Spectral sentry

[revwardoc]

This is a story I read about a Marine (James E Gentry) who served in 'Nam in 1965 with the 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division at Chu Lai. He said that, as part of Operation Allegheny, his unit had moved into an old abandoned French fort to await orders and replacement.

During the first night, one of their sentries was killed by a knife wound to the throat. The fort still had its full complement of sturdy walls and no one could figure out how an enemy soldier got inside.

On the 2nd night, Gentry was on guard when he suddenly saw a man casually standing with his back to the wall inside the compound. He was dressed in what appeared to be a foreign jungle uniform that had a white diamond insignia patch on the sleeve. Gentry was just about to issue a challenge when the guy pointed to the wall beside Gentry. The Marine looked over and a stone began to moveforward and a VC, knife in hand,started to crawl out. Gentry shot him, then emptied his clip into the opening in the wall. When he looked up, the soldier who had pointed was gone.

They explored the tunnel the next day and found it to be several hundred yards long with the entrance out of sight of the fort.

Gentry went home in November of '66 and, several years later, started doing some research on French units that had served there. During the search he found that all the French Foreign Legion soldiers wore a white diamond patch, but the Legion had been thrown out of Vietnam by late 1954. So who was the Legionaire in 1965?:cd:

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Have any of you heard of such stories or do you have a ghost story to share?

[reconeil]

Spooky stuff, and gets your attention. Sorry can't help you out with anymore of such.

Regardless, at least you got me to look up the word: "Spectral".

Neil

Only in War can such things happen.

[Andy]

I have a hard time swallowing ghost stories. If it did happen and that?s a big if how about this scenario. Many Legionnaires had ladies, no big surprise there. What if the guy mustered out of his unit and stayed in Vietnam after ?54 with his lady. He might well have had knowledge of secrets of the Fort, the French were always big on that sort of thing. He would probably have no love at all for the NVA and their pals.

The old boy proudly puts on his old uniform, maybe having knowledge of what the bad guys were doing and goes to a point near the entrance used by the enemy. Perhaps one of several entrances that the Legion were aware of, maybe even they built them.

To be a member of the French Foreign Legion you can not be French. Could he have been an American, striking a blow for God and Country? I don?t know, anything makes more sense than ghosts.

Stay healthy,
Andy

[revwardoc]

Andy,

Not only do I personally love ghost stories, the house I live in is haunted! My wife and I are always hearing someone walking up and down the cellar stairs. Things will be missing for days then turn up in the damndest places (once my wife found a pair of her earrings in the freezer!). Sometimes they can be a real pain in the butt, though. They have a nasty habit of lifting the washing machine lid during the spin cycle so I'll have to go down cellar and put it back down to finish the wash.

I've see two of them, both were elderly. I looked up the history of the house and found out that a middle age couple bought the place back in 1950 (part of a new development). He died in a car accident in 1970, 2 years short of retirement. The widow's sister moved in with her and the widow died of a heart attack in the cellar in '77, then her sister sold the property to a young couple, who sold it to me in '83 mainly because their little girl complained that the "old people" kept her up at night.

Once aelderly neighbor stopped to talk to me about the house and I began to describe what the "former residents" looked like. Heknew that I wasn't a native of the town and asked how I knew about them. I told him I'd seen them arounda few times. He turned "white as a ghost" and walked away.

They're more mischievous than scary, though the old gent does tend to stomp around a bit. But we're used to it.