I found this patch locally. Any opinions as to its authenticity?
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I found this patch locally. Any opinions as to its authenticity?
I would call it locally made, ie local to SE Asia based on the stitching style. You could have anything made, cheaply and quickly, which precluded being made well.
Theater patch was my guess as well.
There is one U.K. dealer that I see at shows a couple of times a year who goes out to Vietnam to purchase items of interest to bring back to sell on his stall and on his website. One item that I noticed which caught my eye when I last saw his stall at a show was a Vietnamese "knock off copy" of a U.S. army wrist watch. If memory serves me correctly he had several examples for sale. They looked like good quality watches and well made but, no disrespect to the Vietnamese "craftsman" who made them, I have to wonder if they work as well as the U.S. made originals? Another item that he had for sale was the iconic NVA pith helmet.
I suppose to some degree the difference in the number of troops that served WWII & Korea vs the Vietnam war dictates the lack of artifacts available for the latter. Perhaps some more painful reasons as well.
There were all manner of locally patches available in Vietnam (in-country) back in the day. Some were official unit patches and others unofficial 'moral' patches such as the one depicted above. There were also locally made sub-unit (company, platoon, detachment etc.) patches made up for esprit de corps. The collector/buyer needs to be care though since tonnes of 'counterfeits' have been made since then.
---------- Post added at 09:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:36 PM ----------
There are a lot of reasons for the lack of artifacts. The ratio of support to combat troops is one. Military regulation and 'interference' is another. Most American service members came and went as individuals loaded in bulk on chartered airliners, except for the early days major deployments and regular USMC battalion rotations, so it was not practicable to cart off a great mass of captured kit.
That patch was one of 2 available, both were basicly the same except different wording. The other one was "Tonking Gulf Yatch Club." I think I have both.
I spent the first 4+ months at SF Hq in Nha Trang. Since I had collected WW 2 German military since I was in high school I had some knowledge of what might sell back home and what I personally wanted. The PX at Cam Rhan Bay had rows of boxes of patches of every imaginable sort so I bought a few of each and sent them home. I also picked up several of each of what was available for SF from our supply room and sent them home. I spent the next 5 + years selling what I didn't want at gun/militaria shows.
I also had a couple of Zippo cigarette lighters engraved and sent home, a slim for the wife and a regular for me. I carried both in the field for a while before sending them home.
I took a ruskie Makerov to Hawaii on R&R and gave to the wife to take home. I also mailed home a bunch of captured VC/NVA uniforms & equipment and brought home a Browning Hi-Power and 2 SKSs. I gave a buddy an SKS to bring home for me since he wasn't taking home a war trophy firearm. That one I later sold, which was why I sent it home.
So, yes it was possible to get a lot of stuff home, IF you knew the ropes and paid attention to the regs. Also SF and a MACV were permitted to bring home three (3) war trophy firearms where the rest of the military was only allowed one (1). Beats the hell out of me why this was, but I took full advantage of it!!! And I've got the war trophy papers for all of them to prove it - including the Makerov which I had papered before going on R & R, so I actually brought home 4 firearms.
Oh and I had bought the the Browning HP at a gun shop outside the main gate of Ft Lewis, Wn on my way to RVN so I have both a bill of sale from them AND war trophy papers for that one. I carried the Browning the whole time I was in country.
Sarge
Here is the dealer's page that I referred to earlier: indo china collectables.1
1. Glad you made it back.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sarge
2. Thank you for your service.
3. Thanks for sharing your story in detail.
Are there many U.S, Veterans going back to visit Vietnam now in recent years, now that it's opened up to tourists?
Sarge and others will well remember some of the most gaudy silk embroidery stuff that was available.......... in the moist hideous colours, with fearsome badges, dragons, logos etc etc. Some of the blokes used to send this hideous stuff/crap home........, as did my pal George Lxxxxxx from 4 RAR........ I mean............ what dad in his right mind, living in the wilds of Ballarat would want a red silk (?) smoking jacket adorned with gaudy dragons with a half eaten VC fighter in its jaws? Yep, That's what Georgie sent home as I recall. The true irony was that Georges dad had really been to war and had fought the Soviet occupiers during the Hungarian uprising, had a price on his head, escaped from Hungary to Austria carrying George, his smaller sister along with mum. We're still in touch and I'll forward this thread to him, now living in Bendigo. Have a chuckle George........
