Ernie Savage, after retiring from the Army, had remained at Fort Benning, Georgia, as a civilian employee helping train Army Reserve soldiers. All this he told us quietly, matter-of-factly, with no hint of bragging or boasting. Terry Wrong told us he would like to make a documentary on the battles and the veterans that would involve taking a group of us back to Vietnam and to the battlefields. WebSgt. It was clear to us that our book about the battles had opened the hearts of these Vietnamese generals and it was that, and our determination to get and tell their side of the story as honestly as we could, that had opened the door to this journey back to our old battlefields. He'd step in and speak up and tell the colonel when the men had all they could take.
Any serious study of our war in Vietnam has to begin with the French war; and those were the books I read on the troopship that brought my battalion to South Vietnam in the summer of 1965. These and the firm stand made by the remaining men pinned down on the knoll, lead to the death of scores of North Vietnamese troops, who never managed to wipe out the platoon. Sergeant Major Basil Plumley : How do you know what kind of goddamn day it is? "He's a real hero, not an actor," I said. After a series of studio interviews in New York, a number of Ia Drang veterans were chosen to make the trip to Vietnam with me and Joe Galloway. HistoryNet.com is brought to you by HistoryNet LLC, the worlds largest publisher of history magazines. Matt Dillon Clark Gregg Capt. WebSelect this result to view Ernie Roy Savage's phone number, address, and more. Former B Company 1-7 Cavalry Sgt.

Ernie Savage Robert Bagnell 1st Lt. Charlie Hastings Marc Blucas 2nd Lt. Henry Herrick Josh Daugherty Sp4 Robert Ouellette Jsu Garcia Capt. You wrote in your book that our men killed your wounded on the battlefield and this is true. Command ultimately fell to Ernie Savage, who led the platoon through the rest of the battle. Our traveling companions on the journey were three of the North Vietnamese officers who had done their best to kill us allLt. | Army Organic Industrial Base Modernization Implementation Plan, Army leadership meets with privatized housing partner CEOs, October 2017 Nominative Sergeants Major Assignments, May 2017 Nominative Sergeants Major Assignments, Pentagon Hall of Heroes Induction Ceremony for Lt. Col. Charles S. Kettles, Signal regiment honors Hollywood director. Ernie Savage Now there was real traffic to contend with on the highway and the streets of Hanoimore cars and a plague of small, noisy, smoky motorbikes had joined the quiet stream of bicycles that had owned those streets before. That's what he always said -- I don't do interviews," Galloway said. Over the past few years, Plumley's personality changed noticeably, Galloway said. WebSelect this result to view Ernie Roy Savage's phone number, address, and more. After retiring from the Army, Herren continued to work at the Pentagon as a civilian employee, while Nadal worked as a human resource officer in several large corporations. We like your book. WebSgt. Without a lot of what we got from him and the colonel, I know some of us wouldn't be here today. A state-owned shop that once displayed four cans of evaporated milk in a dusty window had been transformed into the Hong Kong Kung Fu Video and Coffee Shop, and its tiny tables were jammed with young Vietnamese watching Bruce Lee movies. We would have a chance to talk more that evening at dinner. Perhaps it wasn't believable enough to pass muster with the masses. From those same conversations and our book, the generals knew something about our families as well. Twelve were wounded. Command ultimately fell to Ernie Savage, who led the platoon through the rest of the battle. It was quiet on the bus as each of us turned to his own thoughts about the dinner and our trip south to the Ia Drang in the morning. The Vietnamese Communist Party, shaken but still very much in control, had decided to ease up and see what happened. Command passed to Sergeant Ernie Savage who called in multiple air strikes around the platoons position. Command Sergeant Major (ret.) He was a lot like his reputation; he was gruff and he could be tough, but he wasn't mean. (ret.) Matt Dillon Clark Gregg Capt. The legendary war correspondent met Plumley in the Ia Drang Valley of Vietnam -- a place neither thought they would survive. Ho Chi Minh, had built an army out of an unarmed gaggle of peasant boys and girls and led them with great skill against the Japanese, the French colonialists, the United States and, more recently, against their former ally and neighbor, Communist China. "And it was, because he brought men he knew, a lot of them he'd trained and served with, and that's why we had such good leaders.". Some of us blinked back tears. : They were agitated and rushed us through the formalities in a matter of minutes. They have also lived in Altadena, CA and Pasadena, CA. For all of us the greatest revelations