
before. I didn’t know what to do so I just stood there. Actually,
I froze in place until he finally told me to get the
hell out of his office. He gave me the sick slip and I was out of there
Pronto.
He still had my name misspelled, but I sure wasn’t going back and tell
him. The following Saturday, Sunday and Monday I got up at
4 AM and
reported to the Mess Hall. I stayed clear of that First Shirt for as
long as I was in that outfit. When I needed to go to the dentist the
next time, I again had to face this tyrant. He gave me a
sick slip and I was out of there. I didn’t care if
he spelled my name ‘Benito Mussolini’, I
wasn’t going back and tell him.
I saw this bird one more time during our graduation ceremony. I left
Fort Knox and didn’t bother to say
goodbye to my friendly First Sergeant. Boy, I
would liked to have seen him
about 10 years later. He sure as hell would be
sorry if
he didn’t stand at attention and address me as “sir”.. I will never forget the chow in that training
company. They had a lot of guts calling it food. I lost 30 pounds
in 12 weeks, and it wasn't all from the exercise. I think the Mess
Sergeant had been a pig farmer before he found his home in the Army, at least
his way of preparing food would strongly suggest that. Food was in
short supply due to the budget crunch and a lot of it was Government surplus,
therefore it would have taken someone with a little imagination and creative
ability to prepare a meal that would be half way pleasing to the taste
buds. We ate a lot of powdered eggs, in fact we ate them six days a
week, fresh eggs [or at least they were still in the shell] only on
Sunday. The cooks couldn’t fry an egg without breaking the yolk, so
everyone ate scrambled eggs. We had canned condensed milk for
cereal and morning coffee. No cream for coffee at lunch or
dinner. I don't remember seeing a piece of fresh fruit the whole time I
was there. I heard that three guys broke teeth trying to eat the biscuits.
Another fellow thought he saw one of the green wieners move a little bit.
There was a PX across the street from our barracks but we were not allowed to
visit it until we got our first pay, which was almost a month after we set
foot on the red Kentucky clay, and then we were told what to buy [no candy,
chewing gum, cookies, snack food]. For twelve weeks we spend our days and nights learning
close order drill, how to roll a field pack, map reading, first aid,
camouflage, grade and rank recognition, survival skills, self-defense,
tactics and a lot of other training that would prepare the recruit to be a
good soldier. Of course, the big thrill of the entire twelve weeks was
the issuance of your M1 rifle. We learned how to disassemble and
reassemble our rifles, how to fall in love with our rifles and really mean
it, how to remember the serial number of our rifles, how to carry our rifles,
how to sleep with our rifles, how to clean our rifles, how to do the manual
of arms with our rifles, how to guard with our rifles, how to fight with our
rifles without firing it, and how to fire our rifles. I think I knew
that rifle better than I knew some of my own body parts. Naturally, being Army ground-pounders we marched, and
marched, and marched some more. We took several 5 and 10 mile jaunts
and one 30 mile beauty out to the bivouac area where we spent a week and then
another 30 miles back to the garrison. Camping out in After graduating from basic training I was assigned to subjects as filing, preparation of correspondence,
mailing, and the numerous duties that would be required of a clerk. I
graduated as a Clerk because I couldn't type 45 words a minute; 30 being my
tops. I didn't think that was too bad since I had never touched a typewriter before attending that school. Subsequent to a leave back to Army. I was what was known as SCARWAF [Special
Category Army with Air Force]; Army personnel on loan to the Air Force because the Air
Force at that time was in its infancy, having broken away from the Army only a year
before. There were 450 Air Force enlisted men and 45 Army enlisted men
assigned to the hospital. The Army troops were treated just like the
fly boys, except there was one gigantic morale problem; they did not have
authority to promote Army dog faces. The Air Force got the stripes and
the Army got the shaft. Not a real good situation, or at least not good
as far as the ground- pounders were concerned. My duty assignment was the A & D [Admissions and
Dispositions] office which was stuck down in the bowels of this old Cavalry
structure built about the time Custer was making his last stand against the
Indians. They had added several buildings behind the main section of
the hospital that were used as wards and one building was the mess
hall. All the buildings were connected by covered and heated hallways
so that patients wouldn't get cold traveling within the facility. This
hospital specialized in the treatment of Rheumatic Fever, serving any patient
who was diagnosed RF. Most of the patients came from the Army and Air
Force units in the A THANKSGIVING TO FORGET
I’ll never forget my first Thanksgiving dinner in the service. The
hospital food
was pretty
good most of the time. Two of my friends and I got all gussied up in
our newly acquired civvies and went to the mess hall for
dinner. There were six
big beautiful
turkeys sitting on the serving line, browned to a dark golden color
that made me reminisce about the Thanksgiving dinners my mother
so perfectly
prepared.
I went through the serving line, helping myself to mashed potatoes,
stuffing, gravy, a vegetable, hot dinner rolls and a
nice big brown turkey leg. My mouth was watering. Would it
be as good as the last one I had about three years when my mother made her last
Thanksgiving dinner. I bowed my head in a moment of
silence thanking the Lord for his blessings and in remembrance of my
mother. Now it was time to sink my teeth into that leg
before it got cold.
I picked that sucker up with my left hand and took a big bite. The
blood filled my mouth and was
dripping onto the rest of the food on my tray. I got up and left
without clearing the tray and placing it on the pile of dirty trays. I
went up to the Day room and got a couple candy bars from the
machine. I didn’t want any turkey for a while.
For several years I used to get sick on Thanksgiving Day and have missed
some tasty
meals. I have no idea why I got sick on that particular day.
Maybe that Thanksgiving dinner back in good old Warren Air
Force Base had something to do
with it. I don’t know. One of my duties as an Admission and Disposition clerk
was to gather personal data from people being admitted to the
hospital. We had a standard form that was used to gather general information
including name, rank, serial number, length of service, etc. An Army
Master Sergeant who just arrived from
RANK
HAS IT’S PRIVILEGE
Another one of my memorable admissions was an Air Force Master Sergeant
by the name of Christensen, stood about 6’’6” tall and had
a raspy deep voice. He would have made a good model for
an Uncle Sam poster.
He was in charge of the base theater which he ran with an iron fist. If a
person walked into the lobby with their hat on, he would yell “Take that hat
off soldier”; not caring whether it was a Colonel or a Private.
The national anthem
was played each evening before the movie started. A second or
two before
the first note of the Star Spangled Banner he would step inside the
seating section and shout
“Attention” at the top of his voice, scaring the hell
out of every one in the theater. No one had trouble rising for the
anthem
because they were half out of their seat already from his frightening
announcement.
During the course of my information gathering process, one of the
questions was length of service. When I ask him how
long he had been in the service, he said “just put down 44 years; that
doesn’t count my National Guard time”. His service stripes [hash
marks] each signifying 3 years of military service, started at
the cuff of his sleeve and stopped at the bottom of his Master Sergeant
chevrons.
After completing the paper work I told him he was going to Ward 3 on the
second floor of the
hospital. “Wait a minute, I’m not going to a ward, I want a
private room” he said in his gruff
voice, “who do you work for, soldier?”. I
quickly realized
this one was too much for a lowly Private like me, so I took
him
upstairs to see Master Sergeant Hagan, the Registrar NCOIC. They then
met with Major Elder, the Registrar. Finally, the whole
procession ended up at the office of the
Hospital Commander, Colonel Blank. I’m quietly trailing
along through all this like a little puppy sneaking into the
circus. I was
surprised no one
told me to get lost. After talking to the Hospital Commander
and getting the same answer everyone else had
given him, he asked the Colonel if he could use his phone.
The Colonel agreed and the Sergeant called the
Base Commander, another bird colonel.
“Charlie” he said, “I’m being admitted to the base hospital and they want to
give me a bed in one of the wards. I think my length
of service entitles me to a private room”. The
Sergeant handed the phone to the Hospital Commander,
who upon hanging
up the phone, told Major Elder to give the Sergeant a
private
room.
It seems that 27 years earlier Sergeant Christensen was the First Sergeant of
a company where the Base Commander was first assigned as a Second
Lieutenant, and they were assigned to the same unit many times during their
long careers, becoming close friends.
I went back to my office understanding a bit more about military
protocol; Rank sure does Have It’s
Privileges..... Sergeant Hagan was a little stubby [not fat and not
lean] man that stood about 5' 5" in his best shoes. This guy, who
became a good friend of mine, swaggered around the halls swinging his arms
like someone had just put a key in his butt and wound him up. He and
his wife were Seventh Day Adventists, the only ones I ever met in the
service. I must admit I got pretty mad at him at times, but he taught
me a lot about the proper prepar- ation of correspondence and how hospital
administration was supposed to function. When I took a letter that I had
typed to him for approval prior to the Majors’ signature, he would check it
with a fine toothed comb, measuring the margins and typed letterhead with a
ruler. If there were any errors he would make the correction in red
pencil and send it back to me for retyping. I soon learned to closely
check my work before I took it to him. He had the bad habit of smoking
cigarettes, but his wife didn't know it [so he said, but I don't see how she
could have missed the smell from the smoke that must have clung to his
clothes]. He would puff on cigarettes all day, then about an hour
before he went home he started chewing gum like a hungry puppy chewing his
first bone. He would leave the cigarettes in his desk, douse himself
with a little after shave lotion and go home. He later received a
direct commission and was assigned to an air base in At Warren AFB I lived on the second floor of another
old building with nine other enlisted men, mostly Air Force. My bunk
was one on the extreme left and a physical therapist had the bunk on the
extreme right. This guy, whom I will call Samson because I don't remember his name, would parade around the
hospital wearing the traditional medical white pants and pullover white
shirt with short sleeves that were rolled up to expose his muscular
arms. For some reason Samson and I got into an argument that turned
into a fist fight and wrestling match. I quickly learned that this bird
was muscle bound. Those big muscular arms that he flaunted so brazenly
actually severely limited his movements and ability to respond with
dispatch. He made an attempt to hit me with his right fist to which I
reacted by throwing a right then a left to his face. We ended up
wrestling on the floor where he bit my left side a little above the
waistline. His bite drew blood, infuriating me to the point where I was
sitting on his chest rapidly punching his face unmercifully. Three of
our room mates came into the room and pulled me off of him. In
retrospect, it was probably a good thing they stopped the fight since his
biting my side made me so mad I was out of control. I went to the emergency
room to get my wound treated and I carried the scar for years. The A&D office was moved from the basement to the
first floor and I was assigned to night shift from 4:30 PM to 8:00 AM the following
morning, working every other day. I was required to type the daily admissions and
discharges on stencils and then run them off on the mimeograph machine. I had good
eyesight until I got this job. I also had uniforms that were free of ink. Another duty was
getting information from people that were admitted during the night.
Late one night one of the ambulance drivers told me there was a person in the
emergency room to be admitted. I went to the ER and found this man who
was wearing glasses laying on the table looking straight up at the ceiling.
When I got close enough I noticed that what I thought were glasses was
actually blood that had run from the bullet hole in his left temple, around
his eyes and then down to the right ear. This guy was stone dead.
The ambulance drivers hiding in the next room thought that was pretty
funny. "Hey, Auell, did you get his name?" "Very
funny" I mumbled. This man was an Air Force Sergeant who for
months had been burglarizing homes throughout I don't know why, but I usually went to town with two
of my friends. Angelo DeNova was a guy from headed squirt from Although I had a lot of friends, I was still
lonely. Running around with the guys got to be old stuff. Most of
my leisure time I spent over in the hospital just talking to the
fellows on duty or going to the movies with a bunch of the guys from
the hospital. I wrote a few letters, mostly to Berniece McGill in
Saegertown who I got to know when I hired her to work in our Saegertown store
before I entered the Army and who I took out a couple of times. The
only other people I wrote to was my dad and my sister Viola. The
letters to and from Berniece became more frequent and serious. Before
long we were both talking about how it would be to get married. Finally in February 1950 I was promoted to Private
First Class. At that time the Army adopted miniature rank insignias, the chevrons being
about one-fourth the size that they had been. This little one stripe looked lost on
the sleeve of a shirt the size of mine. I was proud to get the stripe,
even if it was small, and got busy getting my first stripe sewn on my
uniforms. Everyone has to start somewhere and in the service that's
usually at the bottom, exactly where I happened to be at that time.
