Just by chance I came across your article on Long Binh.
I was stationed as a medic, across the sreet from LBJ, at the
24th Evac Hospital.
I remember we had a VIP, in a secluded little room, after the
riot.He did have a head wound of some sort.
I was one of the corpsmen allowed to go in his room.
I remember the MP at the door.
I am assuming it was Col. Johnson .
Thanks for the article.It brought back a memory.
Mel

By Mel Libby on Oct 28, 2008 at 9:44 am

I’m looking for any vets who worked at the prisoner of war
hospital in long binh. I believe it was the 5oth medical clearing
company and then the 74th evac.

By Georgann on Nov 13, 2008 at 3:57 pm

I was with the 557 mp co just a few days in country when the last riot that I ever recall at the LBJ. It was a scary and never forgetting experience Then spent time as a guard for maybe a month before patroling Bien Hoa and doing just about anything else that we did. I want to thank all the guys who share their vietnam experience on the internet. Wish I could hear from Patrick Morelo from Brooklyn NY or all who remembers that tme and place.

Bob Gillum from Muncie In

By Bob Gillum on Dec 23, 2008 at 10:46 am

Hi!
Came across your article several years after it was published. Several important parts of the overall story have yet to be told. Most of us MPs despised wotking at LBJ as it was a no win situation. The prisoner’s were all “innocent” and to a man all claimed they were “victims” not criminals. Please note that these men were not being held because of accumulated past due parking tickets or passing bad checks. Murder, attempted murder, assault, attempted or even successful “fraggings” were more the norm. During the rioting, media people had a lot a lot of freedom and access to the disaster in the making. The inside of the prison was visible to them as the inmates had burned much of the privacy canvas sheeting that covered the fences. As the 557th CBR specialist I had prepared four tank sets (Looked like flamethrowers) of CS gas in case we had to go in (two did not works as the humidity had caked up the CS in the reservoir tank). I expected to have several MPs in front of me as we moved into the stockade as I was blind on two sides and rear from the special gas mask I was equipped with. I remember Murdock as a no nonsense type and he walked up to me and told me “get your self up on the point and fall back and get another tank when this one is dry.” One of the 720th officers agreed with me that the best plan would be to spray each of the many underground bunkers as the phalanx moved into the inner compound where the rioters had set up what really looked like a third world primitive village. As we flushed prisoners out of the bunkers, many home made weapons came with them, the most common being toothbrush handles with a half a razor blade melted onto one end of the handle. Many steel bunk post adaptors that had been sharpened and made into spears and knives were taken. Razor and concertina wire was found hangin just inside the entrance to many of the huts so it could be pulled down to ensnare MPs entering the “hootches.” As soon as I ran out of CS we began using baseball CS grenades in place of the CS gas unit. At no time was a prisoner sprayed directly with gas, nor did I ever see a grenade thrown directly at an inmate. It usually goes unmentioned that many prisoners were brutalized, beaten and assualted by other inmates and some appeared to bleeding to death or severely injured. We had some problems with non-prisoners attempting to drive by LBJ and throw razor blade packages and dope over the wire to them. Many of the inmates were as shocked as we were by what had occurred. Fortunately I had but one more week of working in that place (The LBJ duty was rotated with town patrol, road security, reaction force duty) and got to act as driver to Colonel DeRuz, assistant 18th MP Brigade commander, even got some Huey time when DeRuz and Bde. Commander Gustafson made frequent inspection flights into the brigade TAOR. It should be mentioned that the 615th MP Co. and the 557th MP Co were shoulder to shoulder with the 720th. “Of the Troops and for the Troops.”

Best Regards,

R. Munshower

By Robert Munshower on Jan 17, 2009 at 11:32 am

I worked at the 24th Evac. Hosp accross the street in 1966-67. I remember a riot happening in either late 1966- or early 1967.

By Bill O'Dell on Jan 17, 2009 at 10:08 pm

If you have an interest in learning more about the LBJ Riot, may I suggest Long Binh Jail : An Oral History of Vietnam’s Notorious U. S. Military Prison by Cecil Barr Currey . You’ll have a chance to read ” other side of the story” .. from the perspective of some of the prisioners .. as well as first hand accounts of some of the cadre .

As one of the many nurses who cared for the dozen or so patients brought to the 24th Evac Hosp who suffered severe head injuries from the LBJ riot .. I have always considered it the “darkest” , saddest days I spent in Vietnam ..

Cathie , former ANC 2Lt , 24th Evac Hosp

By Cathie Solomonson on Jan 27, 2009 at 2:03 am

I was assigned to the 557th MP Co when the stockade was still at Pershing Field, Saigon. We had an uprising there in early 1966. In addition after the stockade was moved to Long Bihn there was a riot in the late 1966/1967 time period also as the guy from the 24th Field Evac hospital said. I remember one of the MP’s in our squad getting his arm broken. If I remember right a black Major from the 95th MP Bn in charge of the stockade helped put the rebelling blacks in their place with wording not tolerated today..

