When visiting the wall, leave pomp and ceremony behind

Whenever I think of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall - the real one or a replica - Leslie Dalrymple's face pops into my mind.

Les and I met at the Franklin County Courthouse in Farmington on the morning of May 13, 1969, where we had been ordered to report so we could be drafted into the Army. We were together most of the next five months - at basic training at Fort Dix, N.J.; at advanced infantry training at Fort Lewis, Wash.; and at Screaming Eagle Replacement Training School in Vietnam.

The 101st Airborne Division is a proud unit, with a great history in World War II and, from what I have read, in Iraq. In Vietnam, the division was no longer airborne or elite, and took draftees as did all of the other divisions.

Les was assigned to an infantry battalion with the 101st. Even though I had been trained for nine weeks as an infantryman, I was assigned to work in the information office at division headquarters.

I spent my year writing press releases about soldiers' promotions and medals to be sent stateside, writing for the 101st's division newspaper and for a few months as editor of that newspaper.

After my 12 months, while boarding the plane to come home, another Franklin County guy told me that Les had been killed.

I was anxious to go home and see my wife, Nancy, and our daughter, Tandy, who had been born while I was in Vietnam, and the announcement of Dalrymple's death didn't hit me hard then. Although I had been a rear-echelon soldier, I had taken cover during rocket attacks, been sent out to cover action from the relative safety of fire support bases and had seen from a distance my share of death.

In 1989, a half-size replica of the wall came to the Portland Exposition Building, and I saw Leslie Dalrymple's name on that wall. I fought back tears, stood there and stared.

Guilt because I had escaped actual fighting; that because of my journalism degree someone decided my talents would be better used at a public information office. Les went into the Army from high school. He didn't have an alternative skill.

Anger because many people had intentionally avoided the war while supporting it. One guy, a year ahead of me in high school, left college for awhile and joined the Army Reserves. People in the Reserves and National Guard are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. But in the 1960s and 1970s, serving in those units guaranteed you did not go to Vietnam.

During an anti-war protest at Orono in 1968, the reservist got up and belittled the protestors as cowards. But he wasn't willing to go to Vietnam himself.

Leaving the Expo I grabbed and filled out an application for Veterans for Peace. I actually attended one meeting before deciding the membership did not mesh well with my career working for the local newspaper.

After that visit to the wall, I did not sleep well for a couple of weeks, thinking of Les Dalrymple and the other names carved in granite with his.

In 1992, Nancy and I were in Washington, and we went to the real wall. That was moving, and I again looked up Les and a few other names. But that visit did not create the guilt or anger that attending the replica at the Expo did. Nancy has always been good at tempering my angers - and I had gone to the Expo alone.

I went to the opening ceremony of the wall this Friday in South Portland. It was a mistake. Vietnam was not a war of pomp and ceremony. Saluting was optional for anyone below the rank of lieutenant colonel - men often wearing just olive-drab T-shirts with no sign of rank.

In 90 minutes of pomp, only one person - and I can't remember his name - said anything that touched a chord: "Welcome home."

Family and friends welcomed me home after my year in Vietnam, but no one else did. Some veterans were insulted or spit on - not me, but I know it happened.

The Vietnam Veterans wall says nothing about whether the Vietnam War was right or wrong. It just honors those who died and, to a lesser extent, those who served. That's how it should be.

After the pomp, I walked up to the wall, at Panel 16 West, Line 98, rubbed my hand over Leslie A. Dalrymple's name, and welcomed him home.

Tom Atwell has worked as a reporter and in various editing positions at the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram for 32 years and is now special sections editor and gardening columnist. He served with the Public Information Office of the 101st Airborne Division near Hue and Phu Bai for 12 months in 1969 and 1970. He can be reached at 791-6362 or at:

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