thedrifter
05-28-07, 06:28 PM
05/27/2007
Lawrence Marine killed after leaving hospital bed
By CHARLES WEBSTER
Staff Writer
LAWRENCE - Doug Dickerson didn't have to be out with his platoon the day he was killed in the jungles of Vietnam.
Dickerson got wounded in an August 1, 1967 battle outside Hoi An in the opening days of Operation Pike.
He was in a hospital bed in DaNang when he insisted that he be returned to his platoon stationed out on what was known as "The Island."
He could have stayed back to recuperate from the wounds he had received just two weeks before in Operation Pike with his first platoon from Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 1st Marine Regimant, 1st Marine Division.
But Lance Corporal Doug Dickerson wanted out of his hospital bed in DaNang to get back to his Marine Corps buddies back at "The Island."
"The Island" was a coastal outpost about 20 miles south of DaNang - it was rough and tumble territory where former Vietcong prisoners of war would seek refuge after escape from the grips of their American or South Vietnamese captors.
On August 15, 1967, Charlie Company was sent out to patrol to capture Viet Cong soldiers working in their area.
The plan was to get about 20 men to sweep the enemy into a waiting ambush site.
So two platoons went off in search of the VC, while the other men went off to set up the ambush site.
Things turned bad quickly.
The Viet Cong saw the two platoons first and started to engage them.
As the Marines pushed through the jungle one of the men stepped on a booby trap killing two men and wounding another two Marines.
A medivac was called in to air lift the dead and wounded, but when it arrived it drew fire from the Viet Cong in the area.
The pilot swooped in to get the wounded, but left the two dead Marines behind to be carried out.
Dickerson and the men in platoon arrived on the scene to help out. He picked up one end of a litter with the help of three other Marines to carry one of the dead men back to base camp. Another group of four Marines grabbed the ends of the other litter.
This presented a very dangerous situation.
The Marines could not be spread out to avoid being killed in a cluster, and holding on to the litter required the Marines to step off the trail and into harm's way -- the Viet Cong loved to place their landmines just off the beat path to take advantage of just this very situation.
A few minutes into their trek back to base camp chaos opened up as someone stepped on another landmine.
"One of the guys guying a stretcher stepped on a landmine," recalled Hugh Helm, who was walking just a few yards ahead the men carrying that stretcher, including Doug Dickerson.
Dickerson, who was beside the man who stepped on the mine, was killed instantly. Nine men laid dead.
The Dickerson family remembers the day they got word that Doug Dickerson had gotten killed in Vietnam like it happened yesterday.
But that was August 17, 1967 two days after the son and brother was killed.
A military car pulled up to the house, and out got a Marine Corps Major accompanied by the Dickerson's church pastor Rev. CJ Carter from the First Baptist Church of Eggerts Crossing.
"Don't tell me what happened," Clara Dickerson, Doug's mom recalls screaming out. "Don't tell me what happened."
Minutes later, Doug's dad arrived home, and the major broke the news to the family.
Gail Dickerson, Doug's sister, recalls being over a nieghbor's house babysitting, when her brother Paul came running up to the door out-of-breath.
He was rambling on about the Marine Corps officer and telling his sister she had to come home.
When she got home it was hard to believe what she was hearing, and wanted it to be a dream -- a bad dream.
"For a week I had been having these dreams about a pink satin casket," Gail recalls. "It was hot pink and in front of the house."
For the next few days the Dickerson's waited, and planned a funeral.
"I remember seeing something in the newspaper, but I didn't want to read," she said. "I didn't want it to be true."
LCpl. Douglas R. Dickerson was laid to rest with full military honor in the Ewing Cemetery.
For Doug Dickerson, going off to Vietnam was a duty he believed he owed his country.
What the Lawrence native didn't count on was not coming home.
But Dickerson went off to the war in Southeast Asia knowing the score - he could be killed - but that didn't stop him from wanting to fulfill the duty he felt he owed his county.
"He wasn't afraid to die," his mother Clara Dickerson still recalls him writing.
Dickerson, like so many Marine Corps boots, got shipped off to Parris Island, SC, for boot camp. But there he found some unlikely friends - David Scharibone and Bill Nabinger, of both Hamilton Dickerson and Scharibone were both killed in Vietnam. Nabinger returned home, but with four Purple Hearts to show for his wounds.