I have heard that some went back but I'm not sure what the procedure is. I, myself, haven't went back. Would I? I don't know. I imagine cost would be a big factor and the accommodations.Quote:
Originally Posted by Flying10uk
My friend from 7RAR/RAEME went back and was welcomed BUT it was suggested that when he did go around (Vung Tau and East of Saigon) to just act like a tourist and not a veteran. Accommodation........, cheap as chips but not like living under side-less tents in the monsoon!
Yep, I sent the wife a bright dark green dragon covered set of pajamas.
When we split I kept them just for the hell of it. Still buried around here somewhere?
There was everything imaginable, and then some, to be found in the shops in any of the towns in SVN. I had good picking because I had access to Nha Trang and Cam Rahn Bay. Also got into Saigon once.
Sarge
Oh, you made me chuckle with that Sarge. Yep, loads of this gaudy stuff went home. I wonder what the folks really thought of this stuff. But when you're 20 or 21........
I can say that as a 6th grader in 1972, living on Ft Ord (or any Army/USMC base for that matter) you were NOT cool if your dad didn't send you one of those 'Phu Bai' or 'Nha Trang' stitched cheap jackets. Especially as they said 'hell' and no one would take it away from you ('I'm sure to go to heaven cause...')! Now, my dad loved me and I am fortunate to still have him around, but he was an Advisor and they didn't have access to the cool stuff where he spent his two tours. So they were appreciated. All he could bring home was a 91/30 sniper with the brass and red-laquered plaque that was handed to him on the tarmac by his ARVN team. Will never leave the family!
Talking of which........ Does anyone remember those what we used to call 'VC sandals'? sort of shoe things, made from the treads of old lorry/car tyres, and shaped into sort of something you wear on your feet? I don't know where they found tyres with tread on them because all the old trucks and lorries seemed to have tyres that were as bald as a badgers arse! To be honest, you couldn't really describe these 'shoes' to anyone in words alone
I don't think that making footwear from vehicle tyres is unique to Vietnam; I've heard of it before in other parts of the world.
It is when you're 20, never seen or even heard of anything like it before and when even flip-flops were a novelty
I would imagine that Vietnamese people are resourceful people and when you have nothing probably the next best thing to a pair of "over the counter" footwear is to make your own from truck or car tyres. I believe that one of the other places that I've heard of it being done before, if memory serves me correctly, is Russia during WW2 and perhaps before. It is easy to understand why poor Russian civilians may have done this at a time when their country was being torn apart by the Nazis. The Russian civilians must have suffered greatly during the German onslaught.
Thank you guys for making this thread a lot more interesting than I could have hoped.
I believe that I now remember where I first became aware of people using tyres to make footwear. I was looking at some of the remains of a Handley Page Hamden bomber, at the RAF Museum, that had crashed/been shot down over Russia during WW2. This wreckage was subsequently purchased by the RAF Museum after being salvaged from it's crash site in Russia. Most of the rubber had been cut off the landing wheel tyres by locals for making footwear, if memory serves me correctly.
Yes............... but it hadn't been recovered when I saw the VC sandals so to me, a 20 year old in 1967, abroad for the first time from sheltered boarding school, apprentice school background, tyres converted into shoes were a real eye-opener.
Me too, when I first saw those aircraft wheels with all the rubber cut off and just a tiny bit of the tyre remaining around the rim of the wheel.
They were also called 'Ho Chi Minhs'. They actually were for when you really needed to get the boots off for a bit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter Laidler
The only things I sent home that I can admit to without raising the possible interest of a Crown Prosecutor was an Ao Dia for my then fiancé, later wife, (miles too small for her) and a kiddie-sized set of 'tiger stripes' for a neighbour's little boy at my mother's request.
RE the above - Typo. It should read: They were actually good for when ...
I like the photos of the auxiliary fuel tanks made into boats.
Inventive farmers build vital river boats out of fuel tanks jettisoned from U.S. planes during the Vietnam War | Daily Mail Online