Dear Mom and Dad,
Well it sure is a hot day here today. We are building some shade out of sticks and palm leaves. We have been a blocking force for the last two days so that when you (the company) set up in a straight line and another company goes to the top of the mountain and walks toward you, forcing all VC between us to fight. We haven’t seen anything yet.
Last night we ate supper at 11:30 pm because it took until about 7:30 for the blocking force to get over and then we had about 5000 meters to walk in the dark. We then got up at 5 am and walked 5000 meters again to set up the next blocking force plus pulling an hour and a half guard last night. So we haven’t been getting much sleep.
Well there’s one thing I need and that’s some fruit. I sure have a hunger for it. Anything that comes in a can. A couple of days ago the asst gunner on my squad got that jiffy popcorn so one night we had popcorn. It’s the type that has the handle and everything and you just hold it over a fire and then eat it. It sure felt funny eating popcorn.
Well I am hoping that they let us spend sometime on a LZ to rest, we sure could use it. Awhile ago I was saying that every 16 days we got to go to LZ English, well they quit that so we only got to go once.
Letter home: 13 Aug 1967
How Goes the Battle? 