(The Army changed their rank structure sometime around 1948. Recruit
[E1], Private First Class [E2], Corporal [E4], Sergeant [E5], Sergeant First
Class [E6] and Master Sergeant [E7]. Later they added specialist grades
and E8 and E9 grades.) In March of 1950 I was notified by the Department of
the Army that my 21 month Regular Army enlistment was scheduled to end on October
7, 1950. Due to the’ police action’ in Korea I would be transferred to the Enlisted
Reserve on October 8, 1950 and immediately called to active duty as a
Reservist on that date for an additional 21 months with the same duty
assignment as I currently had. This meant my new tentative date of
discharge was June 7, 1952. In reality, the only thing that happened
was my serial number prefix was changed from RA [which signified Regular
Army] to ER [which signified Enlisted Reserve]. So I had
more than 2 years to serve from this March 1950 date. I thought I might
as well try to re-enlist for 2 years and collect the re-enlistment bonus that
I would be entitled to and could use very nicely since I was now making $90 a
month [before deductions]. Although its hard to believe, the Air Force
had no idea how to handle this supposedly simple task, so they contacted the
Army who apparently couldn't figure out how to re-enlist a Regular Army
enlisted man who was scheduled to be transferred to the Reserve. So
there I sat in limbo as far as my future in the Army. I was perfectly
willing to re-enlist for 3 years which would have only been a year longer
than I was going to serve under the present set-up. Since I sort of
liked military life I wouldn't mind committing another year. No
soap. They would take it under advisement and let me know at a later
date. Berniece and I were getting more serious about each
other and decided that we would get married. Perhaps in retrospect, our decision
was immature and premature, because we really didn't know each other
very well. Nevertheless, over the objection of her mother and father,
we were married at the Methodist Church in of transportation to get to work, so we bought a 1937
Chevrolet two-door sedan for $200 that turned out to be a pretty good jalopy.
At least it started on those bitter cold car as I teased him about his nice new Kaiser
automobile that wouldn’t start. I claimed it was made from recycled
aluminum foil. Actually the Kaiser was a pretty nice car. Another stripe was added in November 1950, making me a
Corporal and my new duty assignment was in the Registrar's office in charge of
the Patient Fund, a procedure whereby the patients left there personal money with us
for safe keeping and could draw it out anytime they wanted it. I welcomed the new
responsibility and small raise. Up to that time I made $120 a month [$90 pay and $30 separate
rations - reimbursement for food that the serviceman would have eaten in the mess
hall if he was living in the barracks]. Major Elder and Sergeant Hagan
practically begged me to transfer to the Air Force, promising that I would be
a Master Sergeant in less than two years. Being a stubborn Dutchman and
of questionable sanity, I told them I had joined the Army and I would be true
to that commitment. That was most likely one of the dumbest mistakes I
ever made in my military career. The Air Force was a young organization
and I probably could have been promoted through the enlisted ranks to the
commissioned officer ranks in the medical administration field like so many
others were doing at that time, including Sergeant Hagan. Live and
learn. It would take me another nine years to pin Warrant Officer bars
on my shoulders. 1951 came in like a lion in 838th Engineer Aviation Battalion at the base was named. I was to report in early
April so we didn’t have much time to get prepared for this move. The
most important consideration was transportation. I would be paid 6
cents a mile but wouldn't receive anything for dependent travel, therefore
travel by public conveyance would require borrowing money for the
tickets. We could sell the 37 Chevy but would have to buy another car
when we got to
We were about 5 miles north of
The motel owners gave us a tour of the town and dropped us off at the
restaurant. After we ate I went to the cash register to
pay the bill and the cashier said our dinners were paid for. I
thanked her, having no idea as to the
identity of the benefactor.
We went to the movies and they wouldn’t take our money for
tickets, and then brought us popcorn.
The following morning after we ate breakfast at the town restaurant where
again the meal was free, I went to talk
to the mechanic who was working on the
car. He told me a connecting rod broke and it scarred the cylinder
wall. They intended
to re-bore the cylinder and install an oversized piston and rings. I
should be
ready later in the day. That sounded good to me and I asked about
the cost of the repairs. He told me it would be
about $400. I called the dealer in
I returned to the garage later in the day and the dealer said he had some
bad news. The boring bar slipped when they were
re-boring the cylinder wall and cut a big groove out of
the wall, rendering the engine junk. He said we would
have to install a new engine in the
car. I asked him the cost of a new engine;
about $800.
He said “don’t worry about it, our machine caused the problem so
I will put
a new engine in your car for the price we quoted for the repair. Come
back tomorrow morning and your car will by ready to go”.
I returned to the garage the next morning and the black beauty Dodge was
purring like a kitten. The
mechanic told me the dealer would not let a new
engine go out of there with old
plugs and points, so they installed new ones at no
charge. I couldn’t believe it. Some Higher Power must have been
looking out for us. We loaded the car with the things we
had taken into the motel and we
were ready to go.
I asked the motel owner what I owed him. “Your bill is $18 for the
three days, but don’t pay me now. Send it to me when you have it
after you get settled in
The whole time we were in that town we never had to pay for one meal, cup
of coffee, soda pop or anything else. The car dealer didn’t even
charge me for the long
distance calls to
How could I ever forget the patriotic and generous down-to-earth citizens
who live in the quaint little town of Upon arriving in we weren’t in a position to consider an estate on one
of the many lakes in the city of I reported to the 838th EAB and was assigned to
Headquarters Company motor pool as a clerk. A far cry from the cleanliness and
orderliness of the hospital that I had just left. I was notified by the Personnel Section that new
regulations established procedures by which an enlisted reservist could reenlist in the
Regular Army. In order to obtain the maximum bonus I re-enlisted for 6 years. When the
finance section was computing the bonus it was noted that I had been granted an advanced
pay before I left Luckily, before we moved from the first rental we got
to know a Scottish couple that lived across the street: Mr. Roberts was the
manager of a drive-in restaurant on the outskirts of town and gave me a job
as a short-order cook. I would work from 5 PM until midnight after I got home from my Army assignment
and on weekends. This job was a lifesaver and allowed us to buy some needed grub
and supplies. To further help out with our shortage of food I was allowed to take
left-overs home when we closed up at night. Later I got an after duty job at the snack bar of the
Base Exchange which was much closer to our home. I cooked hamburgers,
made French fries and sold beer. There was a skinny little Buck
Sergeant who was a cook in a nearby mess hall, who came in every night about
6 PM and started drinking canned beer. After he had downed about six
beers he would line up the cans and talked to them as if they were junior
soldiers. He refused to let us remove the cans from his table.
Before the night was over he usually consumed 12 or more cans of beer before
he staggered back to the barracks. The woman who was the night manager
treated me and all the other employees very well. Little did we know
that she was embezzling funds for which she was subsequently fired. After working as a clerk in the motor pool for about
three months I was promoted to Staff Sergeant [E5]. Since a clerk
couldn't be a first three grader [at that time there were only 7 enlisted
grades, Master Sergeant E7 being the highest] I was placed on temporary duty
[TDY] to the Base Headquarters to work with the civilian safety
director. This older gentleman taught me a lot about ground safety and
assigned me the task of inspecting all structures and roads on There was a small dispensary on Orlando AFB to serve
the military members and their dependents. Only outpatient services
were provided, hence maternity cases and other cases that would require
inpatient services were referred to Patrick Air Force Base at We lived in a nice roomy second floor furnished
apartment close to the center of town. One side of the first floor was occupied by the owners
and the other side by a retired Army Major who had a big dog. Everyone
just called him "Major" and found him to be a personable fellow who
had a tale about almost anything in the world. He assumed the role of
being the authority on all subjects, being loud and vocal in his
communication. His loudness most probably caused more by the amount of
spirits that he consumed than a hearing condition. We got along
with him quite well and he loved baby Cathy. After we settled in our
home and got used to the baby, we were able to take a few side trips to see
different parts of the state when relatives from up north visited use.
My father, Berniece”s parents and her aunt Grace and Uncle Ken visited us at
different times. ANYONE
THIRSTY?
Berniece’s father, Carl McGill didn’t particularly enjoy the hot summer
weather of
Hum! I’ll fix this guy! I got one of our very large ice tea
glasses, filled
it with ice water, returned to the table and gave him the water. Just
like the first two glasses
he gulped it down. I thought to myself ‘Doesn’t this guy have a
bottom?’. Okay, I’ve got the
answer. I got up from the table and got a large
pitcher of
ice water and sat it down in front of him. Aha, I fixed him! To
my surprise, he moved the glass aside and drank the entire
pitcher of water. I gave up. Let him get his own
water from now on. I made sure he knew the location
of the bathroom. I’d never seen a person consume so much liquid.
But come to think of it, on our first visit to In 1951 when we were living in up for $25 an acre. Who would have ever guessed
that Disney World would occupy that land twenty years later. Now it's probably
worth over $25 a square inch or more. The problem I had back then was
that I didn't have the extra $25 to buy an acre. If I had been able to
foresee the development of this land I would have borrowed as much as I could
to buy a few acres. It just wasn’t supposed to happen. Live and
learn, so they say. Here we go again. I got orders to join the 322nd
Engineer Aviation Group at Wolters Air Force Base at Mineral Wells, meant that Berniece and Cathy would have to live with her
parents until they were able to come to I drove to Wolters Air Force Base, sold the Dodge
[Berniece didn’t know how to drive a car at that time, therefore there was no
need to leave the car in The 322nd was like no other organization I have ever
seen. There were about 150 Reservists who were called to active duty for 2 years,
and 45 Regular Army troops of which I was one. Some of the enlisted men were
the bosses of some of the officers in civilian life. Our Company Commander, Captain
Campbell was a vacuum cleaner salesman in NYC and worked for the Supply
Sergeant. [One Saturday morning he forgot to put his brass and captain
bars on his uniform and the Platoon Sergeants who were all part of the NYC
gang refused to call the troops to attention or salute him during an
inspection. He stood in front of the troops bewildered until our
Regular Army First Sergeant told him he had forgotten to put his brass on his
uniform. No inspection that Saturday morning]. The Group Adjutant
was a 50 year old homosexual who was so stingy he wrote a letter to the
Chrysler Corporation asking for a rebate for the ashtray that came with his
car if he sent it to them. I think he had his uniforms left over from
WW11 and wore them without benefit of laundry or dry cleaning since that
time. The Sergeant Major stayed in bed to 10 or 11 o'clock every day,
just in time to arrange transportation for his evening trip to town.
The Regular Army people couldn't believe the behavior, disrespect and lack of
qualification of most of the Reservists, including some of the
officers. After we got to We left Wolters AFB on May 11, 1952 on a special
military train and arrived at Port So this is heard so many things about France and the French,
especially when we were still at Wolters getting ready to shove off. It seemed
like everyone had a different story to tell, generally passed down from a relative that had served
in older family members that had migrated to the in the barracks we were subjected to a barrage of
information mainly from two GIs who had French relatives and who apparently
knew nothing else to talk about. You would have thought we were going
to Utopia. They went on and on about all the things to see and
do; you wondered if they were going to have time for work. Maybe
New Yorkers, especially those from the Big Apple, are better dreamers than
people from the other parts of the good ole Beautiful women, mannerly and cultured gentlemen,
fashionable clothing, savory cuisine, delicate wines, dainty little pastries
and deserts, magnificent architecture, priceless works of art, sculptured
masterpieces, glorious history, and endless tales of French gallantry awaited
our introduction, exploration and appreciation. The Eiffel Tower, the
Louvre, the Arc De Triumph, the Seine, little villages unchanged from one
generation to the next, the vineyards of Bordeaux and the individuality of
Alsace-Lorraine. Would we be able to see most of these sights in the
short time we would be there? Will we be so impressed that we will
return again to continue our education of France, perhaps even as civilians
after we leave the service? It sounded so exciting it was difficult to
control the urge to board the first tour bus that came along. Or maybe
we will have a different opinion of the French scene after we have had a
chance to get acquainted. We boarded a French train and started on our trip to
the eastern part of the country. This was a new and different experience
right from the start. The train was pulled by a 1930 vintage steam
engine, the freight and passenger cars being at least that old. At
times we wondered whether we were going to make it up some of the hills
we encountered on our way east. Obviously the cars were the victims of
the apparent broom shortage and lack of cleaning material. Luckily, we
were fed field rations during the trip. We finally arrived in the city
of Toul-Rossiere Air Base, carved out of a large wooded
area was located about 10 miles from the small The Department of Defense engaged French contractors to
build an air base according to DoD specifications. The contract
specified completion dates for each phase of construction. The first
phase included the construction of a 1000 man mess hall, several latrines, a
water and sewage system, electrical and fuel oil systems, dirt streets,
wooden frames for squad tents and an aircraft runway capable of serving
fighter planes. Subsequent phases included various buildings and
facilities which would culminate in a fully operational fighter air base that
would be a component of the NATO defense system. The mission of the 322nd Aviation Engineer Group was to
insure that the French contractors complied with the construction
specifications, supervise subordinate Aviation Engineer Battalions and
Maintenance Detachments, assume responsibility for certain phases of
construction, and establish liaison between American military and French
civilian personnel involved in the construction of air bases. To
accomplish this mission the Group had experienced Engineer officers and
enlisted surveyors, inspectors, soil analysts, construction foremen,
draftsmen, photographers and supporting personnel. I was assigned to
the Operations Section [S3] as a utility inspector and a member of an
inspection team. Inspection of the runways and taxiways of various
airfields in revealed a tremendous difference between the fields in
these two countries. The German construction was usually acceptable, possibly with
minor corrections. The French people were out to get all they could from
the Americans. Property owners in the small villages where military trucks traveled
frequently claimed the trucks vibrated the roof shingles loose, and would receive a new roof
far superior to the original that had probably leaked for years. The
merchants in the towns and cities indicated the price of their wares on a
small card attached to the article; the price for Frenchmen on one side and
the much higher price for Americans on the other side. They would steal
anything that wasn't locked down, and even some things that were. They
were caught stealing large quantities of food stuffs from the mess
halls. They stole tools, construction supplies, gasoline and various
other items stockpiled on the base. They even stole some uniforms from
the soldiers’ barracks area. Enlisted men of grades E5 and above could apply to have
their dependents join them. The first step was to obtain a suitable apartment, a
difficult task in an area that suffered from perpetual housing shortages that
were worsened by WWII. Most of the available housing that was
half way livable was in the city of With the help of our interpreter, I found a small
second floor apartment on the outskirts of household needs. The first floor housed a small
slipper factory owned and operated by a middle aged French woman. Her living quarters
were on the third floor. She was a real character. When we were negotiating with her
at the apartment she offered us a drink of 'Mirabelle', a very strong clear substance
that tasted more like gasoline than it did a refreshing drink. She poured a half of a
water glass for each of us. She downed the drink without hesitation. The interpreter
took a good slug. I took a small sip and thought the top of my head was going to blow off.