By Daryl Achenbach on Feb 20, 2009 at 9:51 pm

I was with the 615th MP Company. Some of us had just finished our shift on highway patrol and were escorted over to LBJ that night to serve as what I thought was reinforcements. We stood outside the main gate and were then ’selected’ by one of the officedrs you mentioned – not sure at this date, but we , the615th MP’s, were some of the first to enter the stockade in a ‘V” formation. We were on point. I did not know the casualty rates but the story seems correct in all that we witnessed and endured. I do not remember fixing bayonets and I do remember an NCO taking my ammo clips from me and we never locked and loaded our M-14s. In the point of the ‘V’ we used them in unison as clubs when the prisoners would rush us.

By David Kerkhoff on Feb 21, 2009 at 3:46 pm

I was and inmate at LBJ during March and April 1967. There was a riot on Easter Sunday. It lasted several hours. It was very scary, those rioting used bunk adaptors to beat anyone who did not join in the riot. The gaurds then came in with bayonets in a flying wedge. Most of us were caught in the middle. We were tear gassed and the riot came to an end. The tear gass accumulated in the water tank and for a few days we got tear gas when we showered.

By Nate Ford on Apr 24, 2009 at 2:58 am

In August 1968 I was assigned to the 11th Trans Battalion stationed at Cat Lai, VN. I was the first Black officer assigned to the unit since it was established in 1936 in Philadelphia. The SGM was from Philadelphia and gave me the history of the unit because he was there at its inception. The hatred I immediately experienced from many of the southern officers was shocking. Our subordinte units were overwhelmingly Black but regardless of MOS qualifications Blacks and Hispanics were not allowed to ser serve in any capacity except as cargo humpers on ships. We had our own race problems and riot alerts at about the same time as the Long Binh riot. I have often said some day I would tell the story of my year in Vietnam. My unit received a few of the Blacks following the riot and were told by intelligence that they were suspected of inciting the riot but there was insufficient evidence to cout martial them. As a Black officer in that remote location in 1968 I have often revisted in my mind the horrors I witnessed at Cat Lai. Thank God my Bn commander and XO ran a tight ship and by the regulations. There were also a few other decent fellow officers there. But soon after my assignment a few of the white unit commanders let it be known that if they caught any of them socializing with me after duty hours they would be give nastier assignments. And since some of units were LCM’s that sometimes mad insertions on the Cambodian border they did not want any unnecessary exposure to danger. They came to me and told me it was nothing personal but they could not take a chance alienating their southern commanders.

I spent ten months at Cat Lai under those circumstances. Most of my white contemporaries could not safely interact with me except during the duty day. I just happened upon this artice today and am pleasantly surprised to learn that it surfaced in 2004.

By Leon Bordelon III on May 9, 2009 at 3:46 pm

If I recall correctly, the worst thing about being sent to LBJ was that your time served there was “bad time”, which is to say it did not count towards the year you had to spend in Vietnam. Upon leaving LBJ and rejoining his company, a former prisoner still had as much time left in country as he had before going to LBJ. The guy from my company who was sent to LBJ was sent for going AWOL. He had a girlfriend in An Khe he couldn’t stay away from.

By Charles Church on May 27, 2009 at 1:40 pm

what appeared to be brutality was a lifesaving response of a guard or the physical restraint or movement of a belligerent inmate.

I was an inmate incarcerated in silver city. I did not participate in the riot. All inmates were locked up in solitary confinement. Those of us who were put into the silver painted connexs, were told that we would be returned to the barracks when they were rebuilt. I was from california and so was the Staff Sargent in charge of the connexs. My first night I was taken from my connex. The Ssgt said I was a diagrace to his great state. He hit me twice with his batton, cutting me under my left eye. Being a stupid person, I forced myself to laugh at him. Then, 3 mps beat me until I couldn’t walk. The next day the chaplin was walking the compound. He came and saw me, The Major said I needed a doctor. I never got to see a docotr, and because I was labeled beligerent. That was so they could explain my condition. My food rations were cut to 25% of a regular soldier. I weighed 165 lbs, after 6 months there I was 125Lbs. I ask only one question?
When will the real truth about Viet Nam be told??

By C.J. Maffei on Jul 27, 2009 at 8:04 pm

I was stationed at Dak To. We were getting ready for a helicopter mission. All of a sudden there stood one of our guys that had been doing a short tour at LBJ. I questioned him on his “early” release. He told us of the riot. He had came to his favorite medic to get checked out. He looked like a racoon…his face had been pummelled…he was so dark around the eyes. I asked “what the hell”? He (white) was tied to a tent pole and was being questioned. One of the inmates (black) had repeatedly told my guy to call him “Black Beauty”. Every time he refused he was hit in the face. So after a few punches the GI that was hitting him said “why not”. The tied up inmate replied with “I can’t, Black Beauty was a horse”. That is when he really got worked over. My guy was kind of a comedian…obviously his attacker was not amused. That is my memory of the riot.

By John Trotogott on Aug 14, 2009 at 2:25 pm

My comment is for C.J. Maffei:
Why were you put in LBJ ?
And for Leon Bordelon, I was not in LBJ but I had almost the opposite experiance you had, the white men which I am one were doing all of the work while the Blacks were getting stoned and telling all that it was whities war and they didn’t have to do nothing! Remember the Detroit riots? Do they seem simalar to LBJ? Who started those?

By Ken Bentley on Nov 17, 2009 at 12:26 pm