"Dog" stayed "Dog" for several weeks and made every step I made unless she was mooching at the mess hall or chasing rats. A small brown dog, maybe 20 pounds, she was not much larger than some of the rats she chased.
After she went to the bush with us for the first time, she came back as "Point." Obviously, she had never heard the command, "heel." Ranging in front of our patrols, she reacted to any residual smell of a Vietnamese by freezing with her tail stiff and bristled.
She led us to several rice caches and recently placed booby traps. She was never bothered by small arms fire or artillery--outgoing or incoming.
Until I came to Vietnam, there had never been any time in my life that I had not had a dog. Both my parents loved dogs and there were usually several in and around the house. Point and I became inseparable. Pictures of her went back with my letters home and I was short enough to begin thinking about ways to get her home with me. Dog biscuits came from my Aunt Jane in Vero Beach, FLA. Other grunts contributed doggie treats sent by their families back in the World. In the field, her favorite C-rat was ham and eggs with pound cake for dessert. On rotation out of the bush, she always made a bee-line to the mess hall where after ingratiating herself with the mess sergeant, she would make up for bush time and drag herself back to sleep off her food bloat.
At first light, well fed and rested, she was ready to go rat hunting. Sniffing, digging and barking, she would soon have panic stricken rats fleeing from bunkers in all directions. The grunts loved the entertainment and joined in the hunt by throwing their K- Bars at the fugitive rats with occasional success.
She was as much a grunt as the rest of us but her tour ended on February 25, 1971 on a rice paddy dike as we were approaching a village in the Arizona Territory to search for rice caches. As usual, she had the point and was about 40 meters in front of us when she triggered an anti-personnel mine. She died instantly. There was no time to mourn, then. We just grunted on.
This began what was the most unforgettable three days of my two tours in country.
