BILOXI (AP) — Six months at Fort Hood in Texas with World War II Medal of Honor recipient Col. Van T. Barfoot translated into a lifetime of good advice for Blake McIlwain, now retired from the Army and living in Pass Christian.
‘‘I was at Fort Hood in 1965 getting ready to go to Vietnam for the first of three tours and his advice to me was, ’Take care of your troops and they will take care of you,’’’ said McIlwain, now 80.
‘‘I had been in the Army 20 years but I’d never seen combat. He’d been in WWII, Korea and now Vietnam. I heard stories that he single-handedly wiped out three Nazi machine gun nests and then single-handedly destroyed three German tanks.’’
Barfoot, now 90, has a new victory in a skirmish with a Virginia homeowners association that captured national attention and stirred memories for veterans like McIlwain.
‘‘Van Barfoot is one of the most spectacular human beings that ever lived,’’ said McIlwain. ‘‘He told me the only excuse for an officer being in the Army is to take care of the enlisted troops.
‘‘He inspired me to go to Vietnam and be what I can be.’’
McIlwain, a Mobile, Ala., native, was 35 at the time and Barfoot’s executive officer. Both were in the U.S. Army’s 1st Armored Division and soon went separate directions to Vietnam, with McIlwain joining the 1st Cavalry Division, piloting helicopter gunships.
Barfoot, a Mississippi native with Choctaw ancestry, was then 45 and commanding an aviation battalion. He would eventually retire as a decorated colonel.
So would McIlwain, who prefers not to talk about himself but said one of the few remaining World War II Medal of Honor recipients who ‘‘should be able to fly a flag any way that he wants to.’’
McIlwain learned about Barfoot’s skirmish this week when he saw an Associated Press newspaper photograph of Barfoot raising a U.S. flag.
McIlwain read the article and realized his old acquaintance remains a giant of a man, both physically and in fortitude. Barfoot’s skirmish with the Sussex Square homeowners association near Richmond began after Veterans Day when he was told to remove a yard flag pole on which he daily flies Old Glory.
‘‘I’d have hated to be in the position of someone trying to take his flag down,’’ said McIlwain, who moved to the Mississippi Coast 10 years ago.
‘‘Physically he is a big man, about 6-foot-7, dark hair when I knew him because he is Choctaw, but he has blue eyes,’’ McIlwain said. ‘‘Believe me, he didn’t have to tell you to do something twice. He had that look about him and the physical stature to go with it. But usually, he was gentle and soft spoken.’’
With Barfoot’s venerable age and military heroism, fate dictated that governors, legislators and thousands of U.S. patriots would weigh in on his side. The flag itself wasn’t an issue, but the 21-foot pole was against neighborhood regulation. The association relented.
