General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: What happened after the US ran from Vietnam? n/t [View all]pinboy3niner
(53,339 posts)Steve was ramrod military on duty but off-duty he let his hair down and was a real joker. After our early training he got an OCS class ahead of me and when I got there later he was my mentor.
In Vietnam when NVA machine guns were tearing up his men and he had wounded down who nobody could get to to help, he advanced on the NVA machine gun bunkers and took them out getting shot in the process. By the time he got to the last bunker he was too shot-up to throw a grenade, so he carried it into the bunker.
I didn't learn what happened to Steve until many years after the war, but I cried like a baby when I heard that.
There's a vet group named in Steve's honor, and at one of their annual banquets one of the wounded men he saved met Steve's parents. I've also talked to his parents on the phone. He was a hell of a guy.
R.I.P. my friend, Stephen Helden Doane.