A Picture of Courage

Medal  of  Honor Recipient, Captain  Ed  Freeman,

United States Air Force,

died last  Wednesday at the age of 70, in Boise, Idaho  .

May God Bless and  Rest His Soul.
I  bet you didn’t hear about this
hero’s passing,

but  we’ve sure seen a whole bunch  about
Michael Jackson and Tiger Woods.

**********************

You’re a 19 year  old kid.

You’re critically  wounded and dying in the  jungle somewhere in the Central  Highlands  of  Viet Nam . It’s   November 11, 1967.  LZ (landing zone)  X-ray.

Your unit is   outnumbered 8-1 and the enemy fire is so  intense, from  100 yards away, that  your CO (commanding officer) has   ordered the MedEvac 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  half 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 sound of a  helicopter.

You look  up  to see a Huey coming in. But … It doesn’t  seem real  because no MedEvac markings are on it.

Captain Ed  Freeman is coming in for you.

He’s  not MedEvac so it’s not his job, but he heard the radio call and  decided he’s flying his Huey down into the machine gun fire  anyway.

Even after the  MedEvacs were ordered
not to come. He’s coming  anyway.

And he drops it  in and sits there in the machine gun fire, as they load 3 of you at a time on board.

Then he  flies you up and out  through the gunfire to the doctors and nurses and  safety.

And,  he kept coming  back!! 13 more  times!!
Until all   the wounded were out. No one knew until the  mission  was over that the Captain had been hit 4 times in the legs and  left arm.

He  took 29 of you and your buddies out that day. Some would not have  made it without the Captain and his Huey.