I have never tasted anything so strong and putrid in my life. I rented
the apartment in July 1952 with the understanding that Berniece and Cathy
would join me in early October. I was happy to move from the tent city
we lived in at the base, even though I had to ride in the back of a deuce an
a half truck each morning and night to get to and from the base. While
I was at the base during the day, the landlady would enter my apartment, at
times rearranging things as she saw fit. This lady had serious mental
problems. She would rant and rave for no known reason. She would
scream at the top of her voice, at times in the middle of the night. I
think her mental illness coupled with all that Mirabelle she consumed every
day was enough to make her a basket case most of the time. Every evening our truck or bus driver would drop us off
in front of the same small hotel near the train station in Naturally the French had some mores, customs and habits
that were different than what I knew as a good ole American boy. I
usually went in the train station in downtown Another thing that I couldn’t get used to was the
urinal that was placed at the curb of the many of the city streets; the waste
flowing down the gutter. Generally, there was one of these things every
few blocks in the cities. The structure was nothing more than a piece
of sheet metal that was held up by a metal post at each end. The sheet
metal started about a foot off the ground and rose to a height of about 4 feet.
The Frenchman would stand there doing his business as he chatted with people
passing by. “Bon Jour, Madame”. I could never bring myself to use
one of those crude facilities and I think most American men would be too
embarrassed to take part in such a gross custom. No similar facility
for women, but it wouldn’t surprise me if there had been. Stink?
You wouldn’t believe it... Berniece and Cathy arrived from the States in October
1952. We settled in the little apartment in need help is that the other families in that military
organization assist in any way they can. Although some people were less
than complementary toward them, First Sergeant King and his wife were
particularly helpful to us and many other families in the outfit. In a
place as remote as Toul-Rosierre Air Base there were few conveniences like
the super markets or the local well stocked store. Getting a fresh
quart of pasteurized milk was a big deal. It cost a fortune to have dry
cleaning done locally. The commissary and PX on the base when it
finally opened was severely limited by the availability of stock and capable
French help. Most families took a trip to The Operations Sergeant, a young Regular Army Master
Sergeant from the unit's first victim to the attraction and personal
magnetism of the French women that frequented the watering holes around Toul
and Nancy. He would stay out all night, then be late for work the next
day. His ability to function as a Section leader or a NCO was
diminishing daily. He would come to work with the smell of alcohol on
his breath. Half the time he didn't have a complete clean
uniform. After several counseling sessions with the First Sergeant,
Sergeant Major, Company Commander and Operations Officer he was relieved of
his duties as Operations Sergeant and demoted to Sergeant First Class
[E6]. That was only the beginning. Within 3 months he had been
demoted one grade at a time to Corporal [E4], and within 6 months he was
discharged from the Army with a Bad Conduct Discharge. This was a
tragic case of a bright and capable young man who couldn’t resist the
temptations of the French wine, women and song. He allowed his own
destruction. I was appointed Group Operations Sergeant when the
previous Operations Sergeant was relieved of his assignment. This meant
that I was the NCO in charge of the Operations Section [S3] where the mission
planning and implementation supervision took place. Although I was only
a Staff Sergeant [E5] and had less than 4 years service, I suppose the
Commander and Operations Officer felt that I possessed the necessary know-how
and demeanor for the position, and vowed to back me up if there were any
problems with individuals senior in grade who were reluctant to take orders,
indirect as they may be, from a junior sergeant. To increase my
knowledge I went to a 12 week Construction Foreman Course at Murnau, Germany
about 50 miles south of Munich in the heart of the Bavarian Alps. After
I was in the school at Murnau for a short time I had Berniece and Cathy join
me. We stayed in a small hotel owned and operated by a friendly German
family. Our room at the hotel was clean, comfortable and no comparison
with anything in When I returned to the Group after successfully
completing the course, I was promoted to Sergeant First Class [E6] in April
1953. The Commander, Executive Officer and several other officers
wanted to promote me to Master Sergeant as soon as possible, but had to wait
for at least 6 months and had to have an E7 vacancy. We had an
abundance of E7s in the Group and subordinate units, so I didn't think I
would receive that other stripe in the near future. In April 1953 we purchased a new 1953 We moved from our apartment above the slipper factory
as soon as we could find another apartment in The second floor apartment was in a row house that also
had apartments on the first and third floor that were occupied by French
families. Our apartment consisted of a living- dining room, a kitchen
and two small bedrooms. The flush toilet in the hallway served all the
residents. We purchased a collapsible bath tub from Sears. Our
rent was 35,000 French Francs [$100 at that time], ten times the rent the
Frenchman paid for the first floor apartment which had 3 bedrooms. Our
car was damaged twice while we lived at this place, most probably by
Communist vandals who paraded regularly around the neighborhood. One
time they twisted the antenna off, and another time they got in the car and
tried to pry the clock loose that was mounted on the top of the dashboard,
leaving scratch marks and dents on the painted dash. We twice received very bad news from back home.
On October 31, 1952 the Red Cross notified me that my father died on October
29th of a fatal heart attack while he was at work as a watchman in a
Saegertown plant. Then in March 0f 1953 we learned that Berniece's
parents home burned to the ground and her father died of multiple
burns. We didn't go home for either of these tragedies, but
our mourning and pain was as great and genuine as if we had been there for both
funerals. The officer in charge of S3 was transferred. My
new boss was a short, pudgy, 50 year old Major who possessed few
characteristics of a military officer or civil engineer. He must have
been a hang-over from WWII, biding his time until retirement. His
appear- ance left a lot to be desired since he weighed about 225 pounds and
wasn’t over 5’6” tall. He wore the same uniform day and day out.
Maybe it was the only one he had. He wasn’t what you would call a good example of a As I was moving my few personal items to my new desk,
the Major summoned me to his desk, only about 6 feet from mine.
Whispering in my ear he informed me that he had some personal and private possessions
that would be locked in the lower right drawer of his desk. He
instructed me in an unusually authoritative tone, noticeably very different
from his squeaky monotone, that no one was to have access to his desk except
himself and me. I didn't know what to expect. Perhaps, secret
classified plans or documents of some type. Maybe a health record he
didn't want revealed. Perchance some possessions he didn't want to keep
in his apartment in One of the duties of an Operations Sergeant is to be
aware of the status of each of the projects being completed by subordinate
engineer units or contractors. To assure compliance with contracts or military orders it was
necessary for an S3 supervisor or myself to head up a team to visit the job site to
perform specific soil or material tests or to check the progress toward
project completion. Since we had projects throughout The 322nd Engineer Aviation Group was ordered to move
to Landstuhl Air Base, Lieutenant Colonel John Welsh, a gray-haired college
professor from Memphis, Tennessee had been called to active duty for a period
of two years and was now the Executive Officer of the Group. He was chosen as
the advanced party commander and I was selected as the NCOIC. Contributing to my
selection was the fact that my wife was pregnant and was tentatively scheduled to give birth to
our second child around the first of March. Colonel Welch was an excellent military
officer and a fine gentleman. When we arrived at Landstuhl the
welcoming party officer in charge told the colonel he would show him his
quarters. Colonel Welsh told him "I can usually take care of
myself. First I want to see where the men I have with me will be
billeted and fed. I also want to see the quarters for our
families. Then we'll get to the other details". Colonel Welsh and I worked very closely the next few
weeks and got to know each other quite well. He was going to leave active duty and
go back to teaching as soon as his two year tour was completed. He told
me about his wife, his family, his home and the Univ- ersity of him I would let him know at a later date.
Obviously I didn't take advantage of his offer because by the time I reached
the end of my enlistment there were too many other factors to consider,
including the birth of a third child. Our quarters at Ramstein Air Base were recently
constructed multiple apartment structures. We lived on the third floor,
accessible by stairs only. There was a large living - dining room that
accommodated several pieces of furniture, a well equipped kitchen, three bedrooms and a bath and a half.
The government provided good quality furniture, the only complaint by the nit-pickers was
that all the furniture was of the same design and just like your
neighbors. I thought we were extremely lucky to have such a mansion, a
far cry from the places we had in One evening as Berniece, Billy Piper [the wife of
Master Sergeant Ralph who worked in our Operations Section] and I were
playing hearts, Berniece said we better get her to the hospital. The
ambulance took her to Landstuhl Army Hospital located on a high hill
overlooking the German town of Landstuhl, where William John Auell junior was
born a short time later on February 11 , 1954. A new German
citizen, subject to military service when he becomes 18 years old.
Achtung! The officers and men of the 322nd Aviation Engineer
Group just got nicely settled at the new home at Landstuhl Air Base when
communication from the Department of Army notified the commander that
replacements for the personnel of the 322nd would arrive in June 1954.
Since most of the officers and men now in the 322nd were not due to
rotate to the States until May or June 1955, these new replacements
were not needed for a year. Being true to form, the powers in the
Pentagon wouldn’t acknowledge their mistake or retract the orders, so by June
there would be two people for each slot [another example of the inefficiency
of They would transfer me there so I could be promoted to
Master Sergeant, but it would involve moving back to natives, I assumed this was the best chance for
promotion I would get in quite a while since it would take time to get to be
known in a unit after returning to the States. We moved to the Dreaux area and found a house in one of
the little villages not too far from the base and I reported to the 821st
EAB. When word got around Group head- quarters back in applied for transfer to the 821st, some of them were
E7s. These transfers filled all the E7 slots in the Battalion and left me once again working
in an E7 slot but being unable to get promoted because the Battalion now had their full
compliment of Master Sergeants. Nevertheless, I was assigned to the Operations Sergeant
slot under a Major Ferrari and a Captain Larson. The commanding officer was a Lieutenant Colonel, a native
Frenchman who became an American citizen and graduated from the The Colonel was a rare and unusual character. He
was a tall slender man who would have looked good in a clean and serviceable
uniform. However, I have never seen a soldier, especially an officer,
that looked more shabby wearing the uniform of the The Battalion had several projects at the base
including perimeter storm drainage and the construction of a 400 unit trailer
court, both major projects. The Colonel would come over to the S3
Quonset building which was next to his Headquarters, and ask me to go with
him to check the projects. He drove his own Jeep. When we arrived
at a work site he would stop and ask a soldier that may be digging a ditch if
he was getting tired. The soldiers usually answered that they were not
tired, but the Colonel had him come over to the Jeep and would say something
like "You look tired. You sit down here and rest. I'll do your
job while you're resting". The soldier didn't know what to say or
do, so he just sat down by the Jeep and watched his commanding officer dig a
ditch. He would do the same thing if we stopped at a site where heavy
equipment was working; I saw him operate a grader, a bulldozer and a
roller. Quite a bird. As I said, a brilliant engineer, but a poor
example of a military officer. We lived in two different small towns near the air
base, sharing the houses with Ralph and Billy Piper who had two small boys
about the same ages as Cathy and Bill. The oldest boy fell madly in
love with Cathy. Here again, the accommodations weren't comparable to
on-post housing in The year of 1955 finally arrived and we started
thinking about going home. We had to decide which items we would take
back to the States and what we would sell or give to someone. I sure
wanted to get rid of that I wanted to get down and kiss the ground. We were
back in the good old U S of A. I don’t think most people realize how great it is to be
an American. After spending three years in The people that live in the larger towns and cities
have much better accommodations, but nothing like those in most We took a taxi from the airport where we landed to the
car dealer in Our vacation in near Marysville and Presidio of I reported to challenging and memorable experiences of my military
career, at least up to that point. I was wearing my Class A uniform on which my five
stripes indicating my rank as a Sergeant First Class. A
LESSON QUICKLY LEARNED
At a formation during the intake processing on the first day, a cadre SFC
was calling the names of the men to enter the building to begin their
induction as a cadet. He called my name and I
answered “Here”. He looked at me and said
“Here,
Sir”. He then called my name again and I once more I answered
“Here”. He informed me that I would address everyone at that school as
“Sir”. I replied
that I would do that when I became a candidate, but since I still had
my five stripes and there were as many on my sleeve as he
had on his, I didn’t feel that was
necessary.
