As he lay on the ground in South Vietnam, one bullet in his side and another having broken bones in his right ankle, William DeVries thought of his oldest brother, Nolan.
"I thought, 'Well, this is it,'" DeVries said. "I thought I was going to die.
"Just like Nolan."
William DeVries said Nolan, a U.S. Marine, was killed in April 1951, during the Korean War. DeVries said another older brother, Robert, was so upset by Nolan's death that he immediately enlisted in the Marine Corps.
"Robert lied about his age," William DeVries said. "He was 16. I was 5."
DeVries finally enlisted at the end of October 1962, leaving what was then Kirkman Technical High School during his senior year. He became a Marine, just like his brothers, and shipped out for boot camp at Camp Pendleton, California - just as Nolan DeVries had.
(READ MORE: Marine Corps veteran Larry Presnell deals with daily reminders of time in Vietnam)
"I was next door to the barracks Nolan had been in," William recalled. "When I graduated, Robert came and brought our mother.
BIO
Name: William T. (Bill) DeVriesAge: 76Branch of military: U.S. Marine CorpsYears of service: 1962-1966
Staff Photo by Matt Hamilton / William DeVries, left, looks at names on a memorial with Jake Flippo and Cindy DeVries-Flippo at the Veterans Park in Soddy-Daisy on Oct. 18, 2021."Robert said, 'I'm proud of you, brother. It's not an easy thing to go through boot camp,'" William said.
Soon after, William DeVries and his unit went on a 13-month tour of Japan and the Far East. He said they were in Okinawa when their orders came through.
They were headed to Vietnam.
"We didn't know where we were going until we were on the aircraft," DeVries said. "We were handed live ammo."
DeVries remembers well the day he was wounded - June 5, 1965. He and his unit were on patrol when they came upon a village.
"The first thing I noticed was that there were only young boys and old men," he said. "No one else. I knew what that meant."
It meant, he said, that the village supported the enemy. Anyone who lived there and could handle a gun was either gone to fight elsewhere or hidden, lying in wait.
It turned out to be the latter. DeVries said it wasn't long before he was hit.
"We couldn't get choppers in there for about an hour," he recalled. "It didn't look good."
DeVries was lucky, as it turned out - the bullet he took in his side had hit none of his major organs. The wound became infected, but he said that came as no surprise, as the Viet Cong were known for infecting bullets with urine and excrement before firing them.
DeVries said he made a nearly full recovery, though his right ankle has never been the same. He finished his tour of duty at the end of October 1966, signed on with the Tennessee Valley Authority in 1971 and retired from TVA 2008.
Even given his harrowing wartime experience, DeVries said he'd do it all again, but "hope for a little better outcome."
"From the time I knew what the Marine Corps was," he said, "I wanted to join."
(READ MORE: Vietnam veteran Aubie Camp recalls prayer answered during battle on Hill 22)
Veteran Salute will be published daily through Veterans Day on Nov. 11. Read about more Chattanooga-area veterans at timesfreepress.com/veterans/2021.