Stevens 77E In Photos From Vietnam

[oldfoneguy]

These are recently discovered photos of my wife's uncle Michael playing around with a friend while in-country in Vietnam circa 1967. He's holding a Stevens Model 77E. A closeup of the butt pad reveals the distinctive T pattern.

He was a little guy and did tunnel work whenever they came across one. He was awarded a bronze star for saving his squad 2/67 when they came under heavy fire in a rice paddy. The M79 gunner was hit so he made his way over to him retrieved the weapon and cleared out the treeline single handedly. Sadly he came home from the war deeply disturbed, from today's perspective he was suffering from PTSD. While living with my wife's family upon returning home he had some type of unknown incident while traveling on the subway from Brooklyn to Manhattan that caused him to jump in front of a rolling train only 3 months after coming home in 1968.

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[ordnanceguy]

Thanks for posting these pics. Model 77E photos are hard to come by.

That is a sad story about your wife's uncle. Five decades after that war ended its reverberations are still being heard and felt.

Charlie

[CINDERS]

Not only from that conflict but others before it men came home broken and the fraternity had little understanding of the horrors they had endured.
Allot of the poor buggers were shot in WWI when shell shock was misdiagnosed for cowardice, then there is the Gulf war syndrome.

The Govt's today need to expand the help required by these ppl as I have seen stuff on the net where vets are homeless and struggling desperately in society, how do these ppl fall through the cracks it is so very sad to see this.
We see this is Australia, where at last a royal commission is to begin on suicide from returned service personnel again too little to late by our Govt.

[oldfoneguy]

So sometimes good does come out of tragedy. My wife's first cousin and namesake to Michael himself a Marine Desert Storm Veteran was seeing some of his friends having a hard time adjusting to life after the service. He went to school and studied the subject. He has been a crisis counselor for going on 10 years. He helps his fellow vets with employment and housing as well as transportation to the VA Healthcare centers. Heaven knows he's not doing this for the meager money it pays but feels it is necessary to his existence in part due to his Uncles legacy. Michael is a great guy and a proud father of 3 adult boys. I'm proud to know him.