Until I read his book, “Grateful American”, I was unaware of how
heavily Gary Sinise was involved with veteran’s organizations, and it started
roughly about the time that he played the role of Lieutenant Dan in “Forest Gump”.
One of the people that Sinise introduced us to in his book was
a man named Lewis Burwell Puller Jr. Since the Wikipedia article about him is
very extensive, I’ve posted most of it below verbatim:
Lewis Burwell Puller Jr. (August 18, 1945 – May 11, 1994) was an attorney and a United States Marine Corps officer who
was severely wounded in the Vietnam War.
He won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or
Autobiography for his autobiography Fortunate Son.
Life and career
Lewis Burwell Puller Jr. was the son of Lt. General Lewis
"Chesty" Puller, the most decorated Marine in the history
of the U.S. Marine Corps. He followed in his father's footsteps and became a Marine
officer.
Puller was graduated from the Christchurch School, in Christchurch, Virginia, in 1963 and from
the College of William and Mary in 1967. After
his graduation from Officer Candidate School, he received orders to South Vietnam in
July 1968, where he served as an Infantry Platoon Leader for three months. On
October 11, 1968, his rifle jammed during an engagement with North Vietnamese
troops; Puller was wounded when he tripped a booby-trapped howitzer round,
losing his right leg at the hip, his left leg above the knee, his left hand and
most of his fingers on his right hand in the explosion.
The shell riddled his body with shrapnel, and he lingered near death for
days with his weight dropping to 55 pounds, but he survived. Puller later
recalled the first time his father saw him in the hospital. He described how
his father broke down weeping and that hurt him more than any of his physical
injuries. Those who knew him say that it was primarily because of his iron will
and his stubborn refusal to die that he survived. He was medically discharged
from the Marine Corps. He was awarded the Silver Star
Medal, the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal,
two Purple Heart Medals, and the Republic of Vietnam Gallantry Cross for
his service in the Marine Corps.
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For years after he returned to a reasonably sound
physical condition, he remained emotionally shaken, though he earned a Juris Doctor degree,
had two children with the woman he had married before going to Vietnam, and
raised a family. He was admitted to the Virginia Bar in 1974 and began
working as a lawyer for the Veteran's Administration and on
President Gerald Ford's clemency board.[4] He
mounted a campaign for Congress in 1978 as a Democrat in
Virginia but lost in a landslide with only 28% of the vote against incumbent
Republican Congressman Paul Trible. Throughout
the years, he battled periods of despondency and drank heavily until 1981,
when he underwent treatment for alcoholism. Despite that treatment, Puller
continued to suffer severe depression and occasional bouts of alcoholism. |
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Puller told the story of his ordeal and its aftermath in his 1991
autobiography, Fortunate Son: The Autobiography of Lewis B. Puller Jr.,
published by Grove Press. The account ended with Puller triumphing
over his physical disabilities and becoming emotionally at peace with himself.
The following year he won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or
Autobiography. The title of this autobiography was borrowed
from the song "Fortunate Son" by Creedence Clearwater Revival, to which he
gives credit in the opening pages.
Creedence
Clearwater Revival - Fortunate Son (Official Music Video) - YouTube
According to friends and associates, Puller spent the last months of his
life in turmoil. He left his job as a lawyer at the Pentagon to accept a
teaching position at George Mason University. In the days
leading up to his death, Puller fought a losing battle with the alcoholism that
he had kept at bay for 13 years, and struggled with a more recent addiction, to
painkillers initially prescribed to dull continuing pain from his wounds.
Death and aftermath
Puller died from a self-inflicted gunshot on May 11, 1994. He was
survived by his wife, Linda T. "Toddy" Puller, from whom he
had separated in 1991. Puller's survivors included their two children,
Lewis III and Maggie, his twin sister, Martha Downs, and sister, Virginia
Dabney.
Puller's name is not listed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which is
reserved for those who died or who are listed as missing in
action. However, his name is listed on the nearby In Memory Memorial Plaque, which
represents those veterans, like Puller, who "died after their service in
the Vietnam war, but as a direct result of that service, and whose names are
not otherwise eligible for placement on the memorial wall." Terry Anderson,
a former Associated Press journalist, who was
held hostage in Lebanon,
recalled the same hope he had had for his friend, Puller. "This is a man
who had so many burdens, so many things to bear. And he bore them well for 25
years," he said. "What did I miss?" Anderson asked. "I was
his friend. I thought he was winning".
In a statement, Puller's wife, Toddy said, "Our family has been
moved and humbled by the outpouring of affection for Lewis. The many acts of
kindness from our friends across the country have helped us in this very
difficult time. It is clear that Lewis affected the lives of people in ways
that we never knew." Of her deceased husband, she said, "To the list
of names of victims of the Vietnam War, add the name of Lewis Puller ...
