Calvin Murphy

Dec. 20, 2006

When the shooting stops in Iraq, it won’t necessarily end inside the heads of the soldiers.
Calvin Murphy, a Vietnam vet, knows that only too well.
He signed up for the Army in 1965, at the age of 17. He was intrigued by war – the excitement, the prospect of working his way up to the top as a “mustang.” He was stationed along the demilitarized zone between South Vietnam and North Vietnam, where troops were set up to block the enemy from slipping in supplies and troops.
Murphy was well respected, and was told he’d be soon promoted as sergeant. But he temporarily left his squad for a couple of days to guard the base. Shortly after he arrived, he heard rumors that the enemy was ready to attack en masse.
That night, he sat on a tank and heard a rustle—several North Vietnamese soldiers crawling on their stomachs. He couldn’t see them, but he could hear them whisper: “You no see morning, you die, you die.” He radioed his commander, asking for permission to shoot. Permission denied. More taunts, more soldiers; he called again. Permission denied twice more. The invaders snagged the barbed wire, setting off flares, and shooting erupted all around him. Lights flashed in the sky. Murphy began screaming, “Fire! Fire!” His memories stop there.
Murphy said he lost it psychologically, and his superiors decided to ship him out to a Japanese hospital to recover. Enroute, he learned his whole squad had been ambushed on Highway 9 and killed. He later learned they were blown out of a tank and landed on the road without weapons. The North Vietnamese ran them down, shot them in the head, and stuck cards in their mouths: “Yankee go home.”

GUILTY FEELINGS
In Japan, Murphy felt a wrenching guilt that he survived. Then another blow. A sergeant at the hospital said he thought he saw Murphy shoot an American tank. Murphy was stunned. Had he killed a fellow soldier? For decades he lived with the question—through two marriages, and a 20-year career with the National Park Service. “Then six years ago, I found my commanding officer and he said I did not hit anyone. That I did my job the way I’d been trained to do it.”
Murphy was in Vietnam for five-and-a-half months. He thought the worst was over, but when he returned home, he felt shunned by the government, his friends, even older veterans.
He tried to live a normal life, but he slipped into drinking and drugs. He even slept with a gun. Nights were the worst. He’d wake up and remember the screaming, the crawling soldiers, the faces of his old squad pals.
Finally in 1993, he decided to stop drinking. Without alcohol, his despairing thoughts overwhelmed him. “The worst thing that ever happened to me is when my mind cleared up. I started remembering things from war I hadn’t remembered for years.”

LIFELONG DREAM
A psychologist told him he’d need something to fill the void of drinking, so Murphy bought an Appaloosa horse -- a lifelong dream. And he remembered the advice of a vet: the best way to heal was to reach out to other vets.
He took it to heart. He has spent the last decade helping veterans in small ways, such as taking them to hospitals; and in larger ways, such as lobbying in the 1990s for a VA outpatient clinic in Traverse City. He now tells anyone suffering from post traumatic stress disorder to see Dr. Mike Hayes of Old Town Psychological Services.
“Living with PTSD is so hard. You have very intrusive thoughts and want to give up. You try to forget things of the war and they just stay there. You hear the shooting, screaming, the confusion, deafening sounds, then the aftermath. These things never go away and you have to learn to cope. For me it is isolation; I feel safe in the dark at night. I don’t get close to people because you always wonder if you will see them again, if they will live. Even though we are safe, you just can’t forget.”
Murphy also urges vets to seek help with the Veteran’s Health Administration, even though it’s frustrating to navigate, and it’s choked with applications.
“I always look for vets that are not in the VA system and talk them into it. They can get their medicines, have physicals, get screened for Agent Orange exposure, and get into some programs. For PTSD there is a VA program in Battle Creek that I have used several times myself.”

PLANTING A SEED
Murphy welcomes vets to his Bear Lake home to talk, get information, and spend time petting and riding his six horses. In the summertime, Murphy invites disadvantaged kids to come by for free horseback riding lessons to “plant a seed” of hope.
He also belongs to Pointman Ministries and serves as a chaplain for his local VFW post. And he spends a significant time on his court case so that veteran’s disability pay won’t go to ex-spouses.
“These things make me want to go on living. I was not with my squad when they were killed and I feel like I was not there for them, even though I know what would have happened if I was. So in some way, by reaching out to others and helping, seems to make up for that.
“Us soldiers in Vietnam had a saying, ‘Brothers then, brothers now,’ and that means a lot to me. We have to take care of each other, and in some very small way I am doing some good. Because for years I was no good.”