Medals for Mel by, John Howsden

Sixty eight years ago Mel Og was a Twentyone year old Marine standing in the middle of the jungle on Bougainville with an axe in his hand getting ready to chop down a tree. Unbeknownst to Mel, a few miles away in another part of the jungle, a Japanese’s artillery crew was firing an artillery shell with Mel’s name on it.  The shell landed on the other side of the tree. Mel is living proof to the saying, “you never hear the one that gets you.” Although the tree he was about to chop down landed on top of him, it also saved him from being shredded by shrapnel. Instead he was knocked unconscious and suffered an injury to his collar bone.

He woke up in the First Aid station wrapped in a blanket with a fellow Marine sitting across from him shaking his head and saying, “I thought you were dead man, you weren’t even breathing when they brought you in.” Mel took a swallow of the rum the medic had given him to ease the pain and said, “Well I’m obviously not dead.” Mel healed and rejoined his outfit, but for some unknown reason he never received his Purple Heart. 

Mel didn’t complain about not getting his medal and instead went on with his life, thankful that he made it back home alive and well. However his son-in-law, Allen Gilbert, a Vietnam vet himself, knew about the oversight, he felt sixty some odd years was long enough to wait for the Department of Navy to remedy the situation.  Three times he wrote to the Department of Navy and three times he was ignored. Finally it was suggested that he write a letter to Congressman Dan Lungren for assistance. Within a few weeks of writing the letter, Constituent Service Representative Michelle Panos called Allen back.  Initially, Allen wanted to surprise Mel with the medal, but Panos explained that since Mel was still alive, only he could make the request. Mel made the request via Lungren’s website. Allen didn’t hear anything more about it until Mel called him one day and thanked him for getting him his medals.

With the Purple Heart medal in hand, along with five other medals, the only thing left to do was for someone to pin them on Mel’s chest. The ceremony was set for December 18^th.  Allen requested Congressman Lungren do the honors, but he will be in Washington then. Allen then respectfully requested the services of retired Colonel Fraser West, a retired colonel that had fought in the same jungle at the same time as Mel, although they had never met, for the honor of pinning the Purple Heart on Mel. Knowing the Colonel was in his mid nineties, he offered to drive him to the ceremony. The colonel instructed Allen he was quite capable of getting to the ceremony on his own.

So sixty eight years, one month and three days later, Mel will receive a medal that will remind him of how precious and capricious life can be.

A private ceremony for Mell will be held on December 18^{, 2011.}

Feather Dr.

in Copperopolis.