I REMEMBER WHEN…
BY PAUL SULLIVAN, RET. CAPT. USMC
SERGEANT BILL, SERGEANT BILL DON’T DRINK THAT WATER!
Staff Sergeant Bill H. was a big, strapping Marine (Are there any other kind?) who came from South Boston. He was one of those Marines who knew his way around, in such a way that one could always depend on him. He was kind of like the Corporal O’ Reilly of the TV situation comedy “MASH”, nowhere as innocent, but definitely as knowledgeable. He kept his eye on me when we lost our Platoon Sergeant, Gunnery Sergeant Norman M., a product of Beaufort, South Carolina who was an outstanding NCO. Just prior to our landing in Taipei, Norman became quite ill and was unable to continue with our platoon. It was going to be a tremendous loss for our platoon. Fortunately, I was able to get Sergeant Bill assigned for the duration of the exercise in Taiwan.
Sergeant Bill helped put everything in order as we went about carrying out our mission as “guerrillas” for the exercise called “Operation Blue Star”. We would become “Guerrillas” for the duration of our stay in Taiwan. During one of our exercises, my platoon and I arrived at the foot of a hill that needed to be reconnoitered to determine the status of our “enemy”, who we knew were not too far ahead of us. I sent out a fire team to determine their status: location, numbers, weapons, displacement of their weapons, etc.
In the meantime, while I was determining the best placement of my men, I spotted Sergeant Bill preparing to dip his canteen into a small stream that meandered along its way from above. I spotted this just as he placed his canteen to his mouth. I immediately called out to him, telling him not to drink that water. He gave me a cursory glance, indicating he would be fine. I signaled him that he was NOT to drink from his canteen. Too late! He chose to drink it. He raised his hands to show me he was fine, that the water was “cool and refreshing”. I caught up to him a minute later to tell him that we had no idea what was above us coming down in that cool “refreshing” water. I told everyone else to lay off the “damn” water.
It may have been fifteen minutes later when I was gathering information from the fire team I sent out, when all hell broke loose. Poor Sergeant Bill. He began to moan and groan. He was in agony. His whole body began to convulse. He sweated profusely and just sort of lay in a prone position, writhing in pain. On top of all of this, he shit in his utilities. It took about one and one half minutes of this continuous writhing for me to realize we needed to call in for a helicopter to evacuate him. We moved out to a clearing and waited for the helicopter.
When Sergeant Bill lifted off, we gathered together, took the fire team reconnaissance information, and began to maneuver to the top of the hill. Guess what we found at the top of that hill? That’s right, a small village, rather quaint in size; however, right down the middle of the so-called road that ran down the center of this quaint little village was the stream from which Sergeant Bill chose to fill his canteen with its “cool and refreshing water.”
Unbeknownst to our now very enlightened Sergeant Bill and the rest of my men, stood one of the most grotesque water buffaloes I’ve ever seen. There he stood in all his glory, relieving himself of some two gallons of urine. Ten minutes later there stood two children, transacting their business in the same stream. We all learned a very important lesson that morning, especially after moving on up a little farther where the stream, now a small river, was beginning its downward slope. Villagers were congregating there for the purpose of gathering clean water for their daily cooking and cleaning just above the site of their tiny village. It was a lesson well learned. I’m sure none of these people drank from that “cool and refreshing” stream beneath their homes where Sergeant Bill had quenched his thirst with something other than the “nectar of the gods” called water.
PAUL SULLIVAN, RET. CAPTAIN, USMC
RET. CAPTAIN, USMC, PAUL SULLIVAN ENTERED THE MASSACHUSETTS AIR NATIONAL GUARD AT 17 UNTIL 1956. UPON GRADUATING COLLEGE IN 1958 WITH A BS IN EDUCATION, PAUL WAS SWORN INTO THE UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS AND RETIRED AS A CAPTAIN. PAUL IS MARRIED WITH 3 CHILDREN, HE SPENT OVER 40 YEARS IN EDUCATION AND CURRENTLY SERVES AS CHAPLAIN OF HIS LOCAL MARINE CORPS LEAGUE DETACHMENT IN MASSACHUSETTS.