Ellie
Lawrence Marine killed after leaving hospital bed
By CHARLES WEBSTER
Staff Writer
LAWRENCE - Doug Dickerson didn't have to be out with his platoon the day he was killed in the jungles of Vietnam.
Dickerson got wounded in an August 1, 1967 battle outside Hoi An in the opening days of Operation Pike.
He was in a hospital bed in DaNang when he insisted that he be returned to his platoon stationed out on what was known as "The Island."
He could have stayed back to recuperate from the wounds he had received just two weeks before in Operation Pike with his first platoon from Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 1st Marine Regimant, 1st Marine Division.
But Lance Corporal Doug Dickerson wanted out of his hospital bed in DaNang to get back to his Marine Corps buddies back at "The Island."
"The Island" was a coastal outpost about 20 miles south of DaNang - it was rough and tumble territory where former Vietcong prisoners of war would seek refuge after escape from the grips of their American or South Vietnamese captors.
On August 15, 1967, Charlie Company was sent out to patrol to capture Viet Cong soldiers working in their area.
The plan was to get about 20 men to sweep the enemy into a waiting ambush site.
So two platoons went off in search of the VC, while the other men went off to set up the ambush site.
Things turned bad quickly.
The Viet Cong saw the two platoons first and started to engage them.
As the Marines pushed through the jungle one of the men stepped on a booby trap killing two men and wounding another two Marines.
A medivac was called in to air lift the dead and wounded, but when it arrived it drew fire from the Viet Cong in the area.
The pilot swooped in to get the wounded, but left the two dead Marines behind to be carried out.
Dickerson and the men in platoon arrived on the scene to help out. He picked up one end of a litter with the help of three other Marines to carry one of the dead men back to base camp. Another group of four Marines grabbed the ends of the other litter.
This presented a very dangerous situation.
The Marines could not be spread out to avoid being killed in a cluster, and holding on to the litter required the Marines to step off the trail and into harm's way -- the Viet Cong loved to place their landmines just off the beat path to take advantage of just this very situation.
A few minutes into their trek back to base camp chaos opened up as someone stepped on another landmine.
"One of the guys guying a stretcher stepped on a landmine," recalled Hugh Helm, who was walking just a few yards ahead the men carrying that stretcher, including Doug Dickerson.
Dickerson, who was beside the man who stepped on the mine, was killed instantly. Nine men laid dead.
The Dickerson family remembers the day they got word that Doug Dickerson had gotten killed in Vietnam like it happened yesterday.
But that was August 17, 1967 two days after the son and brother was killed.
A military car pulled up to the house, and out got a Marine Corps Major accompanied by the Dickerson's church pastor Rev. CJ Carter from the First Baptist Church of Eggerts Crossing.
"Don't tell me what happened," Clara Dickerson, Doug's mom recalls screaming out. "Don't tell me what happened."
Minutes later, Doug's dad arrived home, and the major broke the news to the family.
Gail Dickerson, Doug's sister, recalls being over a nieghbor's house babysitting, when her brother Paul came running up to the door out-of-breath.
He was rambling on about the Marine Corps officer and telling his sister she had to come home.
When she got home it was hard to believe what she was hearing, and wanted it to be a dream -- a bad dream.
"For a week I had been having these dreams about a pink satin casket," Gail recalls. "It was hot pink and in front of the house."
For the next few days the Dickerson's waited, and planned a funeral.
"I remember seeing something in the newspaper, but I didn't want to read," she said. "I didn't want it to be true."
LCpl. Douglas R. Dickerson was laid to rest with full military honor in the Ewing Cemetery.
For Doug Dickerson, going off to Vietnam was a duty he believed he owed his country.
What the Lawrence native didn't count on was not coming home.
But Dickerson went off to the war in Southeast Asia knowing the score - he could be killed - but that didn't stop him from wanting to fulfill the duty he felt he owed his county.
"He wasn't afraid to die," his mother Clara Dickerson still recalls him writing.
Dickerson, like so many Marine Corps boots, got shipped off to Parris Island, SC, for boot camp. But there he found some unlikely friends - David Scharibone and Bill Nabinger, of both Hamilton Dickerson and Scharibone were both killed in Vietnam. Nabinger returned home, but with four Purple Hearts to show for his wounds.
Ellie