Onkwehonwe Veterans: Reflections of Pride & Service to Their Country

Veterans Day, or Remembrance Day is celebrated in the United States and Canada on November 11^th of every year, in honor and remembrance of veterans living and passed who have served their country.  This day is for thanks giving towards all veterans, living or deceased, with special emphasis on living veterans who’ve served their country honorably during war time or peace.

Once referred to as “Armistice Day,” November 11^th marks the anniversary of the end of World War I.  WWI ended on November 11^th, 1918, and Congress passed a resolution  for annual observance of this day in 1926.  As a result of WWI, Native Americans were offered the opportunity to apply for US Citizenship, if they wanted to do so.

So, all Native American Veterans that served in WWI, or any war prior to, served the US as non-citizens on a voluntary basis.  Many vets were awarded medals of honor decades after their service, or posthumously.   It was not until the Indian Citizenship Act was passed in 1924 that Native Americans were given citizenship to their own lands they had strived to live for many generations.  This also opened the doorway for Natives to be signed up for the draft.

Since the time of European contact, Native Americans have been fighting for this land, this country and its freedoms many take for granted.  The pride the indigenous warriors hold for this land has carried on proudly throughout the generations.  Despite the countless injustices toward Native Americans, all remain proud to have served their country.  Ranging from age 21 to age 85, these stories all differ from one another, but all of them have one thing in common: Pride.

Sergeant Dwight Bero Sr., United States Army, 1978 – 1985 

I served in the US Army for 7 years, from 26 September 1978 to 17 September 1985.  I was a machinist, and when I was in Korea we were rear area support for second infantry division, so we had to handle everything from heavy equipment, trapped vehicles, medical/dental equipment, things for the mess hall, kitchen stuff. That was our most wide array of things because whatever came in we had to handle. We had the only rail head north of Seoul, so everything that was coming up towards the DMZ came to our little compound first.  We had to unload it, we had do everything, but we had to manufacture a lot of special tools. That was a really great deal because a lot of things had to be precisely manufactured, even computer accessories for the world-wide telecommunications system; they had a piece of plastic that was broken, this whole computer system was down and we made one out of aluminum.  The very first time that they brought it they said, “Can you make this?”, and I said, “Yeah, it’ll take me about 45 minutes.” So when I was done, I gave it to them, and they said, “Oh well where that’s nice and smooth right there, that’s the broken off part.”  I go, “Well I didn’t know that, you asked me if I could make this, so I made them a perfect broken part. I told them now that I know that this whole thing is supposed to be threaded, slotted, and grooved like that then I’ll make another one and it won’t take me nearly as long.  But to me, that was a great thing that I made a perfect broken part.

I went away to school in Vermont, and then I went to St. Lawrence University.  I didn’t finish at St. Lawrence because basically my couple years away at High School satisfied my yearning to expand, so by the time I was at SLU I was just tired of school.  I came home I got a summer job, I started making money, but during the course of that summer there was no job market.  Eighteen of us went into the service at the same time, and so for me leaving home wasn’t a big deal because everybody else was leaving too.  I wasn’t going to be missing anything here because everybody was gone, and the guys that were still here, when we came home 7 years later, were still doing the same thing, so we didn’t miss out on anything.  I got to travel the world, I got valuable job experience, I got very good job offers, and when I got done I had a nice working resume.  For me, that satisfied a lot of things and it actually laid out the rest of my life, and I attribute that to the experiences I had over there.”

Corporal Phillip Tarbell, United States Marines, 1959 – 1963 

I joined right out of high school in 1959.  I served 4 years, and got out in 1963.  It was a long four years, but I learned a lot, I went to a lot of different places, and I enjoyed it, I really did.  I have a lot of favorite memories, but I think the most striking one was getting ready to invade Cuba.  It was two weeks setting aboard ship in 1962 just to prepare for an operation like that, to sit there and wait on the water aboard ship someplace off the coast of Florida.  Now we look back and here it was 55 years ago that this happened, and still something that’s in the news; we just recognized Cuba again.  We did go to Cuba on several occasions, and were on standby here and there.  Every time Castro would shut the water off, a company or platoon had to go down to Guantanamo Bay to reinforce the perimeter.  Then you see a movie like, A Few Good Men, and you look back and say, “I was on that perimeter.  We were there when there were just foxholes, there weren’t bunkers.”

It was a growing process, it was a learning process, and I learned a lot about discipline, which helped later in life.  I went into college after I got out, but I became an ironworker for a year before I got a scholarship to go on to college, and got my degree.  It’s been a nice ride.  I look back fondly on the times I was in.  I was glad I got out when I did.  I got out in 1963, and if you remember your history, in 1963 they started the war in Vietnam.  So when everybody was trying to run away from the war, I was in college, I was protesting the war, and my service was then behind me.  I was lucky in a way.

