Ray, originally from the Kansas City area, was ready to join the military straight out of high school, but he had a football scholarship to Northwest Missouri State. After being put on academic probation, he decided to take a break from college and join the Marines. Ray began boot camp in August 1969.

“I figured if I was going to join the military I might as well go all the way and join the Marines,” said Ray. “All the Marines were volunteers and a big chunk of the army was drafted. So I figured it was better to be with a group of volunteers instead of people who had nasty attitudes about being drafted.”

Ray served in the infantry of Mike Company, 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, and his company’s assignment was to scour the Vietnam jungle for the enemy.

“We didn’t have a roof over our head or anything. We lived in the jungle in the rain and the mud and we’d go without showers or clean clothes for a month at a time,” said Ray.

-Messenger photo by Michaela Frerichs
David Ray is United States Marine Corps veteran.

Ray said it was a tough mission to serve.

“That’s the Marine Corps way. You’ve got to do it the hard way and we did,” he said.

On average, there were around 150 men in the company.

“They learned in the years before I was there that just sitting up on a hilltop and staying there for a month running patrols was not good,” said Ray. “The enemy knew where you were and how to plan attacks on you, so they started moving every day. One hundred fifty men would move every day, be it a mile or five miles, and you carried all your gear and weapons and ammunition, which could be a good 100 pounds.”

Ray said once the company had moved, they would run patrols in groups of around 10 men. “You didn’t know what was going to happen and quite a few times, we’d run into the enemy by accident. You could be going down a jungle trail and they were coming the other direction and then all hell would break loose,” said Ray. “Those firefights usually didn’t last long but I was in a firefight that lasted close to an hour.”

Between their month-long stints in the jungle, they would return to a basecamp for a two-day rest.

“It wasn’t in a town, it was an outpost out in the middle of nowhere and completely surrounded by barbed wire. We’d get a two-day rest and then it was back out for another month,” said Ray.

Occasionally, the company would be moving and need to cross a river and Ray said they would take advantage of those opportunities.

“Half of the company would stand guard while the other half would get in the river and take a bath and wash your clothes. You felt nice and clean for a few hours,” said Ray.

After about seven months in Vietnam, Ray was injured and medevaced to Japan where he stayed for 10 days before being returned to the United States. Ray was discharged in January 1971.

After his time in the military ended, Ray returned to college and earned his bachelor’s degree.

“I was a sales engineer. I engineered systems for packaging,” he said.

Ray retired two years ago and then got “bored to death.”

In 2010, Ray published a book about his time in Vietnam entitled, “A Marine’s Promise to God: A Memoir of Vietnam.”

“I tried to just tell some of the interesting and even humorous stuff,” he said.

Ray was able to connect with the family of one of his friends who had been killed in action.

“I looked him up on the Vietnam Memorial Wall and left some messages for my friend Rick Watts. I would go back and check about every six months, and one time I looked and there was a message left by one of his sisters and she left her email address,” said Ray.

The two began emailing and then when Ray was on a business trip to Florida, he took a detour to meet Watts’ family.

“We all got together and got to talk about Rick. She even took me to the cemetery to see his grave,” said Ray.

Over the years, Ray has managed to keep in contact with many members of the Mike company that served both before, during, and after his time, even often attending a yearly reunion.

“There are guys who were there two or three years before I was there,” he said, “and you get to meet these guys and you get to know everybody.”

Ray said they were unable to hold the reunion this year and in 2020, but he’s glad they will be able to get back together at the reunion planned for next year.