Richard The Snake

Posted By
Johnnie J, United States

I read above where a man shot a coffee cup that was sitting in front of a Jap soldier while he was taking a morning dump. I have a story just about the same.

When I was in Nam in May of 1967 my Sergent and I were alone about 3 miles behind our lines. We were looking for a place to advance the next day with the rest of the company to dig out Charly. As we crossed a log my Sergent put his foot right down on a snake that had to be 7 foot long. He shot his m16 about 25 times and never hit the snake!
But when we walked about 15 feet into the thick jungle we found two Viet Cong lieing there dead. I started looking very hard to see if there were any more around.

In another 10 feet there was one more sitting there with his hands up and had been shot in his butt. I speak good Vietnamese and all he said was give up! give up! After a moment I ask him where was their company? He said they all ran when we started shooting.

To make the story short. My Sergent never hit the snake but he killed two men and had shot the other one right in the butt. We just figured if it hadn't been for that dang snake we would have been walking into a death trap within another 15 feet! Everyone called him snake from then on until he was killed. And I would have never been able to tell all of you this story.

My Sergent didn't get to see the U.S.A. again, he was killed fourteen days later about a mile from where he shot at the snake.

Always remember Richard the snake!