"THE HANDCART BOYS"
He's lying in the tree line, blood running down his arm.
Listening for the sound of the Handcart boys, to remove him from this harm.
He flew in on a modern jet that got shot down in this affray.
But he is no different than the wounded at Shiloh, trying to survive, till they safely take him away.
In the dark of the night she waits with so much pain to bear.
Injured in the crash of her aircraft and now this seemly endless nightmare.
Where is the chopper that will lift her from the smoke, the fire and the pain?
Where are the Handcart boys, hurry, her life is beginning to drain? He was wounded when a round slammed onto the "cruiser's" deck.
Shards of metal are protruding from the right side his neck.
The corpsman has stopped the bleeding; he's been prepared, to be extracted in the night.
The Handcart boys are racing his way, and will be there by first light.
Get in, get them out, and hurry back, to the safety of our lines.
It has been this way since ancient wars, to the battles of modern times.
The two-wheel Handcart is the way the wounded were removed from battles in past wars.
Our modern Handcart has a rotor-blade and sliding doors.
Look at history, look at art work, or at movies if you will.
When it came to removing the wounded off of some war torn desolate hill.
It was a Handcart carrying the broken and the dying with their screams of pain.
It was a Handcart transporting at Normandy in the cold June rain.
Every branch of the service has its modern version of the Handcart boys who respond to the call.
They go out for the wounded and dead, bring them back, get them all.
Some times the Handcart boys are brought back in a Handcart not of their own.
Some times they become the wounded & the dying, and for their efforts, they never come home.
There are also women who work these, latter-day Handcarts and their lives too, are on the line.
It is a dangerous mission, but just as their predecessors they to make that recovery in time.
They move out over the desert, into the night as the sand blows and swirls.
These Handcart operators are our Handcart girls.
I have a two-wheeled wooden handcart with an old worn flag sitting out on my front lawn.
It is not a protest, it's a reminder of our injured, who returned by Handcart, lying there upon.
In order to defend this Nation, we will continue to send the brave & young, our freedom they earn.
And we will always have a need for the Handcarts, for our wounded and dead, they must return.
Major Van E. Harl, USAF Ret. 15 March 2003
Vanharl@aol.com
Special Operations Wing – SOW
Pigs are important in special-ops.
One is always on guard duty at Rescue Rock.
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Majpr Van Harl, (USAF)Ret
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The Purple Heart Stamp
“Some shrapnel in my knee,” was Earl McClung’s reply when I asked him if he was wounded in combat. Former SSgt McClung of Easy Company, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the now famous Band of Brothers book and HBO mini series was wounded in Holland when a German 88 artillery round exploded in close proximity of the young paratrooper. For his injury in combat he was awarded the Purple Heart medal. In his case it was almost an after thought on the part of the US Army. SSgt McClung wiped off the blood, took care of the wound himself and got back to the war at hand.
He had jumped into Normandy on the 6th of June 1944, D-Day and fought through to the end of the war, to include the Battle of the Bulge, suffering only that one wound. He was extremely lucky. Many Purple Heart recipients, including his friends and fellow soldiers of the 101st Airborne received their medals posthumously.
The Colonel, my wife, sent me to the post office to get some stamps, it was 5 April 2010. ( The day before the US entered World War I, 5 Apr 1917, is the official retroactive wear date for modern recipients of the Purple Heart medal.) I just asked for a couple of books of stamps and I was handed copies of the now fifth issue, of the Purple Heart stamp first released in May of 2003. The first thing I thought of as I looked at the stamps in my hand was SSgt McClung and Airman First Class Elizabeth Jacobson, USAF.
I met SSgt McClung but I never met A1C Jacobson. Elizabeth was killed on 28 September, 2005 in Iraq. She was the first Air Force female and the first Air Force Security Forces “cop” killed in Operation Iraqi Freedom. Like SSgt McClung she too was awarded the Purple Heart medal. Her family has her Purple Heart along with her other awards and decorations received in her short time in the military and in her defense of our country.
General George Washington was the originator of the first Purple Heart. It was called the Badge of Military Merit and was made of purple cloth in the shape of a heart. Only three were issued in the Revolutionary War and then the award was mostly forgotten about. The concept was reconsidered between WWI and WWII and made retroactive for all wounded in WWI. After the Vietnam War you did not see many new recipients of the medal until 1984 when the wounded from terrorist attacks were authorized the award of the Purple Heart.
I remember meeting a young Air Force Staff Sergeant in 2000 that had a Purple Heart ribbon on his uniform, something you did not see everyday in theAir Force. He had been in Khobar, Saudi Arabia in 1996 when terrorists exploded a truck in the housing complex and 17 Americans were killed in what became know as the Khobar Towers bombing. Hundreds were wounded to include the Staff Sergeant. Crew members of the USS Cole who were wounded or killed when that ship was attacked, in what was supposed to be a friendly nation’s harbor, received the Purple Heart.
Sometimes I do not understand the military and their ways. Captain Tamara Long-Archuleta USAF was killed in Afghanistan when the rescue helicopter she was co-piloting, crashed in the desert while making a mercy flight to assist two injured Afghan children. The entire crew was lost in a nation we were fighting a war in, but she was denied a Purple Heart. Again I do not understand. Her family and the Girl Scouts keep her memory alive at Rescue Rock in the Jemez Mountains outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico.
The US took the prediction of a million c
ausalities in the invasion of Japan during WWII seriously; they had 500,000 Purple Hearts manufactured. There are still almost 120,000 of those medals left. If you are a 2010 recipient of a Purple Heart that medal you were awarded was made in 1944.
The National Purple Heart Hall of Honor (www.thepurpleheart.com) is the registry for Purple Heart recipients and theywant to locate and record the history of the men and women who were wounded or killed in the defense of our Nation and were so honored with a Purple Heart.
But the Purple Heart stamp is what got me started on this column. Now in its fifth release because Americans truly like this stamp and use it to remember our wounded and dead service members. Mail this stamp with your next letter, it is an honorable act.
Major Van Harl USAF Ret.
