Russell E.  Temperley

  Returnee    

LETTER

SOURCE: WE CAME HOME copyright 1977 Captain and Mrs. Frederic A Wyatt (USNR Ret), Barbara Powers Wyatt, Editor P.O.W. Publications, 10250 Moorpark St., Toluca Lake, CA 91602 Text is reproduced as found in the original publication (including date and spelling errors). UPDATE - 09/95 by the P.O.W. NETWORK, Skidmore, MO RUSSELL E. TEMPERLEY Major - United States Air Force Captured: October 27, 1967 Released: March 14, 1973 Flying a single engine, single seater jet airplane from Korat Royal Thai Air Base, Korat, Thailand, Major Temperley took off as a spare aircraft for the strike force.  When a plane had to abort due to mechanical problems, he became an integral part of the armada that was to hit the North Vietnamese Army headquarters in Hanoi. A surface to air missile hit his plane and brought him to a soft landing in a tree.  The branches caused a few scratches, but he had no time to think of them for within minutes the villagers captured him and he was soon on his way to the "New Guy Village" (Heartbreak Hotel) area of the Hanoi Hilton.  "Little did I know that I was now to have 1966 days of paid vacation with room and board in North Vietnam. That evening I was introduced to the North Vietnamese "Human Policy".   (I think the word is humane, but they called it human).  I was told to "talk" and answer all their questions or I would be punished.  At first I was slapped about the face, later punched and beaten about the face and ears, and then later tied up in a ball with ropes and left. Long after I had lost the ability to move my hands and feet I decided that deception was the wiser tactic to use.  About two weeks after I arrived, the military interrogations stopped and the political re-education started.  The Vietnamese wanted me to make recorded tapes of their news items to be played over the camp speakers.  I refused. I was allowed to think about making the tapes on a stool in the Quiz Room in front of a large open window in the dead of winter with no sleep for five days and nights.  These tapes were about the "great defeats of the United States American Imperialists Aggressors in the South" and "the great emulation movements of the North to defeat the American aggressors." To have to listen to this trash every day was bad enough. Finally I realized that if I would read the material poorly and in a monotone, perhaps they would not use it.  That is just what happcned; however, I was put in a cell alone for ten months with my legs in irons for one week, not allowed to bathe for three weeks, nor to shave for a month, plus a few other minor punishments for having a "bad attitude." To give you an idea of the cell where we spent so much miserable time, you must imagine a bed one meter wide, fastened to the wall.  It was made out of two inch hardwood planks. Some were longer as they had built stocks for the legs, or arms and neck.  The floor was concrete.  There was an inspection hole in the door, every ten or fifteen minutes a guard would open it and look in.  We were required to stand up, face the guard and give a low bow.  This would sometimes go on night and day as a harassment. We washed outside summer and winter.  We had ten minutes to wash us, our clothes and our teeth.  Should one be caught with soap all over oneself, and the air raid take place, we would go back in our cell, under the low bed on the dirty floor.  If you were lucky you got to wash the soap and dirt off that day, if not it would be the next day, unless that was Sunday as we could not wash on Sunday. At present I feel no animosity toward the North Vietnamese.  I do, in fact, feel sorry for the majority of them, especially the peasants.  I feel that these peasants are fed so many lies and distorted facts that they do not know what the war is about, or why there is fighting in the first place.  If they do not work, or fill their quota, they are punished.  They are sometimes thrown into prison.  They work in a dictatorial environment at all times; even at home in their villages, under the cadre as well as in the army. Fourteen March 1973 was my day of departure.  Through the waiting line I went. Through the reception line and onto the airplane I went.  And when the plane landed, the crowd had American flags.  The people looked like Americans.  All the yelling was in English.  This was not just another dream.  My long paid vacation with board and room at the Hanoi Hilton was over.  I was free!" December 1996: Russell Temperly retired from the United States Air Force as a Lt.  Colonel. He and his wife Julie reside in Ohio.