[John Sabato]

Ron, I had a friend like that in the Army. His name was SSG Leslie Braz...

A great friend and fellow gun enthusiast... he quietly reported to Fort Ritchie Maryland during my first tour there returning from his only tour to Vietnam...

A "fixed station" communications electronics-crypto maintenance guy by MOS... like me... he was quiet, soft spoken, and seldom did anything but his duty...

I never saw him in civilian clothes... on those occasions when I visited him at his quarters, he wore cut-off fatigues, and an OD t-shirt... we'd play Pinnocle a lot on long 12 hour shifts in the communications center... He never talked about Vietnam... He was a "real" soldier. A patriotic man of honor and ethics.

...about 2 years after he reported for duty at Fort Ritchie, and a month before I shipped out there was a Retirement and Awards Ceremony in which we both participated in formation as observers...

After the retirees were honored came the awards...

When his name was called to report to the Command formation, he acted very surprised and told me he had no idea what it was about.

He was awarded the Bronze Star for Valor...

THough I don't recall the words of the citation, I do remember the discussion of the Post Commander as he was presented the medal. It seems that when he would complete his regular 12-hour shift in the "Fixed Station" communications center, that he would walk on down to the local airfield, and fly door gunner on an armed Huey...

When questioned by me about the medal, he just said that he needed to keep busy to stay out of trouble, and he figured those air crews worked a lot harder than he did... so he would take turns relieving them for sorties when he wasn't working or sleeping... He never spoke about his experience again... and wouldn't give details about why he earned the medal he didn't even know he had been submitted for...


After surviving that combat tour as a fixed station C-E maintenance NCO, he came back stateside and quietly went about his duties in a manner which was an example to all who worked with and for him... One thing that always puzzled me about him was that he was always mooching something or another... cigarettes, half of somebody else's snack... rides, even though he owned a car (a rusty 1952 Chevrolet)... He was married in the fall of 1972... just before I left.

His existence all became clear in the spring of 1973, when I was notified by message in East Africa that he had been killed while walking down the side of a State Highway 35 in New Jersey in the pouring rain... sideswiped by a car. He only drove when he absolutely had to...because everyone thought he was too cheap to buy gas...

Turns out that before he was married, most of his paycheck went to pay insurance premiums with his nieces and nephews as the beneficiaries... he parents were already gone... he figured that if he died in the line of duty, that his only heirs should have the benefit of his existence... He left over a $1,000,000 insurance estate to his new wife, and the daughter he would never see... as he changed his beneficiary right after he was married of course...

That is the type of guy he was... he is gone, but not forgotten... at least by me.

His widow had no shortage of potential suitors ( a million bucks in 1973 money was a lot more than it is now)... and married and moved away about two years later...