Sergeant Lard
I have read that the best times and the worst times of a person's life stays with them forever. This is probably quite true. Really there are many other memories of days long time past that I remember like yesterday and they were not the best of times nor the worst of times. Let me tell you of a couple.
I was in the US Army way back in 1967 and 1968 and was lucky to be stationed in Germany instead of in Vietnam. To all of you college kids, that was the time during the Vietnam War that the US had the most troops in Vietnam and was suffering great casualty rates. I was an enlisted soldier and was at the Specialist 4 rank at that time. One of the duties that the enlisted soldiers had to perform was to pull guard duty every couple of weeks. This was a no-brainer activity and just involved standing around a motor pool of trucks with a rifle and not to let anyone enter the area. No one ever tried so it was basically standing around and being bored for a two hour shift, going to bed for four hours, and standing around for two more hours. You got the next day off so it was not terrible but did get cold in the winter months. Still, it was a heck of a lot better than having a VietCong shooting at you!
One of the guys in my unit, George Nugent, was from Sparks, Nevada. Now, Nugent was a very decent guy but just not the sharpest knife in the drawer. While on a 30 day leave between Army truck driver training school and assignment to Germany, Nugent married a topless dancer he had just met a few days before shipping out. The new Mrs. Nugent now automatically received an Army allotment check for half of PFC Nugent's monthly pay.
We also had non-commissioned officers in the unit. To all of you college kids again, these are the sergeants. They were at the E-5 (buck sergeant), E-6 (staff sergeant), E-7 (platoon sergeant), and E-8 (master sergeant/first sergeant). The staff sergeants were the most worthless of the lot. They were the "lifers" who could not function without the Army being their mother and father. Sergeant Lard was one of those E-6's. Sergeant Lard was an African-American who weighed in around 275, stood around 5 foot 8, and got winded running to the mess hall.
I stated earlier that PFC Nugent was not the sharpest knife in the drawer and was probably the IQ equal of Sgt. Lard. Neither liked each other at all.
One cold December night, PFC Nugent was assigned to guard duty and Sgt. Lard was the sergeant of the guard. The sergeant of the guard had to "post" the guard (take them to their post) and make the rounds a couple of times during the night to be assured the guards were on duty and not sleeping in the cab of a truck. Nugent was bundled up in his Arctic gear and was standing his post by the entrance of the motor pool for his second tour. The second tour was from 3 a.m. until 5 a.m. Sgt. Lard came around to be sure Nugent was on duty. Nugent heard Sgt. Lard and gave the proper challenge of "Halt, Who is there?" Sgt. Lard gave the proper response of "Sgt. Lard, the sergeant of the guard." At that point, Nugent was supposed to say, "Advance, Sgt. Lard, and be recognized." In reality, Nugent called out, "Smile,Lardo, so I can see you." This got blown out of proportion by the two of them at that time and Sgt. Lard pressed charges against Nugent for racism. Nugent received an Article 15 (non-judicial company level punishment) and lost some pay (the topless Mrs. Nugent still received her full amount) and confined to the barracks for a couple of weeks.
It is strange how this memory has stayed with me over the many years. I imagine that Sgt. Lard is now deceased due to some weight related problem and I imagine that PFC Nugent is still in the Reno area trying to impress another topless dancer.
posted by Ex-Fed @ 1:33 AM
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