That’s when I got a chance to meet the Zero week at OCS was the beginning of several weeks of
unadulterated hell, supposedly designed to see if the soldier had the stuff
to become a commissioned officer. It started by each dogface being
issued a duffel bag full of field manuals and another duffel bag of field
equipment. The manuals had to be lined up according to size, not in
numerically or alphabetical order, which made about as much sense as some of
the other things we had to do. We quickly learned the power and
authority of the 'Red Bird', an upper classman who was in the last 2 months
of the program. Their authority usually went to their heads making them
the meanest bunch of bastards one could ever meet. They were much worse
than the cadre and seemed to be everywhere. I suppose it was especially
difficult for me to accept these young smart asses because I was 27 years
old, had over 6 years of Army service, had achieved the next to the highest
enlisted rank [at that time] and had a little experience in the Army
and the world.. Nevertheless, I had to play the game for as long as I
was there. I knew it wasn’t going to be easy. Going to the mess hall was a real treat. We would
assemble on the street in front of the barracks and march to the mess hall. The Mess
Hall had 8 steps leading up to the front door. Each man was required to
remove his cap [flying saucer; a cap with a bill like a policeman’s cap] with
his right hand and place it under his left arm at the exact moment his left
foot hit the first step. If the last man screwed up the entire platoon
would be required to start over, taking up to ten or fifteen minutes each
time there was a mistake. When you finally entered the mess hall you
stood at attention, looking straight ahead. The 'Red Birds' would walk
up and down the line of men to see if anyone 'dog eyed' [not looking straight
ahead]. If you were accused of this terrible crime the 'Red Bird' took
you on a tour of the mess hall totally embarrassing you and making you go to
the end of the line. Once you arrived at the rack that held the trays
you did a ‘right face’, came to ‘parade rest’ , removed a tray, came back to
‘attention’ and did a left face. A few steps further the same procedure
was repeated at the silverware. Once you got to the serving line you
silently received your food, then you went to one of the tables. At the
table you spread your napkin on you lap and began eating your meal. One
hand had to remain on your lap at all times. You had to eat 'square'
meals, which meant you took food on your fork, lifted it straight up to the
level of your mouth, then you moved it toward your mouth, opening your mouth
at the exact moment the food arrived. You then reversed the procedure
to return the fork to your tray while you chewed the food. You repeated
this exercise until all the food was gone. And I do mean ALL.
A
BREAKFAST TO REMEMBER
One morning after polishing off my delectable breakfast of scrambled eggs
and two slices of toast, I left two corners of a piece of toast on my
tray. I got up
from the table
and started walking toward the area where dirty trays and
silverware
were placed before leaving the mess hall. A “Red Bird” stopped me and
asked why I hadn’t eaten my breakfast. In the traditional manner for a
candidate to answer a question from a superior, and everyone was superior to
a lower classman, I screamed at the top of my voice “Sir,
Candidate Auell, I ate my breakfast”. I didn’t
have a snowballs chance in hell of winning this one, so
I had to
go through the line again to get my silverware, finally sitting down at a
table, spreading my napkin on my lap, and ate my two
little bits of toast. Why I needed silverware
for this repeat performance bewildered me, but
I learned to accept their line of good old We finally completed ‘Week Zero’, the most grueling and
miserable 7 days one could ever imagine, and we were now ready to begin our
adventurous and very demoralizing task of getting a little gold bar on our
shoulders. We were up each morning at 4 AM, getting ready for our first
inspection at 6 AM before we went to breakfast. We wore at least two
clean uniforms every day; sometimes more depending on what was going on that
day. We always had to have a clean khaki uniform for the evening
meal. You never wore the same uniform more than once without it
being laundered. Laundry cost the candidate a small fortune. The second week we spent several hours on the parade
field. Each candidate had to demonstrate proficiency in the squad
leader, platoon leader, battery commander, adjutant and battalion commander
positions. To run everyone through all those positions took hours of
marching up and down the field. After spending about ten hours on the
parade field my left knee was swollen up so big I could barely get my pants
off. The next morning it was still swollen so I was sent to the
hospital for evaluation. The Orthopedic surgeon wanted to operate, but
he said he was required to inform me that there was no guarantee of success
and there was a fifty-fifty chance I would end up with a stiff leg. Oh
no, not with my leg. I didn't like the odds so I refused the gamble and
reconciled myself to the fact that I would never be a Second Lieutenant with
a little shiny gold bar on my shoulder. That ended my short period as
an officer candidate and I was transferred to a holding unit for further
reassignment to a permanent unit. The first thing I did once I got out
of my OCS uniform was go to the NCO club and ordered a great big greasy
cheese- burger, fries and a double bourbon and water. Boy, did that
taste good! And I picked that sucker up with both hands and took a big
bite, then I ate my french fries without the use of a fork. What a
slob. If I had still been a candidate I probably would have been
flogged at sunrise. I was the senior enlisted man in the holding unit, so I
was appointed First Sergeant over about 30 men. People were being transferred in
and out every day so you rarely got to know anyone. I was there about a week when I got
orders for home of the Third Armored Division. The post was
adjacent to the town of Shortly after I arrived at my duty station, the 4th
Armored Division along with many other Army units from throughout the United
States departed for maneuvers in Louisiana for an exercise known as
'Operation Sagebrush'. I was detailed as an Operations Sergeant and
assistant to Captain Hester, a big burly Texan who was designated Brigade
Engineer Operations Officer. Our mission was to determine the
capacity of the roads and bridges in the area, suggest alternative routes
when appropriate, arrange for heavy equipment to retrieve disabled or stuck
tanks and other vehicles, and determine the manpower necessary to improve
traveling conditions for the armored vehicles. We had a jeep and a quarter-ton trailer driven by a
wild character by the name of Smith who didn’t particularly care about taking
orders; so we did a lot of turning around after he would go down the wrong
road. We were on the go day and night, making it a lot more interesting
than being confined to a certain job area with a platoon of men. We
ate, slept and rode in that Jeep. When the C-Ration cans got to deep on
the floor, we had Smitty perform a little first echelon maintenance.
And Boy was there mud? Mud was everywhere; all over the vehicles and other
equipment. Even the cooks had to set up their serving line in several
inches of muck. The daily rain was cold and produced more mud. One day we came across one of our construction platoons
that was assigned the job of repairing a bridge. The platoon sergeant asked
if we would put a couple cases of C Rations in our trailer and deliver them
to him the next time we were in that area. When we got back to the base
camp I told the mess sergeant to put two cases of rations in our trailer for
one of the platoons out in the field. The next morning we were passing
the platoons’ location so we dropped off the C-Rations and proceeded on our
way. The following day we were in the platoon area again so the captain
asked the sergeant if the rations helped out. I'll never forget this
Sergeant Patterson, a tall black sergeant, when he said "Sir, if you're
gonna bring us some more food like you brought yesterday, would you mind
throwin’ in a couple rolls of toilet paper? You brought two cases
of apricots". We all had quite a laugh out of that, and the troops
took it good naturedly, but we could understand their desire for some regular
rations. As soon as we got back to base camp that day the captain had
the driver deliver two cases of rations to Sergeant Patterson's platoon; and
I made sure they were C-Rations before the driver left. Thanksgiving morning of 1955 found us in a field near
Deridder, The noon meal was served from the side of the mess
truck, each mess kit being filled with turkey, dressing, potatoes, gravy, rolls, pie and
other goodies. It was raining so hard that by the time a man got back to his tent the
food in his mess kit was running together to make a big cold mess of slop. I think
there was more food thrown away that day than was eaten. I remembered a Thanksgiving
dinner of past at the hospital mess hall at and edible. After 55 unforgettable days of Operation Sagebrush we
returned to Maintenance Inspection]. A lot of people took
leave over the holidays . Others started working on getting ready for our new assignment - basic
training for new recruits. About six weeks after returning from
Sagebrush the Division Engineer Sergeant was reassigned and I was selected to
fill that position. It couldn't have happened to a more appreciative
fellow. I was elated to be away from those grimy recruits, many of whom
couldn't speak or understand English, or at least they pretended they didn't
understand. A lot of Spanish speaking Our mission was to coordinate division engineering
projects by getting military or civilian personnel to complete the desired
tasks. This could involve anything from building a bridge in one
of the tank training areas to processing a work order to replace a broken
window. We were responsible for the requisition and distribution of all
maps, some of which were wall size relief maps. [at one time a draftee with a
masters degree in History was assigned to this map distributors job for
training. One incident I remember was when I ask him how many maps were
in a particular pile. He got 3 different answers after counting them
three different times]. We were also responsible for conducting
unannounced monthly fire drills in every unit on the post, culminating in a
report that indicated response time and hazards noted during the inspection
for each unit. The division commander was adamant about the fire prevention
and safety programs so I didn’t play any games or overlook anything during my
surprise inspections.
A GENERAL’S ORDER An order that’s even more bizarre than
the helmet liner bit was a requirement that every officer and enlisted man had
to look up to the sky when they heard a helicopter overhead. If it was the
Commanding General’s chopper each soldier had to salute it, assuming the
General was aboard. I don’t know what would have happened if you didn’t
salute as he passed overhead; maybe he dropped down and bombarded the
person with a mucket or a blivet, or perhaps carted the offender off to the
stockade. Somehow the word of the General boarding his
helicopter was disseminated around the post faster than the speed of
light. Strangely, most of the streets and areas on the post were
suddenly void of human activity. I never figured out throughout
my Army career if strange people get stars or the stars make some people
strange, but some of them seem to be without one iota of common sense or
regard for their subordinates. We moved out of the mobile home after I returned from
Sagebrush and rented one side of a duplex on a hill about a mile from June Myers who we met in Inspector. On September 9, 1956 Michael Carl
Auell was born at the station hospital at Captain Moore, a Specialist-4 Williams
assigned to our office and myself were designated as ‘couriers’. We
really didn't know what this designation meant until one day in the spring of
1956 we were notified at 2 PM that we would be leaving on a mission at 4 PM
that day. This didn't give us much time to get ready, but we were able
to pack a light bag and report to the Post
Headquarters Intelligence Section [S2] for further instruction. Another grunt
was added to our team, making a complement of l officer, 1 NCO and two peons. We were
taken to a classified air base near May 1957 found me at the end of my enlistment. I
was a Sergeant First Class with over four years in grade. Every time I
thought I had a chance to make E7, I ended up in the right place at the wrong
time, or the wrong place at the right time. Promotions were just about
frozen, so the chance of getting promoted was slim or next to none. I had
eight and a half years of service, but was willing to give that up for a good
job. I submitted an application, was tested, interviewed and accepted
by Metropolitan Insurance Company in After considering spending our life in I reported to After completing all the paper work and other
gobbly-gook in about 3 days I returned to I guess after serving over 8 years it’s in your
blood. I sure didn’t want to remain a civilian if I had to work at the
menial jobs that might have been available to me just to scratch out a meager
living for my family. We deserved better than that and it was up to me
to get it for them. We finally pulled into the city of Shortly after we moved into our new home I bought a
used Vespa motor scooter to travel back and forth to school and later to work. It
cut down on our gas expense and Berniece had our 1954 Buick Super to do the
shopping and hauling the kids where they had to go. I worked on the scooter and had it looking pretty nice
with a new paint job and a wire basket on the front to carry my books.
