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I agree, thus PTSD is real. Never knew this before, but a few Months ago I watched a video on Audi Murphy, one of my all time real life heroes. Seems as much as he seemed to hold things together for the public eye, he suffered from PTSD. Each marriage he had suffered due to his inability to sleep. It ruined his marriages, due to his inability to get past the trauma.

Go figure, one of the top 5 greatest war heroes of American history, suffered for his braveness and ability to think logically under the stress of war. Yet once the war was over, he relived the horror in his head time and time again.

Back in mid 1975, I was still 17, and was traveling through a small Southern GA town Abeville GA. I was stationed at Ft Benning GA. We gave a black friend a ride home for his leave and vacation. We were drinking and smoking pot.

On our way back from dropping him off, it was like 2:00 in the morning and as we drove through the town, a police car stopped us. Seems like Mike, the drive, went through a stop sign. We got stopped and arrested for the alcohol and drugs.

I was young and naive, and Mike was like 22. He convinced me to say the pot was mine because he was like one strike away from getting dishonorable discharged. Well I did, and the next morning he was allowed to go back to the Base. Yet was held under a $10,000 bond. I had no money to pay the bond, and Mike promised to get the money to bail me out. I spent almost a Month in that damn small jail, as I waited for him to help. Evewntually I got ahold of my family and they sent me the $1000 I needed for the 10% bond.

One night is still etched in my mind, and from time to time I find myself waking up in a sweat. It was late, I figure around the time bars close. Just guessing since there was no clock for me to see. Yet I woke up to someone screaming and bunch of people yelling. I rolled over on the bunk and saw 5 white deputies beating a black guy who looked tore well over 6" and made like 250 pounds or more. They were beating him senseless with their clubs and kicking him as he tried to defend himself to no avail.

I stood up and yelled at them to stop because they don't have the right to too that. Then one of the deputies came over to my cage. (I was in a metal cage in the middle of a a big room) The deputy started running his billy club from side to side against the bars yelling at me that I better forget what I see. I remember his words exactly.

"Boy, you better STF up and forget what you see, or you will never leave this county alive. Now why don't you just settle down and go back to sleep Yankee, or we will de the same to you."

I remember being so afraid as I heard them continually beating him. I started crying and just remember waking up hours later when the Sherif showed up with my breakfast. Usually he would get me something from McDonalds or some other fast food place. But that morning I got one of the best home made meals cooked by his wife. He told me his wife cooked it especially dually for me and that there would be more good meals coming, as long as I just forget everything I saw or heard.

The black guy was not in the cage, and to this day I know he is dead. About a week later I got the money and was bailed out. When I got back to camp I told the Captain what happened, and he told me he would get someone to look into it, but it wasn't a military matter. Never heard anything more, and I never got a summons for court on the possession matter.

By the way, my Platon Sergeant is the one who came to get me when my bail money came. On the way out of town I showed him where we got stopped, and the stop sign was completely covered by a tree growing in from of it. There was no way Mike would have seen it at 2:00 in the morning.

I was also excused from being AWOL after my Captain heard what happened. It took me a long time to sleep without thinking of that poor black guy, and even today I wonder what they did to him. I could give more in depth details of that Month, including other blacks who were mistreated and railroaded but what I offer is enough to let you know the whole incident was traumatizing and still bothers me today almost 50 years later.

You were extremely lucky in so many ways. Back in 1975, I think if I had ended up in jail like that, I would have been in big trouble even if I had gotten out of the jail.

In the Navy, people in charge were largely looking the other way, but once drug use became a thing of record (as in a formal arrest) those same people could be counted on to make life worse for you.

That scum who convinced you to take the rap...what an a-hole.

Yes...I read the Audi Murphy story, and it was a sad case. He sure did try, but his PTSD stalked him.