When Ever Duty Calls
Our Country To Be Free,
With A Thunderous Roar
We Will Ride Again, 11th Cavalry
We
few. We happy few. We band of brothers . . .
For he that sheds his blood with me this day, shall be my brother.
Welcome.
I'm Bob Hersey. I served with K Troop, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment
from April 1968 until April 1969. I am proud of my service with the
Blackhorse
Regiment in Vietnam and of the men whom I served with. This site is
dedicated to them - those who came home and those who did not.
While in K Troop, I photographed over 500 subjects
chronicling the lives of the Blackhorse Troopers - their courage, their
sacrifices, their triumphs and their heartaches. The
Photo
Gallery is a tribute to them.
If you explore nothing else on this website,
please at least visit the Photo
Gallery and see why the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment was the finest
fighting force of men in Vietnam.
In addition to taking over 500 photographs I sent
home to my parents 92
letters all of which are reprinted on this site HERE.
Like some of my buddies we had
audio tape recorders. I sent 22 tapes home to my folks. Excerpt,
including firefights, may be found
here .
What
else will you find here? Begin at
Base
Camp. This is your base of operations. At Base Camp you will
find the "meat and potatoes" of K Troop (sorry, I was a cook).
In the Orderly
Room you will find my 201 File, letters, DD Form 214, the daily report and
more. Hungry? Stop by the
Mess
Hall. The coffee's on and so is a little lighthearted humor.
Along your journey, you will find an informative
history
of the "Blackhorse Regiment" - the 11th Armored Cavalry.
In addition, you will find a tribute to K Troop's
fallen heroes on the Taps
page. See which Hollywood celebrity has joined the growing list of
contributors on Contributor's
Corner. Stop by the Motor
Pool and see why the VC called the M113A
- Armored Cavalry Assault Vehicle (ACAV) the - Green Dragon
and don't forget to visit the photo
gallery. The pictures tell the whole story of K Troop in Vietnam.
Feel like chatting with an old friend or like to make
new friends, enter K Troop's Chat
Room.
The
Honor Roll is dedicated to the 62 brave men
of K Troop who were killed in Vietnam. We honor their memory. Their names are
inscribed here that they might never be forgotten.
The 39th Annual Reunion of the 11th
ACVVC will be held in Omaha, Nebraska.
Hilton Omaha 1001 Cass
Street Omaha, NE 68102 For reservations visit
www.11thcavnam.com . By Phone
1-888-943-2768 before cutoff date of August 7, 2024 Group Code:
Armor/11thACVVC Room Rate $137.00 Single, Double, Triple, Quad
Self Parking $8.00 per day Compimentary Airport Shuttle Service
Lobby Bar and Lounge with Corner Market for on the go meals and
Starbucks.
Please watch this space for
further information or visit
HERE.
38th
Annual Reunion
Grand Rapids, MI 2023 September
18 - 24, 2023
Grand
Rapids, Michigan was the site of the widely attended 38th annual renuin of the
11th Armored Cavalry's Vetereans Of Vietnam and Cambodia held September
18-24, 2023. By all indications, it was a huge success with 63 K
Troopers family and friends in attendance. The host hotel was the beauiful
AmwayGrand Plaza Hotel, 187 Monrow NW,
Grand Rapids, MI 49503. Booking site is here
https://book.passkey.com/e/50392329.
A
ground breaking ceremony for the new 11th Cavalry Memorial took place on
Veterans Day, Tuesday, November 11, 2014 at 11:30 am at the site of the future
National Armor and Cavalry Museum in Columbus, GA. Construction
for the new memorial began in early 2015 and was dedication at the 30th annual reunion of the 11th ACVVC.
The
ground breaking was held in conjunction with the official dedication
of Pattons' Park (see pages one
and two
of the flyer). To see the video that
describe the plans, go
here.
The
park is a 750 foot walking trail featuring nine combat vehicle displays
tracing the development of armor from WW II to the present and a parking
area for 30 vehicles. It is located on Fort Benning Boulevard just outside
the gate at Fort Benning, GA and adjacent to the National Infantry Museum.
Please join us on Veterans Day for these two important events.
Search
the memorial for the names of the fallen
HERE at the official
memorial website of the Blackhorse Association.
To follow this
remarkable project's progress, Go
Here.
11th
Armored Cavalry In Vietnam - YouTube
Posted by
Zenoswarbirds
Found in 1971
Blackhorse Lighter Emerges
After All These Years
Rolf Hill returns from Italy in
'71
With Lighter In Hold Baggage
After returning from an assignment in
Italy, Army Specialist Rolf Hill found an unusual
item he didn't expect to find, a nearly new Blackhorse lighter. Rolf and
his wife, Jan kept the lighter all these years with the hope that it might
find its way back to its owner. They sent me the lighter for safekeeping
in K Troop's artifacts collection where it will be shared with our Blackhorse
family at our annual reunions.
Rolf writes, "I
was stationed in Italy ('70-'71). . . the only thing we can think of was that
the lighter was packed (by mistake) in my household goods when I returned to
Maryland. (It might have fallen out of someone's pocket into my stuff;
we don't know). Another possibility Rolf considers is that it could have
belonged to the "Colonel" who lived in the same apartment building as
Rolf.
Thank you Rolf and
Jan for caring for this important piece of our Blackhorse history all these
years and for sending it "home".