Like most of our community, I came out of good ole Salmon River with a degree in high school math and science, and was qualified to do absolutely nothing.  When I hit the job market I realized there was nothing out there.  So I looked at the services and the one that caught my eye and thought I’d be the best at was the Marines.  I went in in July, so Parris Island in July, it’s hot, it’s miserable, and mosquitoes, everything like that.  Home was Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.  We had a lot of fond memories.

Sergeant Cheryl Jacobs, United States Marines; June 1983-1987 ; United States Army 1987-1990; Army National Guard 1 year; 8 years military service 

I went into the Marines of June 1983, and I served 4 years in the Marines.  I got out of the Marines and barely had a two month break, and joined the Army.  The break between the Marines and the Army, the jobs in the community were scarce to what your profession, it was known as your Military Occupational Specialty.  I was Supply in the Marines, and when I went into the Army, it was Supply/Unit Armorer; because I dealt with small weapons; mostly the M16 and the Beretta.  I served a total of 7 years, and when I got out in 1990, when I became a police officer, I did one year in the Army National Guard also.  So, I kind of got three branches under my belt.  I’ve got a total accredited 8 years of military service.

I was stationed in New River, Marine Corp Air Station down in North Carolina, and I did one year in Okinawa, Japan.  From Okinawa, Japan I did an exercise in Korea, and I got to experience the DMZ of South Korea, the Demilitarization Zone of North and South Korea. That was quite an experience; of course I got in trouble for just leaning on the wall on the North Korea side.  I got yelled at basically, not in serious trouble anyways.  I would have to say the exercise of having gone to Korea is one of my highlights of my career, because that’s where I really got the experience of being out in the field, and living in the field for three months.  I would have to say the Army was less stringent than the Marines, so in the end I liked the Army a lot better.  I loved the service, and one of the most thrilling experiences was getting to play for both the United States Marine Corps Volleyball, and the United States Army Volleyball teams.  They compete against the other branches of the service, and try to go after the national armed forced title, which can take you to the national tournament of all volleyball against top universities, etc.

The reason I went into the service was because I got in a fight with my sister, and had already gone to college, and graduated from college in Toronto.  I had gone to SUNY Cortland to be a Phys Ed teacher.  But when I got in a fight with my sister, I smartened up, drove up to Malone, NY and I said, “If I’m gonna fight with anybody, it ain’t gonna be my family!”  So I went to the recruiting station, and the only thing that was open was the Marines.  I said, “Sign me up! If I’m going to fight anybody, put a gun in my hand, I’ll fight the enemy.  My family will not be my enemy.”  Those are some of my highlights of being in the service.  What I got out of it was basically; I learned time management and I’m a very structured person because of it.  That discipline that was instilled in me taught me to be a very structured individual in the jobs that I’ve held to my current position, in which it led me to display and prove to the community my leadership abilities, to having been elected in a political realm on the Northern portion of the territory, and now on the Southern portion, and I am the first female in Akwesasne to have done that.  I have to credit what I’ve gotten out of the military to my demeanor to the community to leadership.  That’s a trait that I’m pretty proud about, that I’ve served on both sides of our elective systems.

Sergeant Thomas V. Herne “The Chief”, United States Marine Corps 1949 – 1953  

After graduation, all of my buddies, Buddy Bero, Donald White, and all the ones that grew up together, we all graduated and we were going to go in the service.  But my dad had a milk route and I told him I’d stay with him, because he was busy in the summer time.  He had a lot of work, so I told him I’d stay with him until the fall.  By then, they’d gone in the Army, and I couldn’t catch up to them anyway.  Then I heard about the Navy, they had a better deal than the Army.  That was the place to go because you could learn a trade like machinist, or whatever.  So I went to Potsdam, NY to join the Navy, and I took the IQ test and the guy looked at it and said I can’t believe this.  I said what do you mean? He said, “You got a perfect score.  I’ve been at this for I don’t know how the hell many years, but that’s the highest I ever saw a ranking.”  I was right out of high school, and reading every day.  That Reader’s Digest was the thing to read, and I love to read.  Anyway, he said, “Boy I hate to lose you, but my quota is filled, but I could probably send you to Syracuse.  Or next door we’ve got the Marine Corps; they’re always looking for a few good men!”  Way back then that was their slogan.  So I went over there and he called this guy up, and the recruiter came right over, “Come on over here Mr. Herne!”  They were happier than hell to have me.  I went in there and there was nothing to it.  I had already taken the test, but they gave me another one.

