WASHINGTON — Willy Lawrence can show his bullet wound from Vietnam, but he can’t show enough documentation to get a Purple Heart.
The 67-year-old Marine already has one permanent reminder from his tour in Southeast Asia: numbness in his arms and legs from Agent Orange. But for taking a slug near the DMZ in 1968, Lawrence would like to finally receive a Purple Heart, which recognizes troops injured or killed in combat.
In this bureaucratic battle, he does not stand alone. Impressed by Lawrence’s story and sincerity, U.S. Rep. Darin LaHood’s office has been advocating his case to military authorities.
But odd circumstances surrounding the Marine’s war injury, combined with rigid Purple Heart criteria, have so far kept the medal just out of reach.
“For me, it wouldn’t get me any money or anything like that,” he says. “I’d like it for my kids and my grandkids. It’d be for them.”
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At age 13, Wisconsin native Lawrence moved with his family to central Illinois. Five years later, he seemed certain to be drafted into the Army and see service in Vietnam. Instead, in the hope of learning radio repair, he joined the Marines.
After basic training in California and other stateside assignments, the radio repairman arrived in South Vietnam on Jan. 30, 1968, as part of a wide presence by the 3rd Battalion in the north sector of the country. At first, he often handled not radios but his M16, as part of two-Marine security details on Navy supply boats serving bases along Vietnamese rivers. He’d witness the staggering power of the defoliant Agent Orange, dropped from U.S. aircraft to clear jungle cover used by the North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong.
“You’d go down the river one day, and there’d be all these trees,” Lawrence says. “Two days later, on the way back, you’d see them all gone, like a fire had wiped them out.
“That stuff was powerful. They dropped it everywhere.”
Later, his unit began moving farther north.
“I walked through rice paddies, and I spent nights in foxholes,” he says.
In August 1968, he arrived at Dong Ha, the northernmost village in South Vietnam — just 6 miles south of the DMZ — and site of the vital Dong Ha Combat Base. During the Tet Offensive early that year, the area — which also included an Air Force airstrip and Army helicopter unit — saw severe fighting, though the base prevailed. Despite flare-ups in May, the base was secure by the time Lawrence arrived. With multiple radio repairmen assigned to the base, Lawrence also took shifts of guard duty.
Aside from occasional artillery exchanges, the only sound of munitions came from the infrequent pop of firearms from the other side of the fence that surrounded the base. The fence passed just 20 yards behind Lawrence’s primitive barracks, housed in a bombed-out building with a makeshift tin roof. The fence marked the outer reaches of the village, but no U.S. troops interacted there, as NVA and Viet Cong were known to be about — and the likely source of the random gunplay, perhaps intended to frazzle the American interlopers.
On the morning of Aug. 6, after an uneventful night on guard duty, Lawrence was relieved by another Marine and headed to his barracks. With nobody inside except one other Marine, Lawrence stretched out on his cot and fell asleep.
He was wakened by a stinging sensation to his left ankle, he says. He looked down. A bullet had pierced the tin roof and lodged in his foot.
“I reached down and pulled a slug out,” he says. “Blood started pouring out. So, I stuck it back in. It was like a nail in a car tire: if you pull it out, the tire will go flat.”
As he fiddled with his foot, the other Marine — who apparently had been asleep and oblivious to what had happened — asked what Lawrence was doing. When Lawrence mentioned the bullet, the other Marine suggested Lawrence go to sick bay.
That morning, with all quiet on base, no one was in sick bay except for a corpsman, who examined and treated the wound. There was no doctor on duty, and the extent of Lawrence’s injury showed no need for one.
Lawrence’s “sick call” record includes a brief report from “6 Aug 1968.” The scribbling — by the corpsman, whose surname might be something like Buckhorn — is only partly legible. But it clearly notes a “puncture” to Lawrence’s “foot below ankle,” between “1/6 to 1/4 inch deep.”
The next notation — “8 Aug 1968” — is an even briefer report, under a signature that might be Gillespie. He might’ve been a doctor and therefore a commissioned officer, but Lawrence isn’t sure and the record gives no clue. But the scribbled, dozen-odd words include a few that are legible: “wound clean” and “entry wound — .45 cal round.”
Lawrence says the wound healed quickly, with no further medical attention. Soon, he was back on duty. Not long after, he says, he asked a commanding officer if his injury could merit a Purple Heart, which has been awarded to injured or killed U.S. service personnel since 1917. According to Lawrence, the unenthusiastic officer replied — incorrectly — that the lack of direct combat made the medal unlikely for him. Lawrence let it drop, as he had more important matters at hand, like doing his duty and trying to come back home alive.
