VIETNAM - The Magazine

[SuperScout]

The battle at the Y Bridge is a whole 'nuther story. That battle occured during the May 'mini' Tet, not the other one in Jan.-Feb. 1968. The 2-47th Inf (Mech) was mightily involved in the mini version, doing more house-to-house stuff in Saigon.

[Gimpy]

Originally posted by SuperScout Always wondered why they built Dong Tam right in the middle of Chuck's impact area for where he practiced mortar shots. I knew I was in trouble when I saw a messhall down there that had ben awarded two Purple Hearts! Once we were down there, the Scouts were assigned a portion of an abandoned 2-story barrack, but after a couple of nights of tip-toeing down to a bunker due to in-coming, we decided to just sleep in our tracks like we had been doing for the previous 9 months.
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I know what you mean Super, I always hated that damn place. Seemed almost every night we spent there we got incoming?

I found some old photos of Dong Tam being built. They had to dredge the My Tho River, and dredge up more than 2 and 1/2 million cubic yards of sand to build this damn place.

[Gimpy]

another photo of Dong Tam under construction.

[Gimpy]

sign at the main entrance to Dong Tam. Headquaters of the 3rd Brigade, Ninth Division in 1967.

[Gimpy]

a photo of the boat basin at Dong Tam.

[Gimpy]

photo from a watch tower at Dong Tam.

[Gimpy]

finally................here's a photo of a "road" (if you could call it that) of several M-113 APCs' getting 'stuck in the muck' near Tan An in September 1967.

From where I was stationed from Sep 1967 to Sep 1968 at times we could hear the fighting for the Y-bridge. The May offensive was the second time I came under fire in Vietnam, the first was the Tet Offensive in Jan 68. I remember these two events even though at times that are over shadowed by my 2nd tour in Vietnam with the 4th ID from Mar 1969 through March 1970. Reading about some of the action the 2/47 saw is interesting since I was with C-2/47 at Fort Lewis from Jun 1973, through September 1975. Have a 9th ID hat and put one of my old 47th Inf crests on it.

[SuperScout]

Not certain who was where, but I think elements of the 11th ACR were in the Saigon area during Tet '68. Coincidentally, the Scout radio freq was same-same as the Saigon MP unit that was taking a real load of stuff from the NVA. I awoke at 0200 to do my usual radio check/SITREP with my tracks, and heard about bad things happening in Saigon. I sent out a ROMEO net call, alerting all units to come to 100% standby. After monitoring the news and noise coming from our Bn NCS and the MP's, I knew it was just a matter of time before the fit hit the shan.

Co. C, 2-47, was blessed to have John Gross as its commander during this period of time. A lesser man probably would not have been able to achieve so much.

[Andy]

Scout & Gimp,

We made it down to Saigon during the Tet Offensive and the May Offensive. In May our battalion 4/23 (M) and a Cav unit from the 1st Division fought in something they called, ?The Battle of the Race Track?. I didn?t know the 9th was there. We were at the Saigon Race Track, half mile north of Tan Son Nuht Air Base. Of course the Y bridge was on the south side.

I asked about the number of mech units cause I just couldn?t imagine where the hell you would used them. In December, think it was December of ?67, we drove down to Dog Tag. As I remember it, we were told you guys were tied up and they wanted some extra Mech people to support your straight leg grunts. Our company pulled into that base camp and spent a night there. Nothing ever happened, but it was a nice ride.

There was a NCO Club there. Talking to some of the legs that told us, it was usually knee deep in mud, chest deep in water. Mud, bugs, rust and crotch rot, Just didn?t sound appealing. When they said more than 50% of your casualties were bobby traps and mines, made me long for home - the Iron Triangle.

Stay healthy,
Andy