After that, I came home and waited the two weeks or so, and then made it to Albany.  I met these guys from Malone, and all along the way we went on the bus, I think it was the Trailway.  Everyone was boozin’, back then everybody drank beer.  Each recruiter knew what the score of their recruit was, and they’d call ahead ya know, like “Thomas Herne is at 97 percent”, or whatever the rating was at the time.  We picked up these miners on Lyon Mountain, big guys.  They all get on the bus, they’re all gung-ho, they thought they were going to take on the world.  They asked, “Well who’s in charge?”  I said, “Right here.”  They said, “YOU? How the hell did they get the smallest guy in the whole group?”  I said, “Well they weren’t looking for size, they were looking for brains!”  Boy we got along good.  It was years later, when Warren Gorrow was still with us, we were at a Knights of Columbus, and one of them buddies were there, I couldn’t believe it!  We got into the booze; I left my hat there that night!  Toni wasn’t too proud of me when I got home!

There are a lot of fond memories of the USMC.  One of the nicest places I was ever in, I shouldn’t even have been in.  That was when Captain Bill Cook (Brother of Andrew W. Cook) came over to camp Lejeune, he had an old beat up Dodge, Club Coupe, looked like an antique all banged up, two door.  There weren’t many nice cars then, but it was really a piece of shit.  If you were on the base, the enlisted men had white and blue little tags on their cars.  Bill had the red one on that car, which was for officers, but when you saw that plate you had to salute.  It was something to see, he had that old clunker and there it was getting saluted.  Then he came over to the base and he wanted to take me to the Officers Mess, and asked if I had a civilian suit.  I said, “No, but I can get one.  I’ll just call my mom and she’ll send it down to me.”  We went there and talk about night clubs, ya know.  It was in LIFE Magazine, right around that time, the Officers Club in Camp Lejeune was as nice as any night club in New York or California.  The women there were dressed up, and the bands that they’d get, they got the best!  But it was something to be there.

After we went to the Officers Mess, it maybe cost him about five bucks to stay there, which was about a fraction of the cost of a hotel room.  But he says, “No sense me spending my good money, you gotta sack in your barracks?”  So we pulled up in that old Dodge Club Coupe, and when we got to the door everybody was sitting around in their skivvies, but they all had stand up to attention and salute!  Bill just said, “At ease, I’m just one of the boys.  I’m with your buddy “The Chief.”  That was something.

Corporal Buddy Bero, United States Army 1949-1952/3  

I joined right out of high school.  I was playing baseball for the Hogansburg Chiefs, me and Donald White, we joined together.  I don’t know, I just graduated from high school and just joined that all.  Nothing else to do.  They asked me what I wanted to be, I said don’t know, and they asked what I took in high school.  I said business courses, and they said, “Put him in the infantry.”  So that was it.  I took a test to become Sergeant, and I got third highest.  We went in front of the board, there was 15 of us, and they asked me, “What plans you got for the military?”  I said I don’t have any; I want to finish my enlistment and get out.  They promoted everybody but me.  Then the next month I got discharged.  They were gonna promote me if I had reenlisted.

After you got out you look at it, it wasn’t that bad really.  In Korea it was kind of tough.  We landed in Poongsan when the war first started, and we pushed up through.  I remember we went 14 days we were in the troop ship on the ocean.  Them Navy guys were laughing at us, the Army guys were sick.  So then we landed there, they were all sure shelling; jeez I said, them Navy guys aren’t too bad after all.

We went all the way up to Seoul.  When we got there we started in North Korea, and went up to the Yellow River.  You think it’s cold here, boy it was cold there.

When I got back I got assigned to Walter Reed, to work in the x-ray department.  I scheduled x-rays for generals, and colonel’s wives.  They had stacks of them.  Then I had guys from Korea that lost their arms and legs.  Walter Reed its all ramps, you know, up and down those stairs.  You see the guys go in and go to work, or see guys sitting there pulling themselves up a ramp.  One time I grabbed a guy’s wheelchair and started pushing him up to help him out.  He says, “What the hell do you think you’re doing, you think I’m crippled?”  He had no legs, no arms.

Private Dylan Durant, United States Marine Corps., 2016 – Present 

I’ve always wanted to help others.  The same reason I joined the Fire Department lead me to joining the Marine Corps.  Something has always drawn me to looking out for others and has become a good quality in the service.  I serve so that others can live in peace, and not have to worry because there are people out there who will stand for them.  I had plans to enlist out of high school.  For as long as I can remember I wanted to join the military.  Initially I planned on the Army, but time after time decided against it, and eventually found that the Marines were where I wanted to go.

