Francis, Joseph A., Cpl

My name is Joseph A Francis I am a full blooded Mi'kmaq Indian from the Lennox Island Indian Reservation on Prince Edward Island, Canada. Prince Edward Island or P.E.I. is the smallest province in Canada nestled between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, It is the smallest province in Canada measuring Maybe half the size of New Hampshire..My family and I moved to Manchester,N.H. in 1960,at that time I was 14 years old..Growing up on the reservation and being in the residential school was reason enough to grow up defending your turf at any cost, loose or win You had no choice but to fight for it.. I was just getting started in amature boxing. I had boxed for about 5 years and done quite well at the sport winning the golden gloves title in two(2) different open classes plus a couple of other AAU titles I had compiled a record of over 90 fight loosing just a handful and was on my way to to turning professional, something that I always dreamed of since I was a kid in the 50's watching the Friday and Wednesday night fights on a small black and white t.v.. But all that was about to change when Viet Nam started to show it's ugly face in the early 63.In august of 1966 I decided to for go a pro career in boxing and fulfill a childhood dream, I joined the United States Marine Corps.five and a half months later with my mos 0311(grunt) I found my self with F-co. 2nd. bn. 26th. Marines 3rd.Mar.Div smack dab in the middle of the I corp. area in the thick of all the fighting that I had only been reading in the papers a scant few months previous.My tour lasted 13 months 26 day's we had been on over 36 major operations all over the I corp. area from Da Nang to the DMZ. The operations that comes to mind are the ones you are wounded on or the ones you took allot of casualties. Operation Hickory was one of those operations.We were on that 10 day operation just the other side of Con Thien when all hell broke lose a couple of weeks later when it was all said and done we were half the battalion that we use to be we lost a lot of good men that left a big empty hole, one you could never fill again. Looking where they use to stand leaves a big empty space..too many losses and not enough time to heal, just go onto the next operation and try to put time between you and what just happened and what's happening all around you. A couple of months after that operation we went on operation Rush in the mountains just west of Phu Bai I was walking point and came across an enemy position that was set up in an L shaped ambush spotted them almost too late, I had to open up on them. before they hit us with the element of surprise. All hell broke loose, they opened up on me and my fire team from all directions with automatic weapons fire and hand grenades. I was more exposed then the rest of my team because of my walking further in front of them In the event of being ambushed,which we were.. I was was pretty much out in the open and exposed to allot of automatic weapons fire and chi-coms going off. I yelled back at my fire team to get the hell out of here that I would cover fire for them so they could get out. I got shot in the back of the leg covering for them and in the midst of changing a magazine I got hit with a chi com grenade shortly after that, it seemed like it took forever to get to me, all I could say to my self is I'm dead, it knocked me ass over tea kettle, all I saw was a bright flash, the next second I'm picking myself off the ground with my fatigues just about blown off me.. I was full of hot sh rap metal. I was in a complete daze for a few seconds, I started to look around for my weapon, I found it with the stock blown off and the barrel grip half gone but it still worked I picked it up and put in a new magazine and started shoot up the place again ,I think Charlie was just as surprised as everyone else in my outfit to see that I had survived a direct hit from a hand grenade that landed right in front me.. I continued to lay down a heavy volume of fire I had about 9 rounds left in my last magazine of the 25 magazines I had, with everyone out I figured it was time for me to get out of there .. I got medevacked Phu Bai then to DaNang From there I went the Philippines and then to Guam Navel Hospital where I stayed For 3 months. I did not want to go back to stateside, so I volunteered to go back to Nam to Finish out My tour of four and a half more months. they didn't mind that there was a shortage of man power out in the field, most units were severely under manned so it was back to the DMZ for a few more months.In late Feb.68 I rotated back to the world (states)and started to work out again to help me rehabilitate my self from the wounds that I had received in Nam. I got stationed at Quantico, Va. Marine Corps Base for the rest of the time that I had left in the corp. Being a small arms and squad tactics instructor, at the same time I worked hard at rehabbing myself would hit the punching bag shadow box and run relentlessly,looking forward to the day when I would get out of the corps and continue my boxing and realize my dream to be a pro boxer.I had been out of the ring for about three and a half years before I would get to realize that dream. One war and what seemed like a life time had passed it all seemed like a night merrish dream and I have yet to wake up. Suddenly I woke up and found myself back in the ring again winning but it wasn't the same allot had changed that feeling that I had before the corps was gone I won several more titles including the New England Title and was selected to the national team and was ranked the number one amature in the country. I won the outstanding fighter award in that tournament but still there was something missing that I could not find or explain..I did turn pro realizing my life long dream. I had a total of 8 fights loosing one with four KO's. My wounds bothered me a great deal, it kept getting harder and harder to maintain the rigorous training to stay in shape, it was time to hang up the gloves and move on to something else I worked many a different jobs in my life time.. the one job I spent the most time on was driveing a tractor trailer which I spent twenty years doing, from flat beds to box trailers to tankers and got to see the country from a new perspective while doing it it was a great experience.. I am married to the most wonderful woman in the world she put up with me for 38 Years, we had 9 children and raised 20 foster children, we are the proud grand parents of 23 grand children. We had 2 boys who went into the Marine Corps and are very proud of them. What was missing was the 3 plus years that I tried to make up for but couldn't, it all seemed like one big time warp and I was in the middle. What I did find out was that we can't make up for lost time time that we assumed we lost because it's not, we just spent it on something else. As for me in my case it was dam well worth it. I would not change one line of it and would do it again in a heart beat. For my experiences in Vietnam I was awarded the Bronze Star with the combat V for valor,the purple heart,cross of gallantry,the combat action ribbon the Presidential unit citation and the other medals that go with being over there.the war affected me in allot of way's,more positive then negative. It made me more keenly aware of life and all that affects it. My values are strong my relationship with my family is very good we are very close. My politics are more conservative and so is my attitude and philosophy.I still have allot of animosity for the people who protested against us and blaming us for the war,we were doing what our country asked of us nothing more.I am 100% service connected permanent and total for wounds received while in Vietnam I became a loner and kept primarily to my self, did not trust anyone. To this day it continues to have an affect on me in many ways the smell of fuel the sound of a chopper song from that era. The smell of a hospital, fire works drives me crazy. Looking back on everything I don't think I missed a dam thing and we are not the losers we came out of that war with our heads held high and in a very Nobel fashion Today I'm a boxing coach teaching the young kids how to box and talking to them on a personnel note about their values and their future and always putting to them just how important their education is and how important it is to finish High school and go onto college and get that degree. I tell them boxing is great but there's life after boxing, we must prepare for it,there's no time like the present,boxing will provide you the discipline to see it through.. P.S. Semper Fi., Cpl. Joseph A. Francis