| Fifties Frogs Magazine |
Vol 11 |
| Pg 2 |
Story from Hamilton Vose III |
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Editor: Brother Nick Nickelson
found Hamilton who was kind enough to send me some of his great
stories. Later I will give more you more info on Hamilton.
Story from Hamilton Vose III I moved to Chicago out of sense of duty to my father, I didn't know him well at this stage, but he had always cared for me financially, lived by his commitments to my mother and had never thrown another duck in her face. My collegiate academic career had fallen on its face as a result of a bar fight I got into at a sorority formal. I had ordered a last round and the bartender was in the process of handing it to me when the sorority mother, who was standing close by, announced, "bar closed", with the stentorian voice of a large woman who liked coeds. His hand pull and the glass was launched into my face like a shot from a fire hose. It did not put out he fire, however but rather ignited it. I thought he had tossed it in my face on purpose and my temper let go with mega force. My fist connected with barman’s nose and he went down and out. I didn’t know then but Hamilton was also out. I was out of school with the loss of my scholastic deferment This is not a good thing as the protective walls of the deferment started crumbling as soon as one becomes a free agent. I did really well the last semester of my senior year carrying an A average, the best I had ever had. After thinking about it for a couple of weeks I decided that the best thing was to put in for active duty with my Naval Reserve unit. I had joined the Naval Reserve while in high school in order to avoid the draft for Korea and I knew that I had to give them at least two years of active duty sooner or later. I informed my father what had happened and what I intended to do. He did not seem overly upset as he was in both World Wars as a Line Officer and loved the Navy. I spoke to my commanding officer and he got a yeoman to send my records to Washington to the bureau of Naval Affairs where they cut me orders to report to the amphibious base in Coronado. When I got there I was assigned to a Seabee unit and given the basics and sent to my barracks. I couldn’t believe it. Most of my fellow Seabees were of absolute minimum age, from the southern part of US and had grade school educations. Essentially they were a labor force and very necessary to the Navy, but not my cup of tea. The thought of spending two years with these guys was beyond my comprehension, and seemed worse than doing jail time. I immediately began scheming. I had always been attracted to the perceived adventure of the Underwater Demolition Teams and shortly discovered that the amphibious base was also the home of Underwater Demolition Unit One, the training unit for the west coast UDT teams. I decided to pay their office a visit. In the service there is something called the chain of command and if ignored there is a decent chance that you will be court marshaled. I had discovered that within the next two weeks a new training class was scheduled to start and I knew that if I put in a formal request I would never make it. I went over to the UDU One office and spoke with the Chief Petty Officer. He in turn, made an appointment for me with the unit’s commanding officer. A couple of days later I was in the office of a full commander who wore the respected trident pin of the underwater warrior. He proceeded to grill me on why I wanted to part of UDT. When he found out that my father was also a Commander, albeit retired, and the fact I had grown up in a beach community where my favorite life guard was a former UDT guy, things went swimmingly. I told him that I had not put in a request for transfer, as Navy regulations require, and essentially he told me not to sweat it. He would take care of it. Several days later I was told to report to my commanding officer at the Seabee office. I did so not knowing fully what to expect. It turned out to be somewhat humorous. The man was furious. He reminded me of a rooky cop in danger of losing his freshly acquired authority. He seemed to take pleasure in chewing me out as thoroughly as he could. He ended up by telling me that I’d had better pray to God that I didn’t drop out of UDT training and return to the Seabees where my ass would become grass. His grass. That didn’t happen and I never saw that officer again. Thank God! So began my indoctrination into the world of UDT. Our class started with 75 aspirants and unlike pimple dripping clods that made up the Seabees, there were some very sharp guys in that class. As it turned out only 12 of them were still around sixteen weeks later when we graduated—the cream of the crop so to speak—and I was fortunate to be among them. That was definitely one of my successes. But even during that period of training I had mini-failures. One in particular was serious enough to have had me thrown out of training if I had been caught. At age 72 when I can’t even walk across the park without stopping to allow my angina to subside, it seems incredible to me to recall the physical things that I was able to undergo and survive during those sixteen weeks. |
continued-
During the latter stage of training we spent two
weeks on San Clemente Island off the coast of San Diego where we were