One afternoon Berniece said she wanted to ride the scooter. I made sure
she knew how to use the hand throttle that automatically returned to the idle
position when released, the clutch and shifting mechanism, and most
importantly the brake. She assured me she understood and had no
questions. She went about 300 feet, turned right, went one block
and turned right onto the street that ran parallel to our street in the
development. She seemed to be gone a long time for just going around
the block, so I loaded the kids and dog in car and went looking for
her. It didn’t take to long to find her. She was trying to get up
from the sandy ground where she had landed when she flew off the
scooter. Apparently when she got on the street behind our house she
gave it full throttle, then became frightened and held it wide open until she
hit the high curb at the next intersection in an area that had not been
developed yet. When she hit the curb she was thrown from the scooter
and landed on her face. Luckily the scooter didn’t follow her
trajectory and landed a few feet from her. She had a nasty burn on one
side of her swollen face, and plenty of aches and pains for quite a
while. She never again wanted to ride the scooter. I picked up
the scooter and began my rebuilding project that included replacing the
steering fork and several other parts. A couple more minor
accidents convinced me to get rid of it before someone got more seriously
hurt or disabled. Within a few months we sold our first house and bought
a 3 bedroom brick home nearer Fort Bliss and in a little better section of
town; plus it had a second bathroom and a back yard enclosed by a 4 foot rock
wall. Of course, the yard was nothing but sand, little sharp
thorns, and an occasional stray tumbleweed blowing in from the West. The Electronics and The course was not as easy for me as it was for those who
had experience with radio and other electronic equipment. My only
experience in anything concerning electricity was the training I had in
vocational high school 13 years prior to this course. I had a pretty
good grasp of electrical theory, but I still had to work hard to refresh my
memory. After we completed the 9 month course, we immediately
entered into the 3 month course covering the Hercules missile. After graduation from the Hercules Missile Maintenance Courses, I and several
others that didn’t come from active missile sites, were assigned to a
training battery and I was further assigned to a launcher training site
with the responsibility of equipment maintenance and teaching students, many
of whom were foreign nationals, how to use the equipment. We usually
had Saturday morning inspections and several times spent the afternoon
working on the trucks in the battalion motor pool. I could never
understand why the A BAR ON MY SHOULDER
I was eligible to apply for appointment as a warrant officer after I had 6
months
experience on the Nike equipment and held a rank of at least Staff
Sergeant [E5]. I was interviewed by a board of officers at
Post Headquarters, who approved my application and recommended
to the Department of Army that I be appointed
to the grade of Warrant Officer W-1. I was sworn in as a
Warrant Officer W1 on June 26,
1959. At that time I had been an enlisted man
for ten and a half years and a Sergeant First Class
[E6] for over six years. I
suppose I was
committed to a military career at that point. I had achieved my
goal of becoming more than an E6, although it took me six years to do it.
I was assigned to The missile range complex was
comprised of an administrative area with offices, mess facilities, quarters
for officers and enlisted men, a large motor pool, several missile assembly
buildings, maintenance facilities and the appropriate utility
structures. The down-range portion of the range consisted of 26 fire
control sites, each with its own launching area. A Range Control system
situated on the highest point on the range had visual and command control of
all the sites. The planners of the facility were derelict in failing to
provide adequate on-site recreational facilities, particularly since the
outpost was so isolated and far away from the recreational facilities at McGregor was the home of Range
Command, a military organization responsible for supporting all aspects of preparing
and firing Nike warrant officers, 1000 enlisted men
and 50 Civil Service personnel assigned to the Command. Range Command was a
subordinate unit of an Air Defense Brigade based at Each Nike The support of ASP units presented
gigantic logistical challenges to the Command. On a weekly basis, exclusive of 2
weeks at Christmas and New Years, great quantities of food and expendable
supplies were needed for the permanent personnel of nearly a 1000 men and a
potential 300 ASP personnel. Fire control and launcher sites down range
had to be maintained in tip-top condition. Each unit would have the use
of 2 deuce-and-a-half trucks, 2 jeeps and 1 three-quarter ton truck, all with
Range Command drivers. Buses provided transportation into personnel were required on a daily
basis.
To gain some insight about the size of
this operation, consider the amount of equipment at There were 36 two-and-a-half ton
trucks, 40 three-quarter ton trucks, 30 Jeeps, 5 wreckers, 5 tractor-trailer
combinations, 20 pick-up trucks, 10 buses and 3 sedans in the Motor
Pool. The Engineer Department had 40 Generators, 10 air
compressors, and 3 portable welders. The Launcher Maintenance Section
was responsible for all launcher equipment and over 4000 electrical cables,
some 5280 feet long, that were used at the range. Presenting this
information may be boring to some, but it was felt that to get a picture of
the size and complexity of "Warrant Officer William J. Auell reporting,
Sir", I addressed my new commander, Major Billy Strong. Major Strong
had been a Major for several years, normal for the pre-Viet-Nam army.
He was a small, ruddy man with a good sense of humor. He was constantly
trying to improve the living conditions of his enlisted men, never forgetting
his time as an enlisted man himself. There was two things I admired
about this man; his concern for the welfare of his troops and his willingness
to make on-the-spot decisions, unlike many officers who hem and haw about the
slightest thing and refuse to take responsibility commensurate with their
rank. Assignment to My first duty assignment at the Range was the of the
Launcher Maintenance Section. There were 20 men assigned to service and
maintained all the launcher area equipment and cables on the range. It
took the next 3 months to inventory all the equipment and several thousand
electrical cables that were the responsibility of this section. I
promptly learned there’s more to this game than the information and data
presented in the Nike course or that meets the eye of an inexperienced observer.
Replacement of faulty equipment or cables was not an easy task; it involved a
lot of coordination, safety, manpower and equipment. I approached this
task with the zest of a proud new warrant officer who had finally got his bar
on his shoulder, but I never forgot the contributions made by the enlisted
men. I kept my mouth shut and listened to those seasoned sergeants,
which I was one of in the recent past, albeit in a different field of
military specialty. No sooner had I settled down in my new job when I was
given the additional duty as OIC of the Engineer Section with 25 men and
another bunch of new equipment, some of which I had little knowledge and no
experience. I had my hands full, especially since I had never seen some
of the special equipment that was now my responsibility. That can be a
dangerous situation, especially if the officer is not smart enough to call on
the expertise of his subordinates and keep his trap shut until he learns
something. Here again I paid attention to the sergeants that
seemed to have a lot on the ball. I learned a lot from them as they
went about their daily tasks. After a few months I felt pretty
confident about my job, and enjoyed working with my crews Major Strong retired in 1960 and was
replaced by a Lieutenant Colonel that was so unimpressive I don't even
remember his name. Major Eugene Towne arrived to be the Range Executive
Officer. One hot and sunny June day of 1960 the Sergeant Major called
to tell me the Range Commander wanted to see me immediately. All sorts
of things entered my mind but I had no idea what this was all about.
Had I goofed up? They certainly weren't calling me to pin a medal on my
chest; I hadn't done anything to deserve it. None of my men were in
trouble, at least I didn't know about it, so it couldn’t be that. Beats
me, I couldn’t think of what they wanted with me. I found out soon
enough. I walked into the Headquarters and reported to the
Range Commander. He introduced me to the Brigade Commander [one star]
and Major Towne, then asked me to sit down. I obeyed.
"Mr. Auell, have you ever been a Motor Officer or Motor
Sergeant?". "No Sir", I answered. "Well, this
command hasn't received a passing grade for a Command Maintenance Inspection
of the motor pool in three years. We cannot tolerate that any
longer. We are going to relieve Mr. B>>>>> and assign
you to the motor pool as your primary duty. We want you to straighten
out that mess ". "But Sir, I have no experience whatsoever.
I don't even have military drivers license", I pleaded. "You'll
learn. When I was a young lieutenant I was the motor officer and I was
there when the first vehicle left in the morning and I was there when the
last vehicle came in at night. You do the same and you'll be all
right. Thank you Mr. Auell, you will work directly under the
supervision of Major Towne. I know you don't have any questions, so you
are excused." were the final words of the colonel. "Thanks a
lot, you s-- -- - -----" I whispered under my breath. In
retrospect, the assignment to the motor pool was a challenging experience
that taught me several techniques that I have used successfully ever
since. Most everything has some good about it; the secret is
recognizing it. I arrived at the motor pool the next morning and was
greeted by my new team of 125 men, including 8 sergeants, a motor sergeant
and a maintenance sergeant. Well, here we go! This would be one of the most formidable
tasks I had ever lived through, at least so far in my 32 years of existence. Anyone who has
spent much time in the Army knows that the cream of the crop troopers are not in the
motor pool; if the powers in charge didn't know what
to do with some one they put them in the motor pool. A case in point was a Private Brown, a draftee who
hailed from A SHINING EXAMPLE `
During a Saturday morning inspection of my Motor Pool platoon, Brigadier
General, the Brigade Commander, stopped in front of
a short, stocky Swedish kid who was a farmer in Major Towne called the motor pool to get a pickup truck
to take him down range. All of our men, including the mechanics, were out driving a
vehicle for ASP units. The only people left in the motor pool was the
Motor Sergeant, the Maintenance Sergeant and myself. I called the Major
and told him we didn't have any drivers, to which he said "I don't want any excuses, I want a truck. Do you
understand that Mister?". "Yes Sir" I replied, "You will have your truck in a
minute". I determined it was more important to have the two
sergeants stay in the motor pool instead of me, so I got a Trip Ticket, slid
behind the wheel of a pickup truck and reported to the Major at Range
Headquarters. As we were going down range through the last guard
post, the Major asked me if I had a license to operate this truck.
"No Sir, I don’t" I answered. "What happens if we have
an accident?" he wanted to know. "I don't know,
Sir, but you’re the senior officer and would be responsible for anything that
happened" responding to his question. "Turn this damn thing
around and take me back to Range Headquarters" the Major
instructed. Whenever he called for a vehicle after that incident, he
would always request a vehicle and a licensed driver. I wonder
why? Even Majors can learn something now and then. We passed the CMI with a rating of very good. Not
the best, but a lot better than the previous unsatisfactory ratings. I put a lot of
hours into that place. I was there many mornings when the first truck
went out and I was there when the last truck came in at night, just like the
colonel had suggested. Many times I got there at 5 AM and didn't leave
until 8 or 9 PM, then drove the 28 miles to my home. I pushed
hard. I informed the sergeants of their value, authority and
responsibilities. I expected them to be in control of every situation
for which they were responsible. The men of the motor pool were treated
with respect and dignity for the first time in many moons. I fought for
and won promotions for my men, who were previously ignored or forgotten when
it came to passing out stripes. The strategy worked. Everyone
pitched in and gave a hundred percent plus. Men were voluntarily coming
back to the motor pool at night and on weekends, without any indication of
further reward. All they needed was someone who cared about them and appreciated
their contributions. Throughout my career as a NCO and as a Warrant
Officer I never lost sight of my days as a lowly private when I too was
treated with respect and dignity at my first duty assignment at Warren Air
Force Base. I heard through the
grapevine that the Brigade was going to send a lieutenant who was getting out of the
service in less than a year to a 5 week Personnel Officer course at Fort Benjamin Harrison at training at Brigade
Headquarters to express my view that sending the lieutenant was a waste of time and
money, and that they should select a man who planned to stay in the Army. He wanted
to know if I had anyone in mind, and I told him that I was interested because I was
currently working out of my field and would like to get away from the motor pool. I
told him if he sent down the request to the Range Command, they would select someone other
than me. I suggested he send down the orders sending me to the school. A week
later orders were received directing me to the 5 week Personnel Officer Course at and asked me why I
didn't inform him beforehand. I told him if I had informed him he would have canceled
my request. Surprisingly he agreed. The Colonel appointed a Second Lieutenant named Sanders
to take over the motor pool. Sanders was a 6'6" black whose
only interests were pay, basketball and who was discriminating against the Afro-Americans. We began to
take inventory so he could sign the hand receipts for the property. He
decided that it was his job to give me a hard time every step of the
way. We had painted all 3 of our quarter-ton trailers but had only
re-stenciled the Army numbers on two of them at that time. I pointed to
the trailers and said "There's the 3 trailers on the list".
He said "I only see 2". "What the hell do you call that
other piece of equipment you see sitting over there, a tank?" I
asked. He replied "I don't see a third piece of
equipment". "Okay Lieutenant, that's enough for today.
We'll start tomorrow morning again". At that point I'm
furious. That incident coupled with the other shenanigans he was
pulling, [particularly one morning when he got to the motor pool before I
did, he called all the NCOs into the office and told them that one of them
would lose their stripes within 30 days after he took over] forced me into
action. I went directly to the Range Commander and told him what
was going on. He asked me what he should do, so I recommended putting
the Motor Sergeant [an E8] in charge since he knew more about the motor pool
than both the Lieutenant and me together. He bought my
recommendation. He instructed the Sergeant Major to have Lt Sanders
report to him immediately. The Colonel immediately relieved him of all
his duties and gave him 24 hours to find another assignment or he would
initiate action against him for conduct unbecoming an officer and other misdemeanors.
Sanders found a new assignment at the gymnasium on the main post, and I was
off to the Personnel school at I was in a class of 35 captains, lieutenants and
warrant officers. 34 of them were assigned to the Adjutant General
Corps, working as personnel or administrative officers in their unit. I
was number 35, the only Air Defense Artillery Warrant Officer in that
class. Before starting any courses on the first day, we were given a
test to determine our knowledge of personnel management. Results of the
test revealed that I wasn’t the dumb cluck I thought I might be, since my
score ranked number 4 out of 35. No wonder personnel records are all
screwed up. Final exam results put me at 11 out of 35. Still not
too bad for an The school’s Management Controls course was taught by a
middle age lanky Major who went from his office to the classroom pushing a
well-made wooden cart that measured about 6 feet long, 3 feet wide and 5 feet
high. The cart had a big red emergency light flashing every time the
cart was being moved. There was also a squeeze horn that made an ‘Ah
hooga’ sound which he used as he was going down the halls to get the students
out of the way, as he entered the classroom or whenever he want to make some
noise. When he got to the classroom no one would hazard a guess of what
he would do next. One time he reached into his cart of goodies, pulled
out a cap pistol, aimed it a one of the students, fire and said “You’re dead
- now that’s control”. Another time he pulled a ladies corset from his
bag of tricks and explained how that was another form of control. On
other occasions he would pull other tricks or do some goofy thing.
