Adam Dumphy
The U.S. Marines have never had need of a publicist. Still they have had many. None can compare with Col. J.W.T. Jr. When one of his books came out with his sketches the young ridge runners, North and South would come down out of the mountains by the droves to have their manes roached, hoofs trimmed and enlist.
Colonel T. established the idealized example of them as hard drinking, hard fighting, hard living, and hard to kill. Of course he was speaking of the “Old Corps” which never existed except in fantasy. Still generations of Marines have tried to live up to this mold. The following fictional stories are of a little man who did just that.
Adam Dumphy’s first introduction into the aura, the espirit, the tradition, of those exalted personages, ‘Marines of the Old Corps’ was in fifth grade when he ran across a book by J. W. T. Jr. Though he knew even then that it must be partly fantasy he was thrilled by the whole idea.
This fascination plummeted the night he went to see his brother embark with the Ist Marines at San Diego’s Broadway pier for the Guadalcanal campaign. That was a macabre scene: the flood lit shabby pier with a high grey wall on the right, actually the hull of a navy transport; the orderly line of Marines winding up the two stage embarking ladders; the grizzled veterans laughing and smoking while the replacements quiet and pale. And behind the barrier their loved ones unashamedly sobbing.
It increased again, as a Navy Recruit (Not a Marine at family insistence.) at the NTC San Diego where he floated though Boot camp while just beyond the chain link fence his Marine counterparts grunted through seemingly impossible evolutions.
It decreased again through involvement in the medical care of the broken bodies of those who did return at USVAHosp LA.
Then resurfaced in years of medical practice in an area where many senior officers retired and told their stories.
He longed to record the aura for subsequent generations but didn’t know how to present it. He finally decided on a comedic format in accord with the fantasy but such that would never distract from reality, (the sobbing Mothers and broken bodies).
In a large city of Central Mainland China which must remain unnamed. And in a decade of Modern Chinese history which cannot be revealed. (Perhaps it would be safe to admit that the events occurred equidistant between the "Bully" of Teddy and the baloney from Franklin D.) In this nameless, timeless setting the American Embassy for this outpost was housed in a large three storied brick and frame mansion set back comfortably in it''s own seven acres of trees and gardens.
Fronting on the main highway north it would have appeared to the mandarins, and coolies, camel drivers and burro boys who passed, stately, dignified and commodious. To the closer observer it was more aptly termed ‘dilapitated’.
For if the foreign policy of Great Britian in those decades could be described a "somehow muddling through", that of the United States was more simply just “muddled", neither through nor back but more accurately around and around in concentric circles. As one Administration after another in Washington ignored the Far East for the pork barrels closer at hand, the lovely old building gradually and gently aged like a still hopeful courtesan. Painted it is true on the outside but underneath wrinkled and sad.
And as the duties and responsibilities of the Embassy became greater within a more complex world, the staff and equipment multiplied in an exponential proportion. The result at the time of which I speak was that the master bedroom, dining and ballroom remained large comfortable and reasonably well kept, but the remainder of the grand old house became increasing cut up and cluttered.
As a result the office allotted to the Military Officer, (called at various times the Military Attaché, Liaison Officer, Armed Forces Representative, or just that "damned dogsbody.") was in what had been, when there was still a coal furnace, the coal stall. Ten by twelve feet in size it nestled beneath the outstretched asbestos covered arms of the "new" central heater (oil but now eighteen years old). A small window at eye level looked out onto the under surface of the back stairway and the door opened into the converted garage. And as the room was more or less octagonal shaped it did not allow the luxury of it''s two desks being spaced.