and emotions came that evening, in a floating restaurant built on a barge on Hanois West Lake. We had asked for this briefing because of the importance of Dien Bien Phu and the defeat of the French in setting the stage for Americas beginning involvement in the affairs of the two Vietnams. WebSergeant Savage was serving as squad leader in the 2d Platoon, Company B, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile), on 14 November 1965, when it was attacked by a hostile force which consisted of approximately two companies. I said 'Well, Sam, it don't seem like that great of a reach to me. "Who made you the (expletive) weatherman?" The most comprehensive and authoritative history site on the Internet. More than 300 American troopers of the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) and thousands of North Vietnamese Army regulars had perished on that ground in November 1965 in the battles that opened a war that would drag on for 10 long years. The girls bounded back smiling, with Plumley's signature scrawled across the back of my register receipt. Subscribe to receive our weekly newsletter with top stories from master historians. I asked him, 'What's the story about you and a German tank and he just grunted and said, 'Obviously I won.' WebThe President of the United States takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross to Clyde E. Savage (RA14746198), Sergeant, U.S. Army, for extraordinary heroism in connection with military operations involving conflict with an armed hostile force in the Republic of Vietnam. The meeting was held outdoors on the shores of one of Hanois seven lakes. Technical Specs. It is just like mine. After nearly four decades of rigid party control Hanoi residents were now experimenting big-time with capitalism and a more free market. Tom Metsker Desmond Harrington Sp4 Bill Beck Blake Heron Sp4 Galen Bungum Erik MacArthur Sp4 Russell Adams Director Randall Wallace Writers Former C Company 2-7 Cavalry clerk Jack Smith, after his two years as an Army draftee, went back to college and drifted into television news as an on-air correspondent for ABC, a job that his father, the broadcast pioneer Howard K. Smith, had held. Snatching the artilleryman's radio, he began calling in and adjusting artillery fire. Sergeant Savage, the 3d Squad leader, now took command. Ernie is related to Mitchell Ernest Sawasy and Ernie Orest Sawasy as well as 2 additional people. He attended events at the National Infantry Museum and seemed to fairly tolerate the limelight, such as it was. At our first meeting in 1982 to map out the research that would consume a decade and result in the publication of We Were Soldiers Onceand Young, my coauthor and best friend, Lt. Gen. The lives of professional military officers are not all that different, no matter what country they soldier for. Savage assumes command, calls in the artillery, and uses the cover of night to keep the Vietnamese from overrunning their defensive position. Moore was the lieutenant colonel who led the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, into the Ia Drang, and Galloway was a UPI journalist assigned to the unit. His dedication paid off, when Plumley staffed the 7th Cav's 1st Battalion with Soldiers he knew to be highly skilled, well- trained and disciplined. WebSergeant Ernie Savage's precise placement of artillery throughout the siege of the "Lost Platoon" enabled the platoon to survive the long ordeal. The situation on that ground was very difficult. Savage assumed command by virtue of being close to the radio and began the process of calling in repeated bombardments of artillery support around the platoon's position.

Sergeant Savage, the 3d Squad leader, now took command. Specialist Galen Bungum WebSelect this result to view Ernie Roy Savage's phone number, address, and more. The airportstill surrounded by the big water-filled craters that American bombs had dug in the rice paddieshad been expanded and was jam-packed with humanity, where just months before it had been smaller and much sleepier. At Ia Drang in 1965, they fought each other with an intimate, bloody ferocity that left hundreds dead and scores maimed, and yet decades later, old enemies could embrace in friendship. Former A Company 1-7 Cavalry commander Col. Meanwhile, with helicopters constantly dropping off units, Moore manages to secure weak points before the North Vietnamese can take advantage of them. 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At the end of that first day, eight of the platoons 27 men were dead. Hal Moore, told me that we had to return to Vietnam and to the Ia Drang battlefields. He fought in more than 20 military operations during his 32-year military career, having enlisted on March 31, 1942, as a private after two years of high school. WebSgt. The Defense of Plataea Proved a Textbook Example of How to Survive a Siege. To subscribe, click here. WebSergeant Ernie Savage assumed command after Sergeant's Palmer and Stokes were killed.