Finally he would get down to the topic of personnel controls which he knew
well and was a very effective instructor. I’m sure the students
remembered him and what he taught us for a long time after leaving the
school. I returned home to Range Command, wondering what was
going to happen next. Back to the motor pool? Back to my old job
at Launcher Maintenance? Receive a letter of reprimand? I had no
idea what the wheels at the headshed had in mind for me. "Mr. Auell reporting as ordered Sir" as I
saluted the Range Commander at his desk in the headquarters in response to a
request received from the Sergeant Major. After a bit of general chit-chat
and a cup of coffee, the colonel wanted to know what I had learned and was
interested in my pre and post course standing. Finally, the colonel
seemed happy with his decision concerning this lowly warrant officer
"Mr. Auell, I would like you to be our Adjutant. We think you
could handle the job. Major Towne and I will back you all the
way. Can you handle that?". I was too shocked to say anything.
Why were they putting a junior W2 in an authorized major slot? I arose,
saluted and stated "I'll do my best". The colonel stopped me
as I was at his doorway "Oh by the way Mr. Auell, you can handle the
motor pool as an additional duty for a while can't you?" "Yes
Sir" I meekly replied. What the hell do they think I am?
Superman? What's wrong with putting one of the other officers in these
jobs? These are both time-consuming full time jobs. My only
consolation was knowing they could not give me a poor performance efficiency
report since they were using me out of my MOS [Military Occupational
Specialty] and Army regulations specifically state that warrant officers
cannot be assigned tasks out of their Military Occupational Specialty unless
the move was justified and approved by a higher authority; and, these
warrant officers will not be given a poor performance evaluation because they
were not an expert in the field they were put in. [I learned that in
Personnel Officer school - see, it's paying off already.] Every Wednesday afternoon visitors from far and wide
gathered at program was initiated to give the visitor a better
understanding of the Nike Hercules missile that was guarding their
cities. This was "big doin's" at the range. We set up
OPs [observation posts] at some of the vacant fire control sites, a
reasonably safe distance from the missile launching site. We provided
goodies for the guests, and everything had to be spit and
polished. A briefing officer made a presentation about the
missile system and directed the observers’ attention to the direction of the
missile liftoff and initial thrust. Many of the visitors were from the city
where the missile battery that was firing that day were located, thus trying
to promote a more harmonious relationship between the community and the
military unit. Other visitors included Major Towne was in charge of all Operation
Understanding activity on the range. He wrote the text that was presented by the briefing
officer. He selected the officers that would make the presentations,
testing each officer for their ability to act in the capacity of a briefing
officer. All officers and warrant officers were required to “try
out" for this "starring role". Only a few officers were
chosen; I was the only warrant officer selected. [Why me? a
person that never had public speaking training or experience. Why not
pick a few of those officers who were college graduates, some with master's
degrees?] After all my bitchin' and complainin' you would find me
down range on an OP almost every Wednesday afternoon. "This first chart depicts the
missile-booster combination in the firing position on
the launcher prior to the initiation of the fire command and missile liftoff.
When the acquisition radar acquires a target and it is selected as the
primary target, it is transferred to the Target Tracking Radar, then the
Missile Tracking Radar will lock on the missile to be fired. The
officer in charge of the firing will press the FIRE button in the Fire
Control Trailer sending a small DC voltage to the booster squibs that
activate the solid propellant booster motors, lifting the
missile-booster combination off the launcher. The missile will be
carried aloft by the booster cluster which burns for approximately two and
one half seconds. At booster burn-out the aerodynamic drag of the
booster cluster pulls a lanyard that activates the solid propellant missile
motor. The missile will go straight up to the approximate altitude of
the target, complete a 7G dive that puts the missile in a horizontal position
on line with the target, then proceed down range to destroy the selected
target, etc, etc , etc”. I remember it as if it were yesterday. On
one of the INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
One bright and sunny Wednesday afternoon I was briefing 14 Vietnamese
Generals at a special OP set
up for this purpose on a vacant Fire Control site.
The three front seats were occupied by the ranking Vietnamese General, the
Commanding General of
After about 5 minutes into my spiel I glanced over to the front row where
the bigwigs were sitting. The Vietnamese General was
very alert and attentive, but his two
hosts, the Post commander and the Range commander who were sitting
on each side of
the Vietnamese General had their heads bowed and were fast
asleep.
Boy, was I proud of our American leaders!!!!! Where else could I
find such dedicated men who would endure the heat of the desert for
their country? I don’t know if I bored them,
the sun got the best of them, they had a rough
time the previous night, or
they were just plain rude. All this, and no acting
fees or residuals, not even a little token amount
for baby-sitting these birds all
afternoon. After I had been Adjutant for about a year, I applied
for a direct commission as a Captain in the Adjutant General Corps. I
figured if I’m doing the job as Adjutant I might as well have the rank and
pay that goes with it. I received a commission as a First Lieutenant
with orders for assignment to J3 Section of the United Nations Headquarters
in In 1965 I was of one of 200 warrant officers out of a
warrant officer force of 17000 that were offered an appointment as a Regular
Army Warrant Officer. This was the first time appointments were offered
since 1948. Although it was an honor to have been selected giving me a
permanent rank of warrant officer, it did carry with it some
disadvantages. First, a retired Regular Army officer cannot work for
the Federal government without losing a large portion of the retirement pay
[the Dual Compensation Act effects only Regular Army Commissioned and Warrant
Officers]. Second, a Regular Army Warrant Officer retiree is subject to
recall to active duty until reaching the age of 62 years [56 for a
commissioned officer]. I had orders that gave me 7 days to report to After receiving a Regular Army warrant officer
appointment I once again applied for a direct commission, this time as a
Captain in Air Defense Artillery. I was rejected because of
insufficient education. At that time I had about 3 years college
credit. When I was offered a commission a couple of years earlier I had
a little over 1 year college credit. That's the way the Army
works. I can understand the rejection since I had refused the
commission previously and they had no assurances I would accept it
now. I had no alternative but to accept their
decision. This was my third and final application for a direct
commission. I reconciled myself to the fact that I would never serve as
a commissioned officer. Hopefully, I would retire as a warrant officer
W4, the highest warrant officer grade at that time. Since then the Army
created a W5 grade, over 20 years after they were using the possibility of
promotion to W5 or W6 to retain selected warrant officers. I was one of
them. They told me I was one of a very few who was Regular Army and had
a Bachelors Degree, therefore I would be one of the first to be promoted to
W5 and W6 when these grades were established. Commissioned officers came and went quite rapidly,
especially during the There were none so rare as Elmer B. K------, Colonel,
date of rank 1951. A 6'3" lanky sort who looked much older than
his actual age due to his baldness and wrinkled face. His personality
was an absolute and constant "ZERO". This bird was the rarest
of creatures ever to fly over the Good Lord’s fruited plain. He came
from a long line of military officers; his father and his brother both rising
to the rank of Major General. This fact, coupled with he being one of
the senior colonels in the entire Although I was holding down the Adjutant job,
officially I had to be placed in a warrant officer slot for my particular
MOS, so I was carried in one of the slots in the Missile Assembly
Section. Captain Jaynes, now deceased, the commissioned officer
in charge of the Missile Assembly Section, met with me one afternoon to
discuss my efficiency report [the bread and butter of a career as a
commissioned or warrant officer]. He showed me the report and said
"You are due an efficiency report in two months. If nothing
changes, this is the way I will rate you". I looked at the report
and knew we were in for a long discussion. "You have rated me with a
score if coupled with a like rating from the endorsing officer would give me
a score of less than 200 out of a possible 240 points. With a rating
like that I will never make W3 and I will be lucky to be retained in the
Army. I can't accept this report Captain. I feel I am being
punished for working in a job that I was asked to do for the good of the
organization" I said. "I'm sorry Mr. Auell, but that's the way
I see it. Your rating is higher than the other 7 warrant officers I am
rating", he said as we both were getting up from the table. I went
directly to the Assistant Operations Officer [S3] Major Klusmeier, an older
officer who had been around and pretty well versed on how the Army
works. He and I went to see LTC Harper, the Operations Officer.
After I told him that Captain Jaynes was literally going to ruin the careers
of 8 warrant officers because he was unfamiliar with how the rating system
worked in the Army, he told his clerk to have Captain Jaynes come to the
office. When Captain Jaynes was seated, Colonel Harper said to him
"I just finished discussing your tentative efficiency report of Mr.
Auell and other warrant officers you were asked to rate. I realize the
officer rating system is over inflated and that you just came on active duty
from the National Guard within the last few months. Now Captain, you
know as well as I do that I can't legally tell you how to rate
any individual. However, I can tell you that your own efficiency report
score could be 10 points under the lowest rating you give to any one of the
warrant officers you rate. So do as you see fit. If you want help
or more information about rating subordinates, Major Klusmeier will be happy
to assist you. That's all Captain. Have a nice day".
Captain Jaynes apparently learned a little more about the officer rating
system and went about rewriting some efficiency reports. I suppose I
could have just accepted his initial report and hope that I would promoted on
schedule anyway. However, I didn’t want to take that chance, and
furthermore I cannot sit idly by when I think I, or someone else, is being
treated unfairly. I had nothing to lose by bringing this matter to a
head. Obviously, my efficiency report was good enough for me to get
promoted to W3 later on. Jaynes remained my friend and was promoted to
Major sometime later after I left the Range Command. Every Wednesday about noon, an hour before Operation
Understanding was scheduled to start, the brigade commander Brigadier General
John D--- would arrive at the Range main office. He would walk into my
office, the second one on the right [the third one was Colonel K------'s
office] and say to me "Get your hat Chief, I want to take a ride down
range". Naturally I went. As we were going from one site to
another he would always say "What does that lazy Son-of-a-Bitch do all
day?", referring to Colonel K------.. "Sir, I don't keep track of
him but he seems to be quite busy doing his job as the Range Commander"
I said with tongue in cheek. I was hoping he would drop the
subject. But he wouldn't. "I know the Son-of-a-Bitch.
He has no idea what’s happening here on the range. He doesn't know
anything about Air Defense. He's dumb". I wished I could
climb into the trunk. He hated Colonel K------ with a passion and
Colonel K------ hated him even more. At one time Colonel K------- was
then Lieutenant Colonel D----'s commander. D---- was promoted to full
Colonel and then Brigadier General while the Big K------ remained a very
senior full Colonel. I would always have to remind the General that I
had to get back to the office to get ready for a briefing at an observation
site. At 4.30 PM every Wednesday Colonel K------ would walk into
my office and ask me if I needed a ride into Bliss. Other days he
didn’t care if I crawled on my knees the entire 28 miles to El Paso, and
generally would not even say ‘Good Night’ to anyone as he was leaving.
I usually tried to drive my car on those days so I wouldn't have to ride with
him. "What did that horse's ass want today?" the Colonel
would ask me. I always replied that we only discussed general subjects.
"Don't give me that line Mr. Auell, I know he wanted to know what I did
all day, didn't he?" he queried. "No Sir, we didn't talk
about you" I lied. I couldn't wait until he left the office for
the day. This particular situation put me in one hell of a
position. Why do I always run into these yo-yos? Maybe I should
have told each of them what they said about each other. Maybe we should
have dusted off the sabers and let them go at it at sunrise in front of the
flagpole. This Wednesday situation with General D--- always upset
Colonel K------ and he was hard to get along with for the rest of the week.
