Dr. Garry L. Willard - Into the Dragons Jaws: A Canadian Combat Surgeon in the Vietnam War

Into the Dragons Jaws

A Canadian Combat Surgeon in the Vietnam War

Dr. Garry L. Willard

Into the Dragons Jaws

Copyright 2021 by Dr. Garry L. Willard

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Tellwell Talent

www.tellwell.ca

ISBN

978-0-2288-2583-8 (Hardcover)
978-0-2288-2581-4 (Paperback)
978-0-2288-2582-1 (eBook)

GARRY L. WILLARD MD FRCSC FRCSEdin FACS FICS

5 years after graduation from Queens University, Dr. Willard found himself in the heat of battle as a combat casualty surgeon in South Vietnam 1968.

Large numbers of civilian casualties sustained during the Vietnamese New Year Tet Offensive January 1968 required urgent care. Canada responded to the International call for help by sending surgeons.

Rigorous surgical training at the University of Toronto had prepared him for volunteer service with the Canadian Red Cross to Vietnam as a trauma surgeon.

He and Queens Meds63 classmate Brad, Dr. Kenneth J. Bradley, were the first two Canadian Medical Officers to be deployed and were sent to Danang from Saigon. They worked where surgical needs were greatest in several cities in the 5 northernmost provinces of South Vietnam below the DMZ. These provinces made up I Corps Military Tactical Zone. The Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) was the dividing buffer between North and South.

History concludes that their postings were at the time and place of the most intense fighting of the Vietnam War. Although sent by the Canadian Red Cross, they were imbedded in the 1 st Battalion 3 rd Division of the United States Marine Corps (1/3 USMC) with rank of Major (Acting), earning a battlefield commendation and USMC decorations.

In 1969, while Chief Surgical Resident at St. Michaels Hospital in Toronto, he obtained his Fellowship Degree in the Royal College of Surgeons of Canada (FRCSC). He then signed on as Ships Doctor on the iron ore carrier M.S. Livanita sailing to Europe for advanced surgical training as a Gordon E. Richards Travelling Fellow.

He underwent post Fellowship training in: Neurosurgery at Rigshospitalet, University of Copenhagen, Denmark; Thoracic Surgery at the Karolinska Institute, University of Stockholm, Sweden; AO Orthopaedic and Trauma Surgery in the Universities of St. Gallen and Zurich, Switzerland; Hand Surgery at the University of Geneva; Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery at Universities of Nijmegen and Groningen, Nederland; Pancreatic Surgery at LHopital Cochin, Universite de Paris, France; Cardiothoracic Surgery at Sully Thoracic Hospital, Cardiff University, Wales.

From 1972, he practiced general, thoracic, vascular and trauma surgery at Etobicoke General Hospital, Toronto for thirty years, being elected as Chief of Surgery in 1981. He moved to a rural surgical practice in 2002 in Alliston, Ontario, continuing in the training of medical students and surgical residents, as Assistant Professor of Clinical Surgery, McMaster University.

He is currently an Assistant Surgeon at Brampton Civic Hospital, part of The William Osler Health System of the Greater Toronto Area.

In addition to his FRCSC, he holds a Royal College Fellowship from Edinburgh, Scotland (FRCSEdin). His promoter was Regis Professor of Surgery, Sir Patrick Forrest. Dr. Willard is a Fellow of both the American College of Surgeons (FACS) and the International College of Surgeons (FICS). And a Diplomat of both the American National Board of Examiners and the American Board of Surgery.

He holds memberships in a large number of North American professional associations, including the Flying Physicians, American Automotive Medical, and Aerospace Medical. He is a Life Member of the Ontario Medical Association and the New York Academy of Science. He was a Founding Member of the American Trauma Society.

He lives on a rural property northwest of Toronto near Loretto with his wife Heather, his daughter Lisa, his autistic son Christopher, variously with his stepchildren Melissa and Matthew, and Scout, the last of a loyal trio of Yellow Labradors.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTO THE DRAGONS JAWS

A Canadian Combat Casualty Surgeon in the Vietnam War

by DR. GARRY L. WILLARD

Brigadier-General (Retired) William J. Patterson

It gives me the greatest pleasure to write the Foreword to this book. It details the experiences and adventures of Dr. Garry L. Willard, a young Canadian Red Cross surgeon, who became a combat surgeon during the Vietnam War, as you will discover, when you read this interesting description of his life there.

Dr. Willard, a 1963 medical graduate of Queens University, while training in the post-graduate surgical program in Toronto, volunteered through the Canadian Red Cross to help Vietnamese civilian casualties following the Tet Offensive that began on 31 January 1968.

The Communist Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese Army carried out a masterful massive offensive by striking simultaneously 130 cities, towns, and villages in South Vietnam during the Buddhist Lunar New Year Celebrations, known as Tet. In addition to military casualties, there were thousands of civilian ones, many suffering head and spinal cord injuries, in a country where many of the doctors were serving in the South Vietnamese military, or had been killed or injured during Tet.

To meet the need for medical assistance, a Volunteer Physician Program was organized in the United States, and through the Canadian Red Cross, Canadian surgeons were solicited to volunteer. Garry and his fellow classmate, Ken (Brad) Bradley arrived in Saigon, where they were declared equivalent to the rank of Major in the US Marine Corps. Initially, they were separated with Garry going to Da Nang to be embedded with the 1 st Battalion, 3 rd Marines of the 3 rd Marine Division, situated in I Corps Tactical Zone - the five most northerly provinces of South Vietnam up against the Demilitarized Zone and North Vietnam.

Interestingly, being attached to the US Marines brought back memories of Garrys days with the Fort Henry Guard in Kingston, Ontario. He had joined the Guard in 1958 to help work his way through medical school. When Garry joined the Guard, it had already become an internationally renowned military re-enactment organization, having participated in the Royal Tournament in London, England, and paraded in Washington, D.C. with the US Marine Corps at Quantico. A friendship with the USMC had been established, which continues to the present.

Garry remembered parading at Fort Henry to the Marines Hymn, which was played by the FHG Fifes and Drums out of respect for their first Honorary Commander of the Guard, General Lemuel C. Shepherd Jr., who was 20 th Commandant of the United States Marine Corps.

During the Second World War, Shepherd, then a Colonel, took command of the 9 th Marines, and helped organize the 3 rd Marine Division for overseas duty in the South Pacific. Garry looked on his attachment to the 3 rd Marine Division as a happy omen.

The discipline and performance excellence of the Fort Henry Guard was to stand Garry in good stead during his days of nerve-racking surgery in less than ideal medical circumstances. By pure accident, an experience as an Army cadet was to save his life and the lives of others when a helicopter in which he was a passenger came under fire. His Winchester High School Cadets Corps was attached to the Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry Highlanders in Cornwall, Ontario for training. In 1954, the SD&G became a machine gun battalion, and he and other Winchester H.S. Cadets were taken to the Connaught Ranges, near Ottawa, to fire the 50 calibre heavy machine guns.