In the afternoon, past 1530 / 3-30 PM of the 8th of June 1969 'Brutus' was travelling in a convoy of 30 fuel tankers out of the Ponderosa to Pleiku along with another escorting gun truck, 'The Misfits', with Misfits leading the convoy while Brutus was the rear guard. Alan Wilson drove Brutus with Merton Barrowcliff on the M-60 and Prescott on the minigun. In the Misfit was Dodd, Hodges and Ward, along with secondary gunners Peter Hish and Alan Wernstrum due to the lack of the minigun on Misfit. Shortly after passing a small Korean compound at the base of the An Khe Pass, Highway 19, the convoy began to take small arms fire all across it's length.

 

While the NVA attack on the front of the convoy was rather light, Prescott on Brutus began screaming over the radio to the front of the convoy and both vehicles began engaging NVA forces within 100 meters of them while the rest of the convoy pushed through the past as Brutus held the rearguard against the main force, at least 40 Vietcong infantrymen, who were being pounded as Sgt. Prescott opened up with the minigun and the other gunners with the 50's. Prescott later said "That it was like mowing grass and the elephant grass and Charlie were being mowed down leaving only a wide clearing around Brutus."

 

At the same time as the Brutus held off this force, Misfit and the rest of convoy began to cross a bridge about three miles from An Khe when they themselves started taking heavy mortar, RPG and AK fire. Misfit was hit by an RPG to the front of the gunbox, causing the vehicle to pull off to the roadside and lay fire into Vietcong coming from water buffalo fields to the vehicle's left as the fuel trucks drove off towards the allied base. The Misfits was rocked by another RPG, which half-blinded Dodd with his blood from a leg wound.

 

Looking around, he saw the blast had also blown Hish and Wernstrum out of the gun box and Ward lay on the floor clutching his stomach. Dodd realized all his gunners were wounded- He then called on the radio that he had three men badly wounded and needed a medevac before climbing outside the armoured box and attempted to get his crew back inside the vehicle as more VC approached the truck. Still conscious, Hish and Wernstrum crawled into the ditch on the side of the road, and Hish grabbed the tailgate to pull himself up when a third RPG hit the rear of the gun box knocking him to the ground. Viet Cong then ran across the road and shot Hish twice as the M-60 tank and M-113 Armored Personnel Carrier (APC) drove up from the allied check point to provide support for the gun truck.

 

The enemy then began engaging the tank and APC, giving Dodd and the badly wounded Ward enough time to rapp on the driver's compartment and leave the ambush. Hish and Wernstrum were both un-intentionally left outside the gun truck, wounded, and were later picked up by the medevac helicopter.

 

While this was all going on with the main convoy, Brutus had continued engaging VC and North Vietnamese Army troops who were attempting to reach the bridge area, with the 20MM minigun eventually misfiring and the crew then using the other weapons to fend off a close-quarters rush of the truck before the enemy withdrew, dragging their dead and wounded with them. (2)

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This combat report was by SGT John Dodd, who joined the 359th Petroleum Truck Company, where Brutus originated from when the 359th had just transferred from Phu Tai to Pleiku in November 1968.

Dodd was attached to the 124th Transportation Battalion from the 240th Quartermaster Petroleum, Oil and Lubricant (POL) Battalion on the 1st of January 1969, in which he was a commander of the 'Misfit', hence the combat extract focusing on the Misfit rather than Brutus. (3)