| Summary: | (6:23) Mr. Brown tells about his platoon getting hit by an artillery round. He also talks about the commanders he served under in Vietnam.Florence-Lauderdale Public Library Digital Archive
Interview with Charles Brown
June 27, 2011
Florence, Alabama
Conducted by Clint Alley and Rhonda Haygood
Clip 3
Charles Brown: We'd just been in country less than three weeks in Vietnam just on a routine patrol that we exp—we, my company experienced our first casualties. And one was my company commander. I, I was standing face to face with him. He was moving my platoon from the rear of the element to the front and he wanted me to take the lead for that afternoon. And while we were talking an artillery round landed close to us and killed him instantly, two others were killed and I think there were seven of us wounded. Now there's a sidelight to that captain being killed. Course I didn't really know him that well, you know, it, I'd just been with him maybe a month and I was spending so much time with my platoon that I just did not know Captain Woods that well. But, ah, we got a, a new commander, was a Captain Ord, O-R-D, West Point graduate, football player at West Point, just a, a giant of a man. And I, I laugh—he's, he's a dear friend of mine today—but I laugh with him because when he came into our company, he was the battalion personnel officer. And being a staff officer, he was always in the rear and those of us that had been in the field for two or three weeks, you know, we were seasoned veterans and now they're sending the personnel officer out to be our commander. “What does he know about combat?” I mean this was the first time we'd been hit, too, but we were the veterans. And, ah, gosh. The man was unreal. The best friend you could imagine. But the best leader, it's just indescribable. Course he went on, advanced a little bit further than I did in the Army. He retired in ninety—, '96 as a three-star general.
CA: Oh, wow.
CB: But I communicate with him frequently. I was with him in March. We went, goodness, close to thirty years without knowing where the other was. I mean, that's so common in the military, after one assignment and you go to your next one, you know, you may or may not see your friends again. And let's see, he stayed with our company for six months and the reason for that was the company commanders they tried to rotate, they were captains and they tried to rotate them through, ah, in six month increments to give more officers command experience in combat and so about six months is all that a company commander would remain with a company, of good, bad or indifferent. That's just six months they rotated it. And, course, I have a hard time calling him Bob today. I, I want to call him Captain Ord, I, that's the way I learned him and when I see him today, I call him Captain most of the time. People look at me and think, "Well, don't you know he's a general?‟ And, "Yeah, I know he's a general, but he's Captain Ord.‟ When I e-mail him I often use his radio call sign from Vietnam and I'll use mine when I sign off. And it's just such a friendship with him. It's just, ah, I could tell you stories about him all day long. But out of my career, the twenty-eight years, he was a great commander. I mean, I respected him; I look up to him. Still do today. He never gave us wrong advice. I mean when, when he advised us and by us I mean the platoon leaders in Vietnam when, when he gave us advice, you could take it to the bank. It was good. Listen to it. At times, I guess, in that six months we had our differences, but being a junior officer that's all it was, was just a difference. I saluted, say “Yes, sir” and go on about my business. I later learned more to what he was doing than I knew at the time. Just suffice it to say he was a good one. If everyone in the military could serve under one commander like him their time in the military would be worth it.
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