The Way of Our World

 You're  19 years old.
You're critically wounded and dying in the jungle somewhere in the Central Highlands of Vietnam .. 
It's November 11, 1967.   
LZ (landing zone) X-ray. 
Your unit is outnumbered 8-1 and the enemy fire is so intense from 100 yards away, that your CO (commanding officer) has ordered the helicopters to stop coming in. 

You're lying there, listening to the enemy machine guns and you know you're not getting out, and no one is coming for you.

Your family is half way around the world, 12,000 miles away, and you'll never see them again. 
As the world starts to fade in and out, you know this is the day. 
Then - over the machine gun noise - you faintly hear that sound of a helicopter. 
You look up to see a Huey coming in. But.. It doesn't seem real because no MedEvac markings are on it. 

Captain Ed Freeman is coming in for you. 

He's not MedEvac so it's not his job, but he heard the radio call and decided he's flying his Huey down into the machine gun fire anyway. 

Even after the MedEvacs were ordered not to come. He's coming anyway.

And he drops it in and sits there in the machine gun fire, as they load 3 of you at a time on board. 

Then he flies you up and out through the gunfire to the doctors and nurses and safety. 

And, he kept coming back!! 13 more times!! Until all the wounded were out. No one knew until the mission was over that the Captain had been hit 4 times in the legs and left arm. 

He took 29 of you and your buddies out that day. Some would not have made it without the Captain and his Huey. 

Medal of Honor Recipient, Captain Ed Freeman, United States Air Force, died last Wednesday at the age of 70, in Boise , Idaho 

May God Bless and Rest His Soul. 

I bet you didn't hear about this hero's passing, but we've sure heard a whole bunch  about Whitney Houston, Lindsay Lohan, The Beckhams, Brad and Anjalina, Kim Kardashian, and the list goes on....

Shame on the media !!! 



Medal of Honor Winner Captain Ed Freeman

What has this to do with anything?  A simple matter of remembering and being thankful.  When this had happened I had served in Borneo, as a 17 year old.  My very first mission was to go into the Ulu - jungle - to search for a missing officer and Royal Marine.  The officer's body we recovered but Tommy Collins lay in an Indonesian grave for 37 years.  He was repatriated about twelve years ago and given a Christian funeral near his native St Helens in Lancashire.  When we give thanks to Captain Ed Freeman, we must also remember all OUR own fallen that the media and politicians would love us to forget.  Special memory to the occupants of the base camp at Biawak, high in the mountains overlooking Indonesia where a despot was preparing to invade Malaysia.

Stephen Flanigan - Royal Marine K Coy 42 Commando. Div One Borneo.