Today it has been 60 years since I checked into Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, South Carolina. At the ripe young age of 17, I stepped into a world I couldn't have imagined. Raised in a tiny Ohio town primarily by four women—my Mom, Aunt, Grandma, and older sister… I quickly realized they hadn't adequately prepared me for what would happen.
The lessons began immediately. We were rudely awakened at the unGodly time of 0430 hours. Eighty new recruits leaped from their racks, startled by the clanging and crashing of what I thought was a trash can, as it ricocheted through the barracks. Me and my other 79 new best friends were shocked into a new reality. The garbage can, excuse me; the shit can, would fly through the air each morning, teaching us to get up on time. I remember thinking, 'You can get a lot done in a day getting up this early.'
Another lesson I learned while on our morning run. We would run singing lovely chants like 'If I should die in a combat zone, box me up and ship me home.' I was running in the outside column when I noticed our DI, who was running and calling cadence, drop out of sight from my left. Wondering where he went, I found out when I was smacked upside the head and rudely told to get my head out of my ass. Seems I was running perfectly instep to the count but also perfectly on the wrong foot. Pay attention to detail.
My first Sunday in boot camp became a real teaching moment for my DI. He marched us across the parade deck and stopped in front of two churches. One Catholic, I would soon learn, and the other Protestant. The DI screamed for Protestants to the right and Catholics to the left. I knew what a Catholic was. Mom didn't like them, so that wouldn't be me. I'd never heard of a Protestant or been to church, so I just stood there. The DI had fire in his eyes when he squared before me and yelled, "Kugler, what are you?"
That was a good question as I stood there with what turned out to be five or six Jews. I knew that because he then screamed, "I know you ain't a Jew!" When I was about eight, Mom took my brother, sister, and me to a Moravian church to be baptized. So I say, "I'm a Moravian, Sir!" I thought his head would fly off.
"A MORAVIAN! What in the hell is a Moravian?" He was two inches from my nose when I meekly replied, "I don't know, Sir." With that, he ordered me to drop for 10 push-ups. Up on my feet, I still didn't know what the hell a Moravian was, so I was back down for twenty more. The day was hot, but my DI was hotter. About that time, a couple more platoons marched up on either side of us. As they were discharged, my DI called out to the other DI's now standing by and said, "COME OVER HERE MEN. WE GOT US A FUCKING MO’RAVIAN!" Now, there was a chorus asking me what the hell was a Moravian.
Down I went for a round of bends and thrusts, and I still didn't know what to tell him. I stood up as he walked up and stood in front of me when he reached out and smacked me upside the head and said, "Private Kugler, I just anointed you a fucking Protestant! Get your ass in there!" I attended my first church service.
The next lesson came at the PT field and the pull-up bars. Try as I might, I only got two pull-ups, and the DI wanted six. He screamed directly into my right ear … "Private Kugler, what the hell is wrong with you?" With my head newly out of my ass (or was it?) I replied, "Sir! I wish I could do them, but I can't!" It probably didn't, but it appeared to me that smoke gushed from under his Smokey Bear, and through gritted teeth, he growled … "Well, Private Kugler, you go wish in one hand and shit in the other and tell me which one fills up first!" I soon learned I could do hard things if I kept my head out of my ass.
Then came a brief reprieve from the madness. This lesson came in the form of a dental appointment. It was week three, and it would get me out of morning PT and the run. My DI told me where to report and, when finished, to come join the Platoon at the PT field. The dental appointment was canceled when I got there, so back to the barracks, I went and laid out on my rack for a bit of peace and quiet. I soon learned the DIs weren't born yesterday.
While stretched out enjoying the quiet, I was startled back to reality by a DI screaming, nearly foaming at the mouth, something about people like me getting people killed in combat. What? But there was no what to be had. He jerked my young butt out of that rack and whacked me two or three times across the face dragging me down the hall where he told me to stand at attention.
Standing there, head spinning, I could feel blood running down my lip and onto my chin. About this time, my Platoon returns from PT, and another of our DIs runs up to me and says, "No, did someone hit you, Private Kugler?" With my head entirely out of my ass now, I knew this was a trick. "No, Sir! I screamed. He came right back with … "It's okay, Private Kugler. Tell me who did it. I'll take care of it." Not a chance at this point. No, Sir was the correct answer, and after a quick 'court,' I was sentenced to 10 days at something called the Special Training Branch or STB. I was about to learn mistakes were punished.
It was then I was introduced to the MPs, who handcuffed me and took me for a ride to the end of the island to the Special Training Branch. I would soon be a member of the Corrective Custody Platoon. The MPs left me outside a small office and told me to report. I scream, "Sir, Private Kugler is reporting as ordered!" Not a peep out of the office. After two more screams announcing my presence, a DI a head shorter than me and much older flew through the hatchway (that was a doorway four weeks ago), grabbed me by the collar of my uniform, slammed me against the wall, and screamed, "Welcome to MY Corrective Custody Platoon!" My first thought was 'insane asylum.'
Sergeant Rex ran things by his own rules. He quickly explained to me that in STB were my new Platoon CCP, as well as Motivation Platoon for those who weren’t sufficiently motivated, and Fat Mans Platoon for those too fat to keep up. He told me my mission while here was to prove that, as he put it, “that the best part of me didn't run down my Daddy's bedroom wall.”
In CCP, I had 11 turds (his words) with me. We had to wear our covers (formerly hats) sideways to signify what turds we were. Our punishment was moving an eight-foot high sandpile fifty yards with two buckets each. When we were done, move it back again. Being a slow learner, I'd had enough of the sand moving duty after three days and decided to go AWOL. And that is when I learned that Parris Island really is an island and surrounded by water.