Weekends must have had the same effect as General D---'s visits since Colonel
K------ was also miserable on Monday and Tuesday. In fact he was always
a miserable old man. Stone Face personified. I never saw him
smile or laugh. Maybe he didn’t have any choppers, I never bothered to
find out. Upholding the traditions of the Air Defense Artillery
and the One Friday night we scheduled a formal party [dress
blues for the officers and gowns for the ladies] at the Officer’s Club on
Biggs Air Base adjacent to For years, Range Command officers presented a small
memento to departing officers for their service at the Range, usually a
silver tray or similar item engraved with appropriate data about the tour at
McGregor. In addition, they each received the “Range Command
Scroll”. We had a lot of fun with the "scroll" which
cited amusing or unusual incidents in which the officer was involved while at
the range. The truth of the matter was that an incident didn't have to
be funny, all we needed was some hint of an occurrence or event and we would
elaborate and embellish it to the point where one would think it was a major
factor in the military life of the officer. Fibbing was not against the
rules, and exaggeration was the rule of the day. Most of the scrolls
were quite comical and earned the applause and laughter of the
audience. The scroll was presented to the officer after dinner and the
officer being honored had to stand up on a chair where everyone could see
him. If I do say so myself, some of these scrolls were priceless
masterpieces. I wrote many of them and helped on nearly all of
them. The scroll at times was 10 feet long. There was a signature
block for each officer at the end of the scroll, many times more than 80
signatures. A TOUCH OF NATURAL BEAUTY
Shortly after Colonel K----- arrived at the Range as the commander we were
having one of our Hail and Farewell parties on
Friday evening, so I took the scroll
into his office and asked him if he wanted to sign it today in order to
avoid the confusion of a lot of
officers trying to sign it at the party. [Prior to the
arrival of
the Big K and his reign of feeble-mindedness, the officers
looked forward to the monthly Hail
and Farewell, which were a lot of fun and a good
way to get rid of some of the pressure of operating
a large missile range] He
looked at the scroll for at least ten minutes as I stood silently beside him.
I don’t
think he read one word on the scroll, he just looked at it. Finally, he
looked up at me, his hand rubbing his
chin, and said in a low drawl, “At best,
it’s crude.
Don’t do this any more. I don’t like it”. [It’s ‘crude’. That
sucker’s got a lot of gut to say this masterpiece that took
hours of investigation, thought
and writing is crude. What the hell did he expect, something like the
Declaration of
“What would the Colonel like us to give an officer when he leaves the
Command? I know you previously stated the trays and other
mementos were too
expensive. When he answered me I almost dropped to the floor
laughing.
Luckily I was able to control myself until I got back to my office. “You go out in the
desert and pick out a nice rock and we will give that to a departing
officer” he said seriously. I said “Yes Sir” and never again
approached the
subject. [Okay, Mr. Nature Lover, what color rock do you
want? Is there any
particular size that you had in mind - maybe something a little smaller than
the one in your
head? Shall we scribble his name on it with an old rusty
nail? Perhaps we could find one with a little jack rabbit poop
on it. That might make
you
happier].
I went back to my office and laughed my butt off. What an
imagination! Then
I realized
how sick this bird had to be. His sense of humor was Zip. Some of
the things
that he said or did were truly out in left field. [Maybe that’s where
we could find a suitable
rock]. Many thought he was either a scatterbrain or
senile. I personally thought he was more than a little of
both. Every day was a challenging experience with this
fearless leader. Lieutenant Colonel Rosnagal, a new-comer to the Range,,
had been assigned as the Executive Officer, replacing Major Towne who
had orders for an assignment overseas. He quickly established himself
as ‘Jerk #2’. That’s all we needed; another character in the
Headquarters building.. A short slightly built man who was called to
active duty from his high school teaching position during the build up of
forces during the SHOWING YOUR COLORS
From LTC Rosnagel’s office came a loud and gruff pronouncement “Mr. Auell, come in here”. I
went to his office and he instructed me to close the door and
sit down. He squinted and looked
straight into my eyes as if he was shooting daggers at me and said very
arrogantly and distinctly: “Red is my color”. Don’t you know that Mr.
Auell?” “Now, Colonel Kennedy’s color is blue-green, I’m sure you
noticed that, didn’t you?” “Mr. Auell, you can have any color you want except
red or blue-green. Everyone else can have their own color. But no
one in this command will have red as their color except
me. Do you understand that Mr. Auell?”.
I had no idea what the hell this scatterbrain was talking about. Was
this a joke, a trick
or was this bird serious about whatever he was talking about. “No Sir”,
I replied “I haven’t got the slightest hint of
what you are referring to”. I could see he was getting a little flustered with
me because I didn’t understand his
game.
I’m talking about my color.
Don’t you understand that? I can’t make it any clearer” he
yelled. After a moment of silence he continued “You used red ink to
write a note to me while I was at lunch. This is not acceptable to me.
Do you understand that, Mr. Auell?” he said sarcastically as his face was
beginning to become his favorite color.
“I was using a red pen to post the duty roster as prescribed by the
regulations, and I wrote the note in red because I had a red pen in my
hand at the time the message was received. I
saw nothing wrong with my action and I certainly
didn’t know that
using a red pen would offend you”, I said firmly when I
finally
realized this jerk was not kidding. I sure as hell wasn’t going to
apologize for using a red pen, especially since it was
“How many people have red pens?” he wanted to know. I told him I had no
idea, but I was sure the First Sergeants had them to
work on their duty rosters. He ended up getting all the red pens
that came into the command and kept
them in a locked desk
drawer. Whenever anyone that used a red pen to perform their
duties needed a new pen or a refill, they had to turn in the old
pen or refill to him, and only
then would he issue a new one.
There was no doubt in my mind that this little exercise in control would be
recorded in the annals of military
history and
would have a profound and lasting effect on the national
defense of our country. I was so proud of my contribution
to the effort. Who else has made such an extraordinary
sacrifice?
I could hardly contain my emotions as I wrapped my red pen in imported lamb-
skin and hid it among the top secret plans in the office safe. I
considered requesting
a 24 hour guard.
A few weeks later I told the XO, in a mildly sarcastic tone which he didn’t
grasp, that I had selected a color
of my own - ‘pale white’. “Good, very good,
everyone should have
an identifying color to make office management much
easier. Good work Mr. Auell, I’m glad you saw it my way”, he said
proudly.
He didn’t get. Dumb Ass. I don’t know what he taught in school, but I hope it
wasn’t
logic or business management..... When missiles were fired the hot boosters and missile
parts that fell to the dry terrain of About 5 years later when I was nearing the completion
of my 3 year Alaskan tour, I called the warrant officer assignment branch at
the Pentagon. The clerk who answered the phoned asked me what I wanted
and I told her I would like to know where they were going to send me when I
left Alaska in a couple of months. A minute or so later, a male voice
said "Where do you want to go?" I stated I would like to go
back to Range Command at My replacement finally arrived. Major Torres took over
as Adjutant and I was free at last from those loony-tunes known as Colonel Stone Face
and Lieutenant Colonel Step-and-Fetch-It. Where do I go from here? Back
to the assembly buildings I hoped. Guess what? Lieutenant Colonel
Harper, the Operations Officer [S3] wanted to see me almost as soon as I got
up from chair in the Adjutant’s office. He explained to me that I had
done a good job as the Adjutant, and he was especially impressed with my
writing ability. After buttering me up with his flattery and promise of
his full support he broke the news to me. He wanted me to write the
Basic Plan for Range Command. Each unit in the Army was required to
prepare a top-secret document that prescribed exactly how the unit would
respond to any and all emergencies that take place in the vicinity of the
unit. “Well Chief, will you do this job for Range Command?” he
asked. Since he put it that way and his shiny silver leaves were
practically blinding this Warrant Officer W2 who wanted to make W3, I had no
alternative but to support the guy who previously straightened out the
efficiency report mess of Captain Jaynes which could have cost my W3 bar and
my Army career. “Sir, I’ll give it a shot”. The Basic Plan is a detailed document that prescribes
how officers, enlisted men and equipment would be used under any and all
emergency conditions such as earthquakes, riots, invasion, insurrection,
nuclear detonations, conventional warfare, missile attacks, violent storms
and/or any other disastrous event. Personnel and equipment was
designated for specific teams and tasks; i.e., Battery A would provide
100 men and the necessary equipment in response to a report of a downed
aircraft on
From my experience as the Adjutant sitting in an office next to Colonel K,
I knew the best time to find this bird as least
partially awake and coherent was in the
morning, so I knocked on his door and reported to him that I had the Basic
Plan ready for his review. He took
it in his hands, leaned back in his chair and
began
reading. I was standing at the side of his desk. After about 5
minutes, which seemed like two hours, he was still on the title
page. I cleared my throat hoping it would stir him to at least
turn to page 2, but all it did was wake him.
He instructed me to bring it back some
other time. I couldn’t let him keep it in
his desk
because it was a Top Secret document and Lord knows where he might
put it.
I took the document back to him every morning for the next 30 working days,
each time he would look at the first page or two and then fall
fast asleep. Taking it to him every morning for 30 days
may seem to be an exaggeration,
but it
actually happened as I have stated. Perhaps he wanted to understand
every word of the Plan before signing it; or
maybe he couldn’t read; or maybe
he had sleeping
sickness. I don’t know why we were going through this day in
and day out. One thing for sure, I
didn’t go in to his office because he enjoyed
my company. He didn’t enjoy anyone’s company. He spent so much time on
the first two pages he should have had the
title and table of contents memorized, especially after the first 10 or 15
readings.
Finally, after standing at the side of this bird’s desk for more times than I
want to
remember, I told LTC Harper “Colonel, I refuse to take this Plan into him
one more time. Court martial
me if you must, but I have had it with that guy”. LTC Harper agreed we had
spent enough time on this matter, so he sent it to Post Headquarters without
the signature of the commanding officer. It was
accepted at Post HQ without a signature since they were well aware of Colonel
K’s shenanigans. Three years later when I returned to McGregor after my
tour in Alaska, I checked the sign-out register to see if he ever looked at
the Plan before he left the command. He didn’t disappoint me, he hadn’t...... I witnessed several changes and events in 7 years at
the Range. Commissioned officers and enlisted men came and went, while
the warrant officers usually stayed for quite a while. Equipment was
changed, modified and deleted. A French Lieutenant standing on the roof
of the Launching Control Trailer during a missile firing was killed when the
missile exploded prematurely. One of the sergeants that worked for me
was down range when a missile accidentally blew up and hit him in the groin,
causing the loss of the one testicle he had left; he had lost the other one
in a similar incident on Okinawa two years previously. A despondent
Master Sergeant from an ASP unit committed suicide by drinking a can of
Brasso [a chemical used to clean brass insignia] because the unit failed to
assemble and fire a successful missile. Jack rabbits and rattlesnakes
were killed by the hundreds. The wind blew most of the time. The
terrain changed with each gust, but stayed near the same. The
wind took away the old and brought in the new. The tumbleweeds seems to
be the same as the ones that just left. The blowing sand could destroy
a new car in 5 minutes. The sand gets into everything and plays havoc
with metal. It gets in you eyes and irritates them. It gets
in your teeth and you feel the grit as you open and close your mouth.
It gets in your hair, making it stiff and unmanageable. It's in
your clothes rubbing against all parts of your body. At times the food
that you eat has a sandy and gritty taste. The coffee you drink has the
added flavor of sand. This was life on the desert. This was life
at After a brief vacation in The one frightening incident we experienced was when
the left rear tire on the car blew out, causing the car to head toward the
left of the road, causing the trailer to jack-knife. When we stopped,
the front left wheel was hanging over the side of the road. There were
no guard rails and there was a 100' drop down to a creek. Another few
feet and it would have been Katie Bar The Door, Good Night Irene and Bye, Bye
Cruel World. After I had everyone, except me, get out of the car I backed
up enough to be able to change the tire. Finally we were on our way
again, traveling a little slower especially near sharp drop offs. Once
we got on the 1387 miles of dirt road I quickly learned to stop or go very
slow when a tractor trailer rig was approaching from either direction,
since they created a dust storm that made it impossible to see for a couple
of minutes. The ruggedness, grandeur and isolation
of the wilderness surrounding us as we traveled north to We crossed the Alaskan border and
eventually reached slot with an electrical plug where
motor heaters had to be used in the winter time or the car would end up being
frozen to the point where it had to be towed to an indoor
garage. The Valiant station wagon and small travel trailer just
didn't cut the mustard in the ruggedness of Seward, named for the Secretary of State William H.
Seward who bought practically devastated the town. Large oil
storage tanks and railroad tracks were tossed around like tinkertoys.
The Army and Air Force each had a recreation facility at that location.
The Army facility had Quonset hut cabins and parking areas for campers.
A Mess Hall provided delicious meals at breakfast, lunch and dinner at
unbelievably low prices. Breakfast cost 27 cents plus 5 cents
surcharge. Lunch and dinner were slightly higher. Bill and
Michael got more than their money’s worth in chocolate milk alone. Even
a box lunch was available when you went out on the boats. A Post Exchange
[PX] stocked essential toiletry, groceries and a good
selection of fishing equipment. At one end of the PX building there was
a facility for cleaning, wrapping and freezing fish. There was a large
room for relaxation, pool, Ping-Pong and table games. And last but not
least, there were several 22' boats with twin 40 motors, an operator, all
rods and line available for the serviceman and his family at the rate of $12
a day from 6 AM to 6 PM. Now that was a bargain! We camped at Seward a few times, albeit not as many
times as we would have liked. We saw some beautiful silver salmon being
unloaded from the recreation boats. The commercial fishing boats
operating out of this port would bring in bountiful catches of shrimp, clams,
scallops and various fish. There were all kind of recreational boats
being used to fish the bay for the silvers when they were running in late
July and August. When the salmon got close to the shore they would jump
two feet in the air. On one occasion as I was watching the fishing
going on in front of me, my attention was quickly drawn to an old man rowing
his small boat about 50’ off shore. All of a sudden it happened.
