LZ Grant, May 12, 1969
Jeff Spenzer
Company C, 2/12th Cavalry
Until dark, I was hanging out with Al Christy at E Company. I went back to my position. I talked with the men for a while. I remember remarking how clear but dark it was. I put my air mattress out behind the bunker in the open. One man started guard duty on the bunker. I think the other two slept in a steel culvert covered with sand bags. I was awoken by Roy Lyles. He was the on guard. Roy was the gunner for our machine gun team. I was the assistant gunner. At about the same time mortar rounds started going off. I ran into the bunker. Roy and I set up the M-60 and attempted to fire we had some movement. I think the gun jammed Roy and I switched position, he unjammed the gun and I started to fire. It was very unreal. There were about 3 to 5 gooks out by the B-40 rocket fence. I remember firing on them and it seemed like they had surprised looks. There was some light from flares. I was so pumped up that I thought the machine gun was firing in slow motion. Roy and I switched positions and he resumed firing.
I felt something touching my leg that was shoved into the bunker from the firing port. I yelled to Roy and stepped toward the bunker door. As I went through the door an explosion pushed me out. I landed on my feet running. A former member our squad, who was in E Company Recon yelled what’s going on. I yelled gooks all over the place and took off running to our command bunker. I ran past the next bunker. The command bunker was two down. All of the men at the position I passed were killed.
I entered the command bunker and found it occupied by two other men. Harold Shaw was one of them. None of us had weapons, out platoon sergeant, Flash, and someone else were out side the firing port. A mini fire fight was going on over the entrance to the bunker we were told a gook was crawling toward us. Flash handed his shotgun to Harold. He attempted to shoot the gook but the shotgun was not loaded. I was pretty shook up and remember setting in the corner of the bunker just holding my head and staring. A little while later, that section was secured and we got out of the bunker. We found weapons. I was still pretty shook up. Our medic asked where Roy was and I told him I did not think he made it. Lucky I was wrong, but Roy did loose his foot.
It seemed we got control finally. I picked up an extra M-16 and Lt. Kopec said we were needed on line.
As dawn approached a Quad 50 approached our position and opened fire. When he stopped, a gook got up running, he was inside the wire. His one hand was just hanging, almost shot off. Many opened up on him but no one hit him someone yelled cease fire and a medic went out the captured him. The next day, where the Quad 50 opened up, it looked like ground beef. Their were bodies around our position, one with the back of his head blown open.
There were also bodies by the B-40 rocket fence where we had opened up with our M-60. The rest of the day was spent building a new fighting position.
Some engineers came to our former bunker. There was a live bangalore torpedo in it, that is what I felt hit my leg. The engineers put some C-4 on the torpedo and blew it up in place. The roof of the bunker rose about 4 feet into the air and the bunker was destroyed.
I am sure I have some of the details wrong but it was a long time age and I do not like to dwell on that night.
Webmaster note: Company C lost three men during the May 12th attack on LZ Grant, Michael Dominkowitz, Curtis Hardin and William Jerse.