The sermon in church this morning was about “receiving gifts” and it started me thinking about gift I received, many years ago. It’s not the ordinary gift…it wasn’t money, or a thing. It was a selfless act of thoughtfulness. When I was in Korea, I was offered the opportunity to convert from the E-4 rank of specialist, to that of corporal, if I would agree to become NCOIC of the fuel dump. I had six Korean civilians working for me, but I had no soldiers. Normally that wasn’t a problem….but one cold winter night it became a huge problem. I was sound asleep in my bunk in the hooch (barracks) when the CQ came to awaken me. I opened my eyes, groggily, hearing the sleet pounding against the corrugated sheet metal that formed the Quonset-hut barracks. “Corporal Vaughan, Colonel Roxbury just called the orderly room. He is out of fuel, and his heat has gone off. The OD wants you to take care of it.” I could not have heard worse news. It wasn’t just that I would have to go out in a sleet storm in below-zero weather, I was going to have to refuel his tank. And because of the way the fuel tank was mounted….it was impossible for me to do that without help. I couldn’t get my Korean civilians….they all lived in the village….in fact….I didn’t even know where they lived. I looked at the nine other bunks in the barracks, at the men, nestled down in their blankets. Dare I start waking them up, one at a time, asking . . . no . . . begging one of them to come help me? There was a new man in the company who had arrived less than a month earlier. His name was Bates, and he was a PFC. The only reason I knew him was because he was in the same barracks. We were “friendly” but not “friends” in that we didn’t hang around together. We were in different sections and rarely saw each other during the day. For some reason, Bates happened to overhear the CQ telling me what needed done. “That’s not something you can do by yourself, is it?” Bates asked. “No.” Bates sat up in his bunk, and began pulling on his socks. “I’ll help.” I watched Bates as he began pulling on his OGs, (winter fatigue uniform). I hadn’t even gotten up the courage to ask anyone for help, but he had volunteered. I was so shocked by his offer that I just stood there; making no effort to get dressed. He looked up at me and smiled. “You’re goin’ to get awfully cold if you go out like that.” It was 0300 and the motor pool, where we would have to go to get the POL deuce and a half, was a walk, through the cold and the sleet, for some three quarters of a mile. When we got there the truck wouldn’t start, so I had to get another one, and back it up to the POL truck, then roll a barrel of fuel oil (435 pounds) from one truck to the other. I also had move the hand pump, to our replacement vehicle so we would be able to pump the fuel from the 55 gallon drum, into the colonel’s 20 gallon drum. It was attached to bed of the truck…which meant we had to find a tool box so we could take it down. That took another fifteen minutes. By the time we reached the colonel’s hooch, it was nearly 0400, and Bates and I were practically frost-bitten. Bates climbed up onto the stand to stick the nozzle down into the tank, and I operated the pump. Colonel Roxbury stepped out of his hooch, bundled up in his parka. “You are a couple of good men to come out on a night like this,” he said. “I want you to know how much I appreciate it.” “Thank you, Colonel,” I replied. Colonel Roxbury’s appreciation, sincere as it was, couldn’t possibly equal the appreciation I felt for PFC Bates, who not only volunteered to help me, but did so cheerfully, and without the slightest complaint. All right, Bates didn’t risk his life to save mine…he didn’t run through enemy fire…he didn’t do anything that often, and rightfully, earns brave men medals. But there is no doubt in my mind that, given such a challenge, a man like Bates would rise to the occasion. I never heard from Bates again after I finished my tour in Korea. I know he was a draftee, and was looking forward to returning home to North Carolina. But I have thought of him often over the past 55 years, and I pray that he has had a life worthy of such a person.
Posted on: Sun, 27 Oct 2013 17:06:46 +0000
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