A tale of courage, survival and love

This tale takes place in Vietnam, 1968. 

It seems that battles get publicity but the small change does not. But small change has its own agony. Take Robert Terrell and Noah Rocket. As their Raiders were down in a cemetery in the late afternoon, a booby trap detonated. Blowing Terrell in two and gruesomely injuring Rocket.

When the explosion occurred, Rocket recalled, "Everything in my life went in slow motion." As the metal fragments hit him he just felt his body being twisted. He recalled thinking, "Ah God, I am going to die out here," before hearing someone yell, "Medic." 

A medical evacuation helicopter soon arrived, and Rocket was on his way to 18 months in hospitals. Initially, he didn't have any idea how badly he was hurt. In one hospital, he was in a room with several mirrors. Not knowing they were mirrors, he looked over to see "this poor guy beside me in the other bed, and he was bandaged from his knees all the way up to the top of his head." He thought, "Man, I really feel sorry for him."

Later he found out, it was him. The prognosis was so bad that authorities sent a telegram to his family saying that if anyone wanted to see him alive, they better come quickly, but he survived. Before leaving for Vietnam, he had a high school sweetheart, Joyce and they were engaged. She stuck by him as they were deeply in love. He eventually got a three-day pass from the hospital, so they could get married, but had to return as he had another year to go in the hospital.

More than three decades later they were still married.

Roger Gregory is a Vietnam veteran and business owner in Priest River.