No, he didn’t catch his first fish of the day or fall into the water. A
big silver salmon jumped into his boat. He held the fish down to the
bottom of the boat with his foot and removed a stringer from his tackle
box. Once he got the fish under control he continued his trolling, but
I didn’t notice him catching any more fish, legally or otherwise. On another occasion when Joyce and Coonie were visiting
us, we went camping at Seward and rented one of the Rec Complex boats to go
fishing out in We fished for salmon whenever we could. Berniece
and Bill Jr. enjoyed fishing, but Cathy and Michael didn't show much interest
in the sport. However Michael did have a short- lived venture as a
business man along the In the summer of 1968 our neighbor LTC Bill Green, his
son Kyle, Michael and I went to Deep Creek to fish for the King.
We camped in our cab-over camping rig on the shore where Deep Creek flows into
the bay. When we arrived at the creek on Friday afternoon, Bill Green
noticed that a Warrant Officer that worked for him was fishing the creek and
hadn’t caught anything in two days. I rigged up my pole with a red and
white spinner that I had bought at the PX for 17 cents, and started
fishing. On the second throw, I locked on to a King, weighing out at
about 25 pounds. The second day we went fishing again and shortly after
I put my line in the water with the same rig I had used the day before, I latched
onto another King, this one being about 18 pounds. My fishing for King
salmon was over for the year of 1968. Incidentally, neither Green nor
his friend had to bother cleaning any King salmon. The Warrant Officer
was scheduled to visit my missile site the following Monday for an inspection
of assembling a nuclear missile; although he jokingly talked about how the
embarrassment of not catching a fish while I caught two was going to have an effect on the inspection, as usual
we passed with flying colors. The crystal clear waters of the A CATCH TO REMEMBER
On one of our trips, several officers and their families were at a
clearing on the
shore of
the
I heard that I threw my fishing rig over my shoulder toward the bank, took a
few steps into deeper water and reached out to grab
the jacket.
I picked the jacket out of the water, and once I realized the contents of the
garment I yelled “My God, it’s
David”. He was still asleep. I took him to shore
and gave
him to his mother, then went off to an area where I could be alone.
As I thought about what just happened, I became very enraged and disgusted. I
could not
believe that everyone just stood there like statues, especially when
someone thought
there might be a child in that jacket. I had to be alone where
I could vent my frustration and
disappointment in my fellow officers. If I had
returned to the group that were still fishing, I’m
sure I would have done
something I might have regretted later .
I often wondered how those people that did nothing when they thought there
might be a child in that jacket, would have felt if that
little fellow kept going
downstream and ended up in the cold and rapid waters of the
I finally realized my mind and body were guided by a force much stronger than
anything I could ever muster on my own. Thank You Lord! I then
went back to the group, but pretty well lost my desire for
fishing for the rest of the day.
For years we have joked about this incident, making wisecracks about
David’s swim in the The camping area at Cooper's Landing served as
our base camp on more than one excursion when we were in search of the
delectable meat of the red salmon. [Actually the only way we liked red salmon
was smoked]. Most of the time we camped with other families we knew
from the missile unit. The presence of bears was evident along the
banks of the Russian and Kenai rivers. Claw marks where they had picked
up the carcasses of fish that had been filleted were numerous, and feces
could be found around the area. No one knew when these creatures might
decide to visit an area and their behavior was unpredictable, therefore it
made good sense to take a few precautionary measures. In addition to
being careful about the handling of food, almost every group of people had at
least one person packing a side arm or a high powered rifle. I always
carried a loaded 357 magnum revolver I borrowed from our neighbor Bill
Green. Thank Goodness I never had to use it. Although it may seem far fetched, the Army did indeed
send me to I was initially assigned to Battery C,
located across Cook Inlet from Battery A was located about a half
mile from the Anchorage Airport, in fact one of our missions was the
protection of that airport. Going from Major James Revels was the Commanding
Officer of Battery A was authorized a Major as
the Commander, a Captain as the Executive Officer, a Fire Control Platoon Leader
Lieutenant, 2 Fire Control Warrant Officers, 2 Launcher Section Platoon Leader
Lieutenants, and 3 Launcher Area Warrant Officers. Most of the time we didn’t have the
lieutenants for the platoon leader slots, therefore the warrants had to fill
those positions as an additional duty. I was the senior Warrant Officer
in the Launching Area, making me responsible for 4 Sections of Nuclear and
Conventional warhead missiles and everything that was involved in keeping
them combat ready at all times. This was an awesome job considering the
number of missiles , the intricate policies and procedures that had to be
followed verbatim, the complexity of the missile and warhead systems, and the
supervision of 2 warrant officers and 125 men, 10 of which were trained
missile technicians and the rest of the men being launching area
crewmen. There was a tremendous amount of stress and pressure assuring
that every- thing operated like clock-work 24 hours a day every day of the
year. There were always unannounced OREs at least twice a month,
dependent on how well the unit performed their duties during the previous
exercise. Each missile had to be disassembled, inspected by Ordnance
personnel, tested by my maintenance crew and then reassembled once a year,
meaning this double firing battery had at least 1 missile out of action every
week for maintenance. There was never a dull moment. During the mating of a nuclear warhead
to the missile body every step had be performed exactly as delineated in the
3-inch thick procedures manual. One error in procedure or one safety
violation would be sufficient to declare the entire operation
unsuccessful. The NCOIC and myself had to personally observe every
action taken by one of the 5 man crew. Each tool had to be inspected
before it was used, regardless of how many times it was previously checked
and used. It was a major deficiency for anyone to step on one of the
many electrical cables or air lines. Torque wrenches had to be checked
and set for each nut, bolt or screw [the Hercules missile had hundreds of
flathead short bolts that had to be torqued]. It was amazing how the
slightest error or mishap could cause termination of the evaluation.
Many Launcher Warrant Officers and NCOs on the missile sites throughout the
air defense system had been relieved of their position because of this
inspection, literally ruining their Army career. Someone once said that
this examination was where the term "chicken shit"
originated. I think it was just a carryover for Artillery OCS. Annual Service Practice [ASP] was
conducted at one of the firing batteries stationed in the mountains adjacent
to going twice each year, once for each
side of the launching area. So my assembly crew and I were the 'lucky'
ones to go 6 times during our 3 years in Another time I rode the 1930 vintage
train powered by a steam engine of the same era. The route was picturesque
beyond imagination. The scenery was spacious, majestic and breathtaking
as we went through small Eskimo villages, over narrow bridges spanning deep
valleys and around the base of Four times I flew with the rest
of the crew on a 727 that took 43 minutes for the trip from We usually had a perfect score, or
near perfect score every time we went to The Battalion Commander rotated to the States and was
replaced by a gung ho who was determined to rule this battalion with an iron
fist. The first Saturday morning officer meeting after he assumed command eventually
turned out to be a good lesson for this eager whippersnapper. As is
proper to show respect, everyone came to attention when he walked into the
room. He said "While you are all standing, the Warrant Officers
move to the left of the room", emphasizing our status as being
subordinate to any and all commissioned officers. This was his first of
many stupid mistakes. I don't know if he disliked warrants or he was
just dumb as hell, maybe both. We moved to the left side of the room
and each one of those warrant officers sat there silently planning his
demise. His second mistake was the exclusion of warrant officers from battalion
officer parties. If he wanted to play games he was about to face a
group of players who knew every trick in the book, and although he
didn’t know it, he never had a chance in this little skirmish.
The first taste of his own medicine came when the
firing batteries started to fail all of the OREs ran by Group and Battalion
staff. He couldn't understand this sudden drop in the efficiency of the
firing batteries, since previous records and reports indicated proficient and
competent firing batteries. The next thing that happened was the
Warrant Officers complained to their Battery Commanders, which was passed on
to the colonel, that they could no longer perform the duties of the platoon
leader such as getting ready for barracks inspection, or teaching equipment
drills because it was interfering with the maintenance of the
equipment. We understood that there was a shortage of lieutenants and
the The Since the warrants didn't want to hurt their It seemed like the Army had their share of boneheads,
and its been my experience that they are not primarily in the enlisted or
warrant ranks. Another case that supports this premise is that of the
Group Commander who replaced Colonel Gray. His name is not remembered
or important, but his deeds and conduct will forever be deeply engraved in
the minds of those he tried to harm or ruin. For the sake of this
discussion, we’ll call him Colonel Dud [very appropriate for this
character]. One of his first acts was to sneak up on the sentinels and
dogs guarding the missile sites around He would make unannounced inspections of the missile
sites, totally disregarding what was going on at that particular time.
He would grill and harass anyone to the point of near breakdown. He
loved to show up at night or on holidays. He had his daughter inspect
the Battery A mess hall the first Christmas his family was in His wife entered called him the morning she was ready to go home, but he
informed them he was too busy to pick her up until after 4:30 PM. The
Commanding General finally called Colonel Dud and ordered him to pick up his
wife immediately. He dropped her off at their quarters and went back to
the office. Nice guy, huh?. At least he didn't discriminate
against any one group, he was mean and hateful to everyone, including his
family. Colonel Dud called his acting Group Supply Officer [S4]
into his office and informed him that he wanted hand-receipts prepared for
all the small expendable office articles such as staplers, scissors, rulers,
tape holders that staff had in their desk and have the Group staff sign for
the articles in their desk. CW4 Forshay, an old warrant officer who had
3 thousand years of service and was going to retire as soon as he left Alaska
told him this is a very unusual order, and sarcastically added "Does the
colonel want to include pencils and paper clips on the hand
receipt?". Colonel Dud shouted to Mr Forshay "You make one
more smart remark and I'll courts martial you! I don't care how much
service you have". The first hand-receipt the Chief prepared was
for the colonel, and when he took it to him for his signature on a Friday
afternoon, the colonel wanted to know if the other ones were signed.
When the Chief told him he was working on it, he ordered the Chief to get
them signed over the weekend and have them on his desk at 8:00 AM Monday
morning. The Chief worked all weekend going to the homes of the staff
getting them to sign the documents. No wonder everyone loved this
Colonel so much. Missile launcher areas need several pieces of equipment
and a wide variety of hand tools to properly maintain operationally ready
firing systems and missiles. In the launching area of Battery A there
were 2500 hand tools and several pieces of testing equipment for which I was
responsible and had signed a hand-receipt for the items. The Army long
ago recognized that small hand tools get lost, broken or stolen so a system
was established that authorized a quarterly dollar allowance for each
military unit. They could use this allocation to replace small
expendable tools, among other things. Each Army post set up a
facility known as the 'Country Store' where Supply Sergeants could select the
items needed in their units. This system had been used successfully for
years. However, our most excellent and infallible leader thought the
system allowed units to be lackadaisical about controlling hand tools and
forbade any battery to use the system. He sent his Group staff to each of the missile sites to
inventory all tool sets. The tool sets I had signed for were missing
some small tools valued at $55. In accordance with Army supply
regulations these tools could be replaced by the Country Store system, unless
there was some indication of foul play which would require a “Survey” to
determine what happened to the missing items. A Surveying Officer was
appointed by the Post Supply Officer after receipt of a request from a unit
commander [in this case Colonel Dud]. The Lieutenant that conducted the
survey found no indication of misdeed and recommended that I be relieved of
any pecuniary responsibility. The Post Adjutant General issued an order
to that effect. However, enter Colonel Dud. He didn't like the
results of the survey and told his Supply [S4] Officer, CW4 Forshay again, to
prepare a cash collection form so I could pay for the tools. The Chief
told the Colonel that collection proceedings could not be initiated because
the survey resolved the matter and any further action was forbidden by
regulation. Not to be outdone by a few Army regulations, the Colonel
ordered the Battalion Commander to put a letter of reprimand in my permanent
file in Washington, D. C. and send him a copy so he would know that it was
done. The Battalion Commander presented the letter of reprimand to me
and said he would not send it to I heard later that Colonel Dud relieved the new Battery
A Commander after the Major had only been there 3 months because the Colonel
came to the site and inventoried a tool set in the Fire Control section and
found that a pair of pliers was missing. Reports of other unbelievable
conduct by this wild man would be hard to believe unless you at one time were
subjected to his sadistic and domineering ways. I never met a man that
had a good word for him. In fact most of the officers and men hated him
with a passion. I only hope his conduct was discovered in time to
prevent him from getting promoted to Brigadier General, and that his erratic
behavior was eventually curbed before he hurt any more people. It’s
idiots like this horse’s butt that force some good dedicated officers and
enlisted men to consider a career other than the United States
Army.. There are a lot of fond memories of |