taught how to use explosives, do inland demolition raids, and work
as underwater cartographers. We also trained with live ammo by having a
goat hunt. The Island was infested feral goats. The 0nly real problem is
that we were armed with M16 carbines with military loads and the bullets
went right through the goats if hit in the body. I soon learned to make
head shots and nailed about 7 goats. I think we got about a dozen in all
and had a marvelous barbeque. One night we were tasked to make
an inland recon raid. The operation started at midnight and we paddled
our rubber rafts into range of the beach and slipped over the side into
the 62 degree water. We then swam in pairs to the beach where we were
under observation from our instructors even though told not to
acknowledge their presence. I was beginning to have some serious
problems. I was exhausted from all of the strenuous operations we had
undertaken and felt my blood was turning to ice. I knew I was
approaching my personal breaking point and was trying desperately to
conceive of a way to survive. By this time I had wriggled about 30 yards
into sand dunes above the highwater mark. Sparse salt grass was
interspersed with patches of sand and I had not seen an instructor
observer but I knew they were out there. I decided arched my back and
fake my way out of continuing the operation and squirmed around on my
belly and faked vomiting again. Sure enough I felt a foot placed on my
back and one of my instructors asked. "What the hell is the mater with
you Vose?" Naturally I said, "Absolutely nothing Chief, I’m fine" and
then went into my act again. This time he said, "Come with me, you’re
off the operation." I objected strenuously but thank God it didn’t do
anything. I was sent back to camp, got a hot shower and crawled into the
sack. I spent 2 seconds feeling sorry for my buddies still out there and
then I was out light a light. The next day I was rested and ready to get
back to the program. It was the only time I that I failed, but I did
fail. I just wasn’t caught doing it. In UDT you cannot quit or you’re
out. During this time I also cemented the likelihood of my graduation
although I really did not think of it at the time. We were required to
do various distance swims within specified times which culminated in an
off-shore swim along the beach for two miles. The instructors picked the
spot with a certain malicious precision because as the tide
changed it created a definite set to the south and we were swimming
north. I started with my first swim buddy and for the first hour I was
doing ok. However three things happened, more or less, simultaneously; I
began to tire, the tide began to change and the current started working
against me. Slowly I began to head for the
Mexican border, backwards. By this time I’d had had several swim buddies
as the instructors kept changing on me until they finally ran out of
guys. They couldn’t find anyone that was as slow as me. By this time, I
had been in the water for over two hours. and the rest of the class had
finished and were lying in the bottom of the guard boats cursing
Hamilton’s persistence. I had lost the feeling in my hands and legs and
my arms felt like they were made of lead, but I kept at it. Various
instructors asked me if I had had enough and invited me to quit. But for
some strange reason I wouldn’t do it. At long last they ordered me out
of the water and the whole class returned to the beach. We were all
dying for a hot shower at this point, but that was a joke. Instead we
headed off down the beach on a "five mile run." This is five miles down
and another 5 miles back. When I finally reached the showers
I was in the process of lathering when I got the shock of my life. My
balls had disappeared. That’s right, the delivery sack was empty. I
didn’t know it at the time, but that is a natural defense mechanism of
the male body when subject to extreme cold. Ship those jewels to the
inner sanctum for survival's sake. They dropped back where they belonged
about a day later. I didn’t realize it at the time, but my persistence
won me a lot respect with the instructors that day and probably had a
lot to do with my making it through training. Although I was built on
the order of a natural athlete and at six foot, 205 lbs, was gifted with
a powerful body. I was to learn something extremely valuable while going
through UDT training. It was not physical power that guaranteed success,
quite the contrary, it was all mental. Mental attitude is what the
instructors were trying to expose in the trainees. Could they take it
and still function? Those that could made it though the class. Those
that could not did not. Strangely only two guys were
dropped from the course for lack of performance. One of them could not
swim. He was told to go learn and come back. Everyone respected his guts
in joining the class. Those that dropped out quit on the own accord, Editor: I have read many
UDT stories. All the way through this one I felt like I was going though
my training class again. I have much admiration for
Hamilton's honesty in bringing back his and our past. Where I am, I don’t know, I’ll never
know, in the silence you don’t know, you must go on, I can’t go on,
I’ll go on. —Samuel Beckett [ top ] |
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