When I ran to the water's edge, Sergeant Rex quickly realized I was gone. He organized a search party, and they swept the area around me as I lay in the water with only my eyes out. They called off the search as dark came, and I remember Sergeant Rex's last words to me. "Private Kugler … have fun with the alligators tonight!" Thought-provoking, for sure. My future was uncertain; I spent three days trying to get off the base without success. I snooped and pooped night and day and reached the Main Gate. I hadn't eaten, drank swamp water and was riddled with mosquito bites and a couple of scorpions as well. I was sick by the time I was apprehended.
The MPs yucked it up with guns drawn, spread eagle, and handcuffed me again. The brig was in my future with a Court Martial on the way. After a brief stop at base HQ, we were off, not the brig but back to CCP and Sergeant Rex. Holy Shit, he's crazy. And then came the lesson that changed my life.
He grabbed me by the neck and tossed me into his office. I landed facing him, sitting on the floor. He spun his office chair around, leaning on the back, and said, "Kugler, what is wrong with you? Do you want to be in my Marine Corps?" I said, "Yessir!" He glared at me but didn't scream. He said, "Kugler, you haven’t eaten for three days, you’re bitten everywhere and look like shit. I'm a Force Recon Marine and I don’t have to do that. What are you thinking?'
It's strange, but I felt he cared about me then. That is not something I felt, rightly or wrongly, at home. I looked him in the eye and said, "Sir, I don't know what's wrong with me, but I know I want to be a Marine.” He sat, staring at me and said, "Kugler, I will give you the break of your young life. I am vouching for you. You're not going to the brig. You're starting over and giving me ten straight days in CCP, and then you're going out and making me proud!"
Something inside me changed. Someone believed in me. I realized later that was the exact moment my head came out of my ass for good. And it didn't hurt that when we shook on it, he stared at me and said, "Kugler, you fuck this up for me, and you'll regret the day you were born." I believed him. And that is when I learned the only way out of a problem is through.
For the remainder of boot camp, which went as it was supposed to, my lessons came from others, thank goodness. After my time at CCP, I went to a new platoon. We had a DI with us twenty-four hours a day. Taps were at 2200 hours (10PM), so around 2100 hours, this particular DI would have a unique mail call.
We'd stand two each at the end of our bunks at attention. The DI would announce, "I have a letter from Ohio." There were probably twenty people in there from Ohio. If no one claimed it, the DI would say, "Going once, going twice …. "eventually, a Marine would run up and report for his mail. Invariably, it would be the wrong guy to whom the DI would say, "Private, do you know it is a federal offense to take someone else's mail? You could be charged. Give me twenty push-ups." The games began.
Once, someone sent me a magazine, which I knew was a no-no. I ran up and reported, and the DI said, "Kugler, do you really want this magazine?" With my head firmly out of my ass now, I said, "No, sir!" Then would come, "Are you sure, Private? Because you know I can't throw this away unless you approve." And I would say, "Throw it away, Sir!"
One night, late in boot camp, a Marine was called up to receive a letter. The DI handed him the envelope and asked, "Private, what do you think is in that envelope?" The Marine felt it and said, "Gum, Sir. A pack of gum." The DI sparred with him as he did with me, reminding him that Marines were not permitted to chew guns in uniform. He asked the Private what he wanted to do.
The Marine told the DI he was 'entitled' to the gum. The DI's temperature rose as he said, "Private, you are absolutely right. You are entitled to anything your family sends your petty little ass. So, do you want this gum?" The Marine replied, "Yessir!" The DI told him that since he was part of a Marine Corps team, this Platoon, he must share whatever he had with his fellow Marines.
The Marine was instructed to get his K-bar, a 12-inch Marine-issue knife, sit in the center of our squad bay, and cut a piece of gum into 80 pieces. That took a while. When he said he was ready, he had to go up one side and down the other, placing a sliver of a piece of gum on our tongues. Lesson learned. Follow orders, and I would learn firsthand over and over again after two years in Vietnam that following orders does save lives in combat.
One of the last things you do in boot camp is qualify on the rifle range. It was August on the South Carolina coast, and it was hot and humid. By this point, we learned or should have learned that discipline in the Corps is everything. On one sweltering afternoon, we're laying out shooting all day long when a Private goes to the Drill Instructor and says he needs a drink of water. This was a no-no. You drink when we tell you to drink.
The DI said, "Private, get back on the firing line. We have a break coming up." That was the respect that comes as you progress in boot camp. But this Private stood firm. "Sir, Private so and so requests permission to have a drink of water." The DI took a deep breath, leaned down, and said, "Private, I'll forget you said that, get back on the firing line." The Private persisted in reciting a Marine Corps order that stated something about recruits being permitted a drink every so many hours. That was it. The DI went berserk.
He stopped the firing line and brought everyone in a circle around him. Did I say it was hot? It was like sitting in a panting dogs mouth. "Gentlemen, I want you to know we have a fucking lawyer here amongst us." He explains that the Private demands he has a drink and even tells him the regulation requiring it.
So he dispatched the 'lawyer' to double time to our barracks to retrieve two tin buckets and canteen cup. He gave the rest of us a rare break. We sat in a semi-circle as the 'lawyer' returned. The DI had him go over to the fixture and fill his buckets, and then he had to give each of us a drink with his cup, and eventually, he got his drink. And for the remainder of our time at the range, probably ten more days, the 'lawyer' was required to carry two buckets of water everywhere we went. He took them on runs to the chow hall and the showers and had them sitting nearby while he shot on the firing line.
And here I am sixty years later, remembering those lessons like yesterday. Those lessons served me well through four years in the Corps and a marriage of fifty-five years, and counting. Three kids and six grandkids and a successful career in business. And I owe it all to those DIs who did all they could to teach me to keep my head out of my ass and do hard things.
Thank you, Sir!