The United States Air Force: An interview with Charles Hammond

I conducted an interview with Charles Hammond, a man who served in the United Sates Air Force on Thursday May 22, 2003. We met after school at around 4:00 p.m. at the Canton Public Library. I had no initial expectations for the interview. I only hoped that it went well because I was extremely nervous. I later learned that I had nothing to be nervous about.

Me: Okay, to start off I’d just like to get some background information. Where do you live?

Charles: Canton, Connecticut

Me: Have you lived here all your life?

Charles: No.

Me: Where else did you live?

Charles: Brooklyn, New York; West Hartland, Vermont; Plainville, Connecticut; and Canton, Connecticut.

Me: Wow, okay. Um, how old were you when you enlisted?

Charles: I was 20 years young.

Me: And what year was that?

Charles: It was September 23, 1966.

Me: And which war was that?

Charles: Vietnam.

Me: Okay. Did you go through any type of training?

Charles: I spent three months at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas.

Me: And what was that like? Was that hard in any way?

Charles: Well, it was challenging. It was a lot of physical stuff, marching, uh survival training.

Me: Do you remember any day of training in particular that was hard?

Charles: Nah, I really enjoyed that part of, that aspect of the Air Force.

Me: Good. So what branch of service were you?

Charles: The United States Air Force.

Me: And what were your superiors like?

Charles: They were all good guys.

Me: You respected them?

Charles: Yes.

Me: Um, what rank were you?

Charles: Uh, when I left the Air Force I was a Sergeant E-4.

Me: So where did you serve?

Charles: I was at the McGuire Air Force Base in Rightstown, New Jersey for four years.

Me: And what were the conditions like?

Charles: Well, we lived in barracks and there were three of us to a room. And the facilities were real nice. We had a physical fitness center, gymnasium, swimming pool, track, baseball, softball, and golf course.

Me: Did you make a lot of friends?

Charles: Uh, just with the group that I was with. There was 12 of us rooming together.

Me: What were they like?

Charles: (laughs) Nice guys.

Me: Really?

Charles: Yeah.

Me: Do you still keep in contact with any of them?

Charles: No, after we got out of the Air Force, there was 3 of them that we corresponded with when they were off in Connecticut, and we used to get together once in a while. And it just seems like they vanished off the face of the earth. I haven’t heard from them for probably 15, 20 years.

Me: Do you remember the day you guys met, what that was like?

Charles: Well, uh, we were all at the recruiting center in New Britain. That’s where we all got together, and we just left the recruiting center in New Britain and went to New Haven. Then we flew into New York. Then we… no, we took the bus to New York Then we flew from New York to Dallas, Texas. Then we took the bus to Lackland Air Force Base and it was HOT!

Me: Hot?

Charles: Hot.

Me: Like, how hot?

Charles: Well, it was September down there, probably about ya know, 90 degrees at least.

Me: Yeah. Wow.

Charles: And you knew, you knew you were different because you got sunburned.

Me: Oh, really?

Charles: Yes, yes.

Me: So what was your average day like?

Charles: After I got out of, at basic training? Or at my, at my duty station?

Me: Like, at your duty station.

Charles: Well I was with the um 16^th and 11^th Military Air Lift Wing out of, right, New Jersey, and I was assigned to the 438^th Transportation Squadron and I drove shuttle busses. I drove delivery trucks, and my last assignment was driving for the base commander, who was a 2-star general. My workday started at probably 7 in the morning till about 4:30, 5 o’clock in the afternoon, and we were on call 24-7. So, it was exciting. I worked a flight line picking up pilots and crews that were coming in from overseas and departing to go overseas, so it was an exciting four years.

Me: Four years?

Charles: Yup.

Me: What was the best part about serving?

Charles: The pride in doing justice for our country. I really enjoyed being part of the armed forces. It was kind of a tribute to myself, to my father who was killed in World War II.

Me: I’m sorry.

Charles: Yeah, and to my step-father who survived World War II, and I’m just proud to do it. Ya know, it was the American way back then.

Me: So you really believed in what you were fighting for?

Charles: Oh yeah! I’d go back in today if they’d let me.

Me: Really?

Charles: Yup.

Me: So, what was the worst part?

Charles: The worst part?

Me: Yeah.

Charles: Being away from my wife and son.

Me: So, did you get a lot of mail from them?

Charles: Oh yeah. Every once in a while I’d sneak out and come home.

Me: Really?

Charles: Well, it wasn’t that far. Breaks down to, uh, where my wife was living was in Connecticut. It was probably about 4 or 5 hour ride. Sometimes less.

Me: Yeah? So what were holidays like?

Charles: Holidays. That was a bummer. If you didn’t get time off, and you had to hang around the base, it was bad, it was very lonesome, very lonesome.

Me: So there were times when you didn’t get time off?

Charles: Right. Well, you got 30 days vacation; and uh, I usually took that all at one time. And we’d just do our thing for 30 days, and uh, a lot of phone calls, a lot of phone calls.

Me: So, did you ever see any combat or fighting?

Charles: No.

Me: Were there ever moments in particular when you ever felt scared, nervous at any time?

Charles: Well, there was an incident at McGuire Air Force Base. I was driving a flight line and I used to have to pick up the people in the tower. And there was I think it was an F-16 or something like that, and it was coming in for a landing and he didn’t make it and he flipped over and it exploded and it was uh, probably about 5…600 feet away from where I was parked. I was scared ‘cause I thought I was gonna go too. But, that was probably about the scariest situation that happened in the Air Force.

Me: So, what happened to him?

Charles: He didn’t make it.

Me: So, what was life like after the service?

Charles: Well, people didn’t have any respect for the soldiers that were in the service at that time. We got a lot of people that were making derogatory remarks at the soldiers and stuff like that, so…

Me: Why were they doing that?

Charles: Because of the Vietnam War.

Me: Oh, so did being in the service change you perspective on life, or change how you viewed the world?

Charles: Well, life is very short; and I want to the most that I could do for my country after I got out of the service.

Me: Looking back, would you do anything differently?

Charles: I would have stayed in the Air Force.

Me: Really?

Charles: Yeah, in fact I did go back in the Air Force from 1976 to 1979 in the Connecticut International Guard. I was a military policeman and I ascertained the rank of Staff Sergeant E-5, and I was stationed out of um, Bridey and like I said I was a military policeman for 3 years.

Me: And what was that like?

Charles: That was great. A lot of training, and a lot of training in our summer camps were down in the Air Force base in Balboa, Georgia. And we did a lot of uh, combat training.

Me: And that was hard?

Charles: Oh yeah, cause I wasn’t used to it, ya know, I mean after a while it kind of comes back to ya.