Honor Flight

By Jemi Chew

FALMOUTH — Roy T. Mains, the most decorated Vietnam veteran in Pendleton County, boarded an Honor Flight to Washington, D.C., on May 18.

“I got to see the Vietnam Wall and walked down there,” Mains said last week.

“Everything was interesting, very heartfelt.”

Honor Flight is a nonprofit organization that flies veterans for free to memorials of the war in which they fought. 

Mains, 75, registered for the draft when he was 18, was examined by his 19th birthday, and was in basic training during his 20th birthday.

At age 21 he was a decorated, combat seasoned veteran.

BASIC TRAINING

Mains took basic training in Fort Dix, N.J., and described it as “a lot of people shouting and screaming at you” to instill discipline in the soldiers and teach them to follow orders.

“They basically break you down and then build you up mentally,” Mains said.

“It’s hard to explain when you have people that have very, very low IQs and people that are the very, very most intelligent with high IQs, and you’re all put together in one group and everybody is expected to perform and do the same.”

Mains said that everything was controlled and there was hardly any freedom except towards the end of the training cycle.

“If we went to a movie, the whole company went to the movie. We marched or ran every place,” Mains said.

They also went to church services on Sunday together, regardless of the soldier’s respective denominations.

FLIGHT TO VIETNAM

Mains had a long journey to Vietnam.

I was fairly calm. I’ve been a calm person my entire life. It was just something you anticipate,” Mains said about his emotional state during the long journey to Vietnam. “You know what you’re going into and just prepared yourself mentally.”

He flew from Cincinnati to Fort Lewis, Washington where they had an orientation and received orders. Then he flew to Hawaii, Guam and finally Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam.

VIETNAM

“One of the first impressions I had getting off the plane at Cam Ranh Bay — which I had never spent any time at all whatsoever around an ocean — when they first opened the plane door and you stepped off was the humidity and the smell of the ocean air. It’s just like a slap in the face just to how quickly it hits you,” Mains said. “The salt air, the seaweed and the smell of Vietnam humidity.”

Mains remembers that it rained constantly but could not recall ever seeing a thunderstorm because it would be impossible to distinguish a storm from the many explosions and flares.

In Vietnam, Mains saw rice paddies, hills, valleys, mountains, beaches and jungles.

“Actually, now Vietnam is a very beautiful country,” Mains said. “So just depends on your perspective as to how you’re looking at it and when you’re looking at it.”

Mains was with the American Division Delta Company first of the 52nd, 198th Light Infantry Brigade and served with a diverse group of all races and backgrounds from across the nation. He even fought alongside a typical surfer boy from California.

“There was only one color in Vietnam in my opinion and that was army OD green,” Mains said.

There was also a strong camaraderie.

“It was almost like a family, almost like he was your brother because you were dependent on him and he was dependent on you for your safety for your livelihood, you know everything that was going on in the combat situation” Mains said. “So when you did lose somebody, it touched you very deeply.”

Mains and his squad would patrol certain areas looking for enemies, and if there was a situation where they were called into combat, helicopters would fly them into the fire zones and they would jump out and start fighting.

He recalls many experiences, including sleeping on the ground under makeshift tents made of ponchos and bamboo sticks, water purification and salt pills, booby traps (which was the colloquial term for IEDs) made of tin cans and nails, tunnels where enemies would appear from and start shooting, and a raid that uncovered weapons resulting in his Bronze Star Medal and a personal letter from the senator.

He also had to be careful as he walked because there would be sharpened bamboo sticks placed in the ground or hidden in pits that one could accidentally trip and fall on.

But one of his most prominent memories was the incident that earned him one of his Purple Hearts.

INJURY

Mains remembers landing on his back after the explosion. He was shell shocked but not unconscious, and his purple smoke grenade had gone off.

“The only thing I can think of is I’ve got a hand grenade hanging on the right side of my vest,” Mains said. “You set that smoke grenade off, I’ve got five seconds to get these hand grenades off of my vest and throw them or they’re going to go off.”

Mains recalled that it seemed to happen in slow motion, and he was cussing, screaming and giving orders at the same time.

Behind him, his squad sergeant was also screaming because of a broken leg but Mains could not help him as he had a broken leg himself and shrapnel in his body.

After he was transported to the hospital, he was inspected by the head nurse. Mains said that all his clothes were cut off and he was only covered by a small square cloth. When the nurse lifted the cloth, he recalled with a laugh that in his daze, he wondered to himself what she was doing as it did not register that she was looking for injuries.

HOME

It is hard for Mains to explain what it was like coming home from the war.

“I knew I was out of the war; I was alive. I just took every day one day at a time to a certain a situation.” Mains said. “You know my entire life has been access your situation, recon, make adjustments, assessments and then move forward.”

The Pendleton County veteran community was supportive and welcoming. Mains said that he was accepted as an “equal,” not just a peer, and that it was like a brotherhood of people who all understood what he had been through and vice versa. They also helped him to get his veteran benefits.

“I didn’t go through any of the large cities like other veterans did, where they got off the planes and had to take their uniform off because people spit on them,” Mains said. “When I came back to town I was welcomed by the community.”

MEMORIES

Life went on — Mains married after what he describes as a “whirlwind romance” to Patty, and they raised eight children together. He worked on the farm and served the community in various roles. But the memories of Vietnam, while distant, remain in his life.

After the flood in 1997, Dennis Walker, a good friend he served with, managed to get in touch with him again.

He also has all the letters he wrote to his mom while in Vietnam and fading pictures he took on a small Kodak 124 that he sent home to be developed.

“The history needs to be told,” Mains said.