Ed Freeman

[xoxoxoBruce]

The Vietnam War was and always will be a contentious issue. I know the pro and all the cons. I was vocally against it.
But that said, I appreciate the sacrifice of the people that had to endure it, and the heroism some displayed, in that war.

Ed Freeman

Imagine, you're an 18 or 19 year old kid. You're critically wounded and dying in the jungle in the I Drang Valley, 11-14-1965. Landing Zone X-ray , Vietnam . Your Infantry Unit is outnumbered 8 to 1, and the enemy fire is so intense, from 100 or 200 yards away, that your own Infantry Commander has ordered the Medi-Vac helicopters to stop coming in.

You're lying there, listening to the enemy machine guns, and you know you're not getting out. Your family is 1/2 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 distinctive sound of a helicopter, and you look up to see a Huey, but it doesn't seem real, because there are no Medi-Vac markings are on it.

Ed Freeman is coming for you. He's not a Medi-Vac pilot, so it's not his job, but he's flying his UH-1 Huey helicopter down into the machine gun fire, after the Medi-Vac choppers were ordered not to come.

He's coming anyway.

He lands in the middle of it all, then sits there absorbing the heavy machine gun fire. They load more wounded soldiers on board the now bullet riddled helicopter. Then he flies you up and out through the gunfire ... to the Doctors and Nurses ... and life.

And, he kept coming back ... 13 more times .. and took about 30 of your buddies who would never have never made it otherwise.

Medal of Honor Recipient Ed Freeman died last Wednesday at the age of 80, in Boise , ID ......May God rest his soul...