Colin Albers

Vietnam Veteran: 

Colin Albers: Writer for My Life, My Story 

I was born in 1947 in Camden, New Jersey. I attended Edgewood regional High school, but I was a bad boy and got expelled. I attended Camden County vocational and became a printer just like my stepfather because I wanted to please him which was a tall order. I broke a printer that was worth a couple 100,000 dollars. I decided to join the army after finishing school. I went to basic training and AIT at Fort Dix, New Jersey. I was then stationed in Germany and was ironically put at the print shop. My time around printers was once again short lived as I ended up breaking another printer by dropping a wrench on it. I got transferred to support and worked as a clerk typist. During my 19 months in Germany, I was still a bad boy finding myself getting a couple Article 15s. In 1966, I went to Fort Bragg for a year. During my time there, I taught troops first aid and how to throw hand grenades. This one time, I almost got blown up by a grenade that a troop dropped. I throw it after just in time and jump on top of him. It wasn’t long before I pissed off a sergeant and almost got into a fist fight with him. I got sent to Vietnam after being at Fort Bragg for a year. My first 30 days in Vietnam there was not much that I liked such as the people and the food. After this time, I mentally “died”, and I felt like they were going to get me. The last 30 days that I was in Vietnam, I felt “almost alive” and found myself behind a 50 Cal machine gun protecting a colonel who thought that he was a philosopher or something. I was a quartermaster and loaded the bodies to be sent back to the states. I went to Hawaii for nine days for R and R. The Tet offensive began when I got back from Hawaii during this time, I lost a lot of buddies. After six months, I got sent home to the states. I was discharged in Oakland California, but my welcome home was not so welcoming. I had rocks and bottles thrown at me by protesters. I spent the next 45 years not talking about Vietnam. I have seven kids from my first two wives and four sons that do not speak to me currently. I realized after having four wives, I learned that I have PTSD. In 2008 my now wife told me to come to the VA and I also found out that I am 100 percent service connected. However, all my problems add up to 220 percent. The cause of my service connection came from being transferred from Germany to fort Bragg. I was in a bad car accident and got a TBI. I also currently have cancer from agent orange which brings me to the present day. I come for chemotherapy for five days a week for six weeks. I live in pain every day from my back injury for which I had three surgeries. I was a bad boy most of my youth, but I never did any drugs. I eventually cleaned up my act and went to real estate school. I had my credits that I earned while in the service transfer over which was nice. I got a perfect score on every test that I took in real estate school. I was a real estate broker for 30 years and I sold cars for 10 years