The military provides a rite of passage and allows many to mature and gain life skills that take years to develop in the civilian world.  For myself it was a chance to do something I’ve always wanted to, a chance to travel and become a leader and purely a sense of pride and patriotism.  There have been plenty of times I question my decision but I have yet to regret it.  The Corps has given me more opportunities and experiences that I would have never had otherwise.  I am thankful for being able to serve my country, my people, and myself.  I couldn’t be prouder to say that I’m a United States Marine.

The thing I love the most about the military is the brotherhood/sisterhood.  The amount of people I’ve met since enlisting is outstanding, and the bond that is created is like no other.  You create friendships over months at a time and become closer than you ever thought imaginable.  It comes with both sides though as it makes it that much harder to say goodbye to those you spent every day with.  It also amazes me to see the transformation these Marines make from civilian to Marine, or fresh and timid to confident and hard working.  We suffer and persevere together.  It’s an amazing feeling to be willing to do anything for those around you and to be able to trust them to do the same for you.

Specialist, Rodney Reyome, United States Army 1989 – 1996 

I come from a family full of veterans.  My father, uncles, and cousins.  My favorite memory is the brotherhood, the only time I knew I had someone’s back and they had mine.

Rodney D. Tarbell, E5, United States Navy 1983 – 1987  

I joined the Navy because I had relatives serving.  My best memories were the overseas sights.

Robin Tarbell, E4, United States Navy 1988 – 1992 

I joined because my brother Rod went in the Navy and I wasn’t the scholarly type!  I’m not religious, but one of my favorite memories was going to the Vatican.

Private First Class Bobbi Jo Cook, United States Army, 1985 – 1987

I enlisted basically because my college fell through.  My mother said, “Well, you’re not sitting around Jo, go get a job.”  So I went to Massena, NY and I joined the Army.  So, I could have took two weeks, or six months.  So I took the six months, then went down to Fort Jackson, South Carolina for13 weeks of basic training.

Favorite memories of serving include my first duty station was in Germany, just unreal.  The people , the friendships, and just the common sense and common knowledge that I learned over there in what it was to be a service person.  How dedicated, and how important it is.  You don’t realize when you’re out what Veteran’s day is about, or you don’t  think about it as often, I find, until you’re in there.

I had a nice company.  I was in a signal company, communications.  I got to travel; my first Christmas was spent in Denmark, I got to spend it with a family.  There were 25 of us in different homes.  We met up that first Christmas night in the bar, and we were singing.  It’s just such a comradery over there with the townspeople.  It’s just a different atmosphere, very outgoing.

All in all, it was a great experience.  Wish I could do it all over again to tell you the truth.  I find if people don’t go to college, I think they should go in the service.  It’s a paycheck too, but I think it’s a learning experience.  You have to go in there being a little physical, and be comfortable holding a weapon.  Got to play softball over in Germany too.

You’re on call 24/7, it doesn’t matter.  I never got to go home until I got discharged.  I think came home in between once before I flew over.

Alvin “Tuffy” Delisle, E4, United States Army, 1963 – 1966 

I had no special reason that I enlisted.  I was a young boy, 18/19.  In Kahnawake there was nothing here for a young man.  Just one day I got up and wanted to enlist in the US Army, no special reason.  No regrets.  After boot camp I went to Korea for one year.  That was my first tour of duty.  I served 12 months there.  Then I came home, and was stationed in Long Island.  My job there was to bury US Veterans coming home from the Vietnam War.  We buried people in Riverhead, Long Island.  That didn’t go too well though, I didn’t like that.  So I went to the company commander, and the next thing I knew I was being sent to Vietnam.
They shipped me out to Vietnam, and I spent a year there.  I had no problems, I didn’t get wounded or anything.  We made it and came home, and that was it.  It wasn’t a pleasant duty, but it was alright, you know.  A lot of young people, 19-20, they were being killed for no reason.  Not that we knew.  Anyone that was over there never really wanted to fight anyways.  They just went because they had to and that was it.  Even though a lot came to Canada, to run away from the war.  That part was sad.  Too many young guys lost their lives for no reason.  It was alright though.  12 months.  A year is a long time.  But they took care of you.

I had so much medical problems when I came out.  I was only 38 when I had a heart attack.  I believe it’s from Agent Orange, napalm, and all that stuff.  I was right there when they were dropping all that stuff.  It’s all been downhill since then.  I go to Albany, NY for treatments.

In Canada, Remembrance Day is honored because, “If we do not, the sacrifice of those one hundred thousand Canadian lives will be meaningless.  They died for us, for their homes and families and friends, for a collection of traditions they cherished and a future they believed in; they died for Canada.  The meaning of their sacrifice rests with our collective national consciousness; our future is their monument.” (Heather Reynolds, 1977).  November 11^th is also recognized by Great Britain, France, and Australia to commemorate their veterans of both World Wars.

BY: Ohseraseia:hawi