Marine Corps Vietnam Tankers Hisistorical Foundation

Marine Corps Vietnam Tankers Historical Foundation^®

Marine Corps Vietnam-era Tankers and Ontosmen Have Made History. Your Historical Foundation is Making it Known.

1st Platoon, Bravo Company, 3rd Tank Battalion.

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mcvthfb11@gmail.com

All photos courtesy of Lloyd "Pappy" Reynolds

Inside the M48A3 Tank

Where a Tanker works, lives and sometimes dies.	Driver's compartment in the hull front. Spent a lot of time in here. Emergency escape hatch under seat. When top hatch is buttoned up the only vision is thorough the three 2 x 6 inch periscopes.
Loaders area, turret left side. Showing part of 90 mm Gun breach, 90 mm vertical ready rack (16 rounds), 30 Cal. Ammunition box (2,200 rounds) and .45 Cal. M3A1 Grease Gun in rack.	Gunners area, turret right side. Showing part of 90 mm Gun breach, safety shield, ballistic computer, telescopic sight and periscope sight.
Turret bustle, right behind main gun. Showing 90 mm Canister rounds in ready rack (8 rounds), document bag, radio shield and radios (2 two way radios, send and receive, and 1 receive only)	Tank Commanders area, turret right side, behind gunner. Showing T.C. override, radio controls, searchlight controls and part of range finder sight.

Hill 55 area

M43A3, with the old 18 inch white light searchlight and the new Commanders Copula donut vision block installed. Hill 55, not far from Danang.
Rain gear, kept us dry, but made you sweat.

Laundry day.
A little clean up.

Cloths line.
Air strike in the Arizona Territory,
taken from hill 65. Soon we would go into the Arizona.
Shower in the foreground.

A little bit more may do it.
Grunts from 2/5 on line preparing to sweep the area. Our objective is a ville we called the VC R&R Center.

Into some heavy brush, the Grunts lead while the tanks support. Without the Grunts, tanks were vulnerable to RPG teams in brush like this.

This Amtrack was tracking my tank when it hit a mine. Why I never set it off I'll never know. A lot of Grunts were on it when it went up. The Amtrack burned for about three days.

Into the VC R&R Center. The VC had left by the time we got there but they left a lot of Booby Traps for us to find.

We didn't leave much for them, when they came back, and come back the always did.

Old River crossing.
All gone.

Chico the Company Mascot.
Liberty Bridge.

An Hoa and Phu Loc 6 area.

VC suspects, all female, they had in there baskets, ammo, 1st aid supplies, and money. Suspects hell, what were they going to do, open a surplus store?
Phu Loc (6), along Liberty Road to An Hoa at the Song Thu Bon River ferry crossing. A bridge had not been built yet.

Payable and Rockpile area.

Andy Capp, Bravo 13.
Super Goof II, Bravo 14.

At "Payable" near the "Rockpile". L to R. John Mackovitch (Sp?), Steve Baker, Ron Shuppy, Harris "Alfie" Himes, Myself, "TJ" Wharton.
Ron Shuppy Photo.

Myself and Ron Shuppy at Payable.

Steve Baker and me straing my "Rasin Jack" through a coffee can full of Battle Dressings.
Enjoying some "Raisin Jack" through an IV Tube.

Digging out after a night of heavy rain.
Outside of our "New" Bunker.

Inside our new bunker at the Rockpile.
Wayne Smull, Joe Tories and myself at the Rockpile with the "Razerback" in the Background.

With Andy Capp at the Rockpile.
Some of the Marines of 1st Plt. Fred Mace, ? Moyer, Wayne Smull, Ron Shuppy, Charlie Carson, Jack Butcher, Greg Martin.

An Army "Duster" in my tank slot while we were out on an Operation.
Mine Damage to Bravo 11.

Highway 9.

Highway 9, not your standard Freeway.	Bravo 14 taks a hit from a Claymore type mine.
The .50 Cal ammo box that may have saved Ron Shuppy.
Highway 9 through the Gunners Perescope.	A tank on Highway 9. (Moisture dammaged film)

The day we drowned Super Goof II.

Yep, I guess the Grunt's report was right. The bridge is still there, but under about two feet of water and the ends are gone. All photos courtesy of Charlie Clements.	The next day isn’t looking any better although it has stopped raining. For awhile anyway. By now we are getting hungry and we shot something about the size of a deer. It was Black with two white stripes along its back and had two horns like an Antelope. What ever it was we cooked it and ate it.
On the third day the water was down a little and we could see the top of the bridge. We tried to get a line over to the people on the other side. No go. Almost lost a Marine trying.	Tanks to the rescue. By the fourth day we thought the water was low enough for a tank to get across. The Grunt C.O. of India 3/3 is in photo center. His XO is giving the signal to get started. T.J. Wharton was the T.C. and Jerry Whall was driving. The "Razorback" is in the background.
Looks like a good place to cross. Wide but should be shallow, just above a bend in the river, upstream from the "Little Rockpile". A real good spot.	Well maybe not such a good spot. Jerry tried to keep the engine going but when the water got up to his neck, it was time to pull him out. He couldn't get out on his own by then as the water pressure was to great.
As Jerry gets a blanket on the C.O. of I/3/3 tells T.J. "you said this thing could make it". Just like a Grunt to believe a Tanker. We're good but we don't walk on water.	All ashore that's going ashore. But it's not for liberty call. It's abandon tank. Hell we never even got 100 feet from the bank. There sat a $250,000.00 rock. We had to leave security near it until the water went down enough for us to strip it of anything useful like weapons and ammo.

M43A3, with the old 18 inch white light searchlight and the new Commanders Copula donut vision block installed. Hill 55, not far from Danang.	Rain gear, kept us dry, but made you sweat.
Laundry day.	A little clean up.
Cloths line.	Air strike in the Arizona Territory, taken from hill 65. Soon we would go into the Arizona. Shower in the foreground.
A little bit more may do it.	Grunts from 2/5 on line preparing to sweep the area. Our objective is a ville we called the VC R&R Center.
Into some heavy brush, the Grunts lead while the tanks support. Without the Grunts, tanks were vulnerable to RPG teams in brush like this.	This Amtrack was tracking my tank when it hit a mine. Why I never set it off I'll never know. A lot of Grunts were on it when it went up. The Amtrack burned for about three days.
Into the VC R&R Center. The VC had left by the time we got there but they left a lot of Booby Traps for us to find.	We didn't leave much for them, when they came back, and come back the always did.
Old River crossing.	All gone.
Chico the Company Mascot.	Liberty Bridge.

Andy Capp, Bravo 13.	Super Goof II, Bravo 14.
At "Payable" near the "Rockpile". L to R. John Mackovitch (Sp?), Steve Baker, Ron Shuppy, Harris "Alfie" Himes, Myself, "TJ" Wharton. Ron Shuppy Photo.	Myself and Ron Shuppy at Payable.
Steve Baker and me straing my "Rasin Jack" through a coffee can full of Battle Dressings.	Enjoying some "Raisin Jack" through an IV Tube.
Digging out after a night of heavy rain.	Outside of our "New" Bunker.
Inside our new bunker at the Rockpile.	Wayne Smull, Joe Tories and myself at the Rockpile with the "Razerback" in the Background.
With Andy Capp at the Rockpile.	Some of the Marines of 1st Plt. Fred Mace, ? Moyer, Wayne Smull, Ron Shuppy, Charlie Carson, Jack Butcher, Greg Martin.
An Army "Duster" in my tank slot while we were out on an Operation.	Mine Damage to Bravo 11.