Congratulations to our Blackhorse brothers at
A Troop,11th
ACR, winners of the first Presidential Unit Citation awarded by the Obama
administration. Read More Here Video
Thunder Run
Pizza Run
Pizza
For
Our
Veteran
Patients
Dan Stroia began a pilot program over
3 years ago at the VA hospital in Phoenix, Arizona. The program
provides pizza and soda pop to the veteran patients at the Phoenix
hospital. Dan would like to take his program nation wide and invites all
members of the 11th Cavalry's Veteran Troopers of Vietnam and Cambodia to
join him in providing in their area VA hospitalized veterans with pizza
& soda pop.
If you would like to share in this very worthwhile project and put tons of
smiles on our fellow veteran patients faces then contact Dan and he will
give you all the details that you will need to begin a Thunder
Run Pizza Run at your area VA hospital. Dan says that the
only cost to you would be your time. Funds for the program may be
provided by veterans organizations such as the DAV, VFW, American Legion
and others. For additional information visit here
and look for entries 474 through 478.
Dan Stroia
K Troop 11th ACR, Vietnam '67-'68
8350 E. McKellips #158
Scottsdale, AZ 85257
Australian, Keiran Bailey
Finds Lighter On Australian Beach
38 Years in
the surf.
Keiran
Bailey of Victoria, Australia found this remarkably preserved lighter clearly
marked Black Horse with our distinctive Blackhorse patch on the face and on
the back, 11th CAV, Xuan Loc, Vietnam with the date, 1969-1970. Keiran
found it during the Australian summer of 1991-'92 while snorkeling in a place
called Congwong
Bay on the northern corner on the march larger Botany Bay, some 23 Kms
south of Sydney, and sent the lighter to me to
preserve and to share it with our Blackhorse brothers. Bill Lewellen, of
K Troop, is bring
this historic artifact to the 23rd Annual Reunion in Chicago of the 11th ACVVC
for everyone to see and marvel over.
Keiran writes that while snorkeling, he was looking for some
shells, rocks or sponge coral for his marine aquarium. He says that
while swimming along he noticed a metallic glint about 15 meters from the
shore. Upon investigation he notice the lighter wedged between the sand
and some pebbles in a crevasse about 15 feet deep with only the shinier base
of the light showing in the light of day. He recognized it immediately
as a Zippo lighter not unlike the one he himself owned. The lighter sat
in his undersea treasure collection until a year ago when he examine the
inscriptions, did a web search and sent in on to us here at Ktroop.com.
Inscribed on the bottom of the light are the words, "New
Oriental", presumably the manufacturer. The lighter has no personal
inscription so we can only wonder who might have lost it. In all likelihood
it was lost by a Blackhorse trooper while on R&R (rest & relaxation) in Sydney. If it did
wash from the shores of Vietnam all the way to Australia that would be an extraordinary
journey for this lighter to take, but I wonder?
Mr. Bailey writes in the letter that he enclosed with the
lighter, "I am very pleased and it makes me content to know that this
lighter is finally in its rightful place among its original owners. I
hope and pray it conjures up some good memories for your Blackhorse
buddies. I'm sure that if this lighter could talk it would disclose a
vast amount of incredible stories to share with us all".
I thank Mr. Bailey for sending the lighter along to us, at his
own expense, and after having done some creative internet investigative work
in locating us hear at K Troop, 11th ACR, Vietnam at Ktroop.com.
Sadly, in March of 2011, Keiran was
struck by a motorist and killed while riding his bicycle.
Your place in history at K
Troop's - Contributor's Corner.
See who has contributed their photos, stories, personal letters and more. Who knows,
you might see yourself in your buddy's photo. Do you have some of your own that you
would like to share? Send them along and I'll include them. For more details,
visit your corner of K Troop - Contributor's
Corner.
Your newest contributor - Errol
Brumm served as K Troop's maintenance sergeant in 1967-'68.
My Audio Tapes
Sent Home From Vietnam
I, like many of my
buddies, sent home audio tapes to loved ones. Some of us sent reel to reel and
others sent cassette tapes. I recorded mine on a Sony, portable desktop cassette
tape recorder. The recordings captured my impressions of the war and my service with
K Troop. Not only do they convey personal messages, exchanged with my mother and
father, they also contain radio transmissions, firefights, TV broadcasts and sounds of
Vietnam. I've chosen what I consider to be the best of the 22 tapes and placed them here. A fraction of the total are available now. New
excerpts are added each week.
Declaration of Support
We, combat
veterans of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment (Blackhorse), fought for the
United States of America in Vietnam and Cambodia. During this war against communist aggression, our nation was bitterly
divided and many American citizens rose in protest against our involvement. Members of our
armed forces were the objects of disdain and ridicule. We returned home to a national
landscape of public opinion and political division unchanged until the morning of
September 11, 2001.
See what Military.com is
saying about Bob Hersey and K Troop
in an article called, "Cooking For K Troop - My Life with the 11th Armored
Cavalry Regiment in Vietnam". Visit Military.com
today.
Yours truly
is making a splash at Seabeecook.com in a featured article on the Cooks & Bakers
page titled A Cook with the Blackhorse in Vietnam.
Visit Seabeecook.com today and discover more
about US Military - Cooks and Bakers.
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