Missions accomplished. On Feb. 19, 1969, he was shipped out of Vietnam. Stateside, that May 1, he was honorably discharged as a corporal.
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Back home, Lawrence didn’t parlay the Marine radio training into a job. Instead, he eventually drove a forklift at Caterpillar Inc. for 32 years before retiring. Meantime, he met and married Denise. They still live in the same Washington house where they raised two boys, who in turn gave them four grandchildren.
The couple is in the process of moving to Canton, near camping sites they frequently enjoy. As they settle in to perhaps their final season of life, Lawrence has developed a renewed interest in his Marine tour — a change of heart from 1969.
After returning home, soured by the war and the country’s unwelcome attitude, he threw away most of his Vietnam photos and handful of war mementoes.
“I didn’t want to remember it,” he says.
But by 1988, as his boys neared manhood and asked him questions about his service, Lawrence started thinking about the Purple Heart again. Consulting an Amvets representative, he made a simple written plea to the Marines, explaining the shooting and including his short medical record.
Lawrence was denied. Of multiple criteria allowing the medal, an injury must have been caused by the enemy. Though the denial did not question Lawrence’s veracity, it did note the medical file’s lack of a key detail. “Although the exact cause of the gunshot wound cannot be determined, without some verification it cannot be attributed to enemy action.”
As a possible remedy, the Marines suggested Lawrence obtain sworn statements by two witnesses to attest that the bullet was fired by the enemy. Lawrence doesn’t know the names of the other Marine in the barracks or the two personnel who signed his medical file, nor could the Journal Star find anyone with names akin to the haphazard signatures. But if Lawrence somehow could track them down — if they’re not dead — would they recall a relatively uneventful day involving a minor foot wound to someone they haven’t seen in almost 40 years? Almost impossible.
And even if they could recall the injury to Lawrence, how could they possibly swear as to who pulled the trigger? Totally impossible.
So, Lawrence again let the matter rest. But early last year, thinking about his grandchildren, he decided to try again. For an appeal, he’d have to file paperwork with the Navy, which oversees the Marines, and its Board for Correction of Naval Records — pretty much the last option.
First, though, Lawrence went to the office of U.S. Rep. LaHood, which frequently assists veterans seeking medals overlooked by the military. Lawrence won over veterans caseworker Michael Gilmore, who does not take military service or medals claims lightly. With the Illinois Army National Guard 1/178 infantry battalion out of Bartonville, Gilmore served in Iraq (2006-07) and Afghanistan (2008-09). Over several months, in addition to helping with documentation and other paperwork, Gilmore peppered the Navy with questions as to how to best appeal for the medal.
Earlier this year, Lawrence again was declined. In addition to citing the lack of proof of enemy fire, the board noted a new obstacle. A Purple Heart wound must have been treated by an officer — that is, a commissioned medical doctor — and not simply a corpsman or medic.
Generally, combat wounds (especially bullet wounds) require the attention of a doctor. However, according to Purple Heart rules, an injury — like Lawrence’s — does not have to be severe: “A ‘wound’ is defined as an injury to any part of the body from an outside force or agent. … A physical lesion is not required.”
Still, in that no doctor was involved, the board concluded, “It is regretted that the circumstances of your case are such that favorable action cannot be taken.”
The board also stressed that further appeals would be ignored, absent new evidence. Lawrence has nothing more, nor any other injuries — well, except for peripheral neuropathy. It’s a condition of the nervous system with symptoms that start with numbness and tingling to the hands and feet, but often leading to throbbing or shooting pain, along with muscle weakness, loss of coordination and extreme sensitivity to touch.
The military recognizes Agent Orange as the presumptive cause of that chronic ailment, which is why Lawrence gets a disability check. Purple Heart rules state the medal can be awarded “as the result of friendly weapons fire while actively engaging the enemy” — but that doesn’t include a defoliant dumped by U.S. aircraft near or on American troops.
Despite all those hurdles, Lawrence has an ally in LaHood’s office. The congressman said, “I will continue to be the strongest advocate on his behalf and work with the Navy to ensure that this American hero’s service is honored.”
That attitude is enough to make Lawrence hopeful his kids and grandkids will someday see him get that medal.
“It’d be something for them to hang on to,” Lawrence says.
PHIL LUCIANO is a Journal Star columnist. He can be reached at pluciano@pjstar.com,facebook.com/philluciano or (309) 686-3155. Follow him on Twitter @LucianoPhil.