He suffered terrible wounds that never really healed" In 1991, she
was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates.
On Veterans Day 2010, the Lewis B.
Puller Jr. Veterans Benefits Clinic at The College of William & Mary Law
School was named in honor of Puller.
Like his father, Lewis Puller Jr. has been the recipient of numerous
awards, which are listed in more detail in the article cited above.
Sadly, his story, or ones like it, are becoming more numerous for combat
veterans.
https://www.ptsd.va.gov/understand/common/common_veterans.asp
The incidence of PTSD for veterans is increasing. Although the incidence
among WWII veterans is fairly low, it has gradually increased with each conflict,
and it is the highest among veterans of Iraqi Freedom, at 29%.
The increase in PTSD has also led to an increase in suicides.
In 2012 alone, an estimated 7,500 former military personnel died by
suicide. More active duty service
members, 177, died from suicide that year than were killed in combat, 176.
The Army had
52% of the suicides from all branches.
(Fortunately, treatment with psilocybin has been found to be very
effective in treating PTSD).
In 2013, the United States Department of Veteran Affairs released
a study that covered suicides from 1999 to 2010, which showed that
roughly 22 veterans were dying by suicide per day, or one every 65
minutes. Some sources suggest that this rate may be undercounting
suicides. An analysis done in 2013 found a suicide rate among veterans of
about 30 per 100,000 population per year, compared with the civilian rate of 14
per 100,000.[However, the
comparison was not adjusted for age and sex.
According to a report published by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)
in 2016, which analyzed 55 million veterans' records from 1979 to 2014, the
current analysis indicates that an average of 20 veterans die from suicide per
day.
A 2021 study by Brown University estimated
that 30,177 veterans of post-9/11 conflicts had died by suicide. When compared
to the 7,057 personnel killed in the conflicts, at least four times as many
veterans died by suicide than personnel were killed during the post-9/11
conflicts.
A study released in 2022 found that as many as 44 veterans die on average
per day from suicide when accounting overlooked causes of death that are
aligned with suicidal and self-harm behavior, which is 2.4 times greater than
the official estimate.
The total number of suicides differs by age group; 31% of these suicides
were by veterans 49 and younger while 69% were by veterans aged 50 and older.[11] As with
suicides in general, suicide of veterans is primarily male, with about 97
percent of the suicides being male in the states that reported gender.[6] In
addition to differences among age and gender groups, there has also been found
to be significant disparity in suicidal ideation and completion rates among
marginalized groups such as LGBT military members. Suicidal ideation was
found to be 2-3 times greater in LGBT active-duty and veteran service members,
with transgender veterans having been found to
commit suicide at double the rates of their cisgender peers.
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In 2015, the Clay Hunt Veterans Suicide Prevention
Act passed in the Senate and was then enacted as Pub.
L.Tooltip Public Law (United States) 114–2 on February 12,
2015. It requires the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to organize an annual
third-party evaluation of the VA's mental health care and suicide prevention
programs, to mandate website updates at least once every 90 days about the
VA's mental health care services, to offer educational incentives for
psychiatrists who commit to serving in the Veterans Health Administration (VHA),
to collaborate with nonprofit mental health organizations with the goal of
preventing veteran suicide, and to extend veterans' eligibility for VA
hospital care, medical service care, and nursing home care. However, the
limitations of this act are very restricting. Veterans can only access
extended eligibility if they have been discharged or released from active
duty between the years of 2009 and 2011 and if they have not enrolled in care
during the five years following their discharge. |
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Never served |
Veterans and |
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Women |
5.2 |
28.7 |
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Men |
20.9 |
32.1 |
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The table above shows the difference in suicide rates between veterans
and non-veterans.
In August 2016, the VA released another report which consisted of the
nation's largest analysis of veteran suicide. The report reviewed more than 55
million veterans' records from 1979 to 2014 from every state in the nation. The
previous report from 2012 was primarily limited to data on veterans who used
VHA health services or from mortality records obtained directly from 20 states
and approximately 3 million records. Compared to the data from the 2012 report,
which estimated the number of Veteran deaths by suicide to be 22 per day, the
current analysis indicates that in 2014, an average of 20 veterans a day
died from suicide.
Veterans Day is less than a month away, so there are a few things you an
do beside enjoying your day off:
1)
Thank a vet, and consider
buying them a meal (which I have done)
2)
Buy those poppies
3)
Fight for increased
funding for military vets Veterans
Health Administration - Wikipedia
4)
Do NOT vote for Donald
Trump, who thinks that military folks are suckers
5)
Vote for people who support
veterans, and get people like Tommy Tuberville out of Congress.
