Viet Cong Wedding in the Jungle

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363-04835.pdf
Digital Object Identifier
363-04835
Title
Viet Cong Wedding in the Jungle
Description
Article published in the New York Herald Tribune about the marriage of a Việt Cộng soldier and nurse, page 2
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Draft transcripts were automatically generated via Google Document AI and are currently under review. Please report significant errors to Archives & Special Collections at archives@unl.edu.
Transcript
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- Page 1
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NEWS PERSPECTIVE
Viet Cong Wedding in the Jungle
By Beverley Deepe
A Special Correspondent
BINH DUONG, Viet Nam.
The bride wore the black
pajamas of a peasant; the
bridegroom looked resplendent
in his khaki uniform decorated.
with the insignia of command-
er of the village guerrillas.
The 22-year-old bride re-
ceived only a few handker-
chiefs from her fellow Viet
Cong nurses; the 27-year-old
bridegroom received "best
wishes" from his Viet Cong
subordinates and superiors.
The bride and bridegroom ex-
changed photographs of each
other, "but we had no money
and only gave each other
souvenirs."
The godmothers of the Lib-
eration Army fighters served
sweet cakes, candy and tea
during the dusk-to-midnight
celebration; the bridegroom's
Viet Cong commander a po
litical cadre-talked with the
bride's commander-a doctor
-and they agreed. the mar-
riage was
on, the bride's
mother and the bridegroom's
54-year-old father also agreed
and the celebration rolled on
until midnight.
The two Viet Cong superiors
of the bride and bridegroom
verbally pronounced them
married and "it was generally
accepted we were married."
RETURN
At midnight, the bride re-
turned to treat the Viet
Cong wounded and the bride-
groom returned to his village
to command his guerrilla
units. It was one week before
the young people could see
each other and spend the
night together-and then only
with permission of their com-
manders.
The eyes of Mrs. Nguyen
Van Long twinkled as she re-
called her wedding in the
jungle village of Phu My
Hung, only 20 miles northwest
of Saigon and two miles from
a large government training
center. Her husband explained
that "it was love at first
sight," but the marriage in
the fall of 1963 was arranged
in traditional Vietnamese
fashion through an elder
mediator. Mr. Long, sitting in
a Vietnamese government re-
education center, explained:
"My father introduced me
to the Viet Minh (the pro-
Communists fighting the
French during the French
Indo-China War) in 1947 and
when I was nine years old I
became one of their liaison
boys; I stayed with them until
1954 when the war ended.
After that, I remained in the
Ho Bo jungle (a renowned
Communist stronghold for
decades) until 1960, when we
THE WAR-TORN FABRIC of Vietnamese life
forces peasant women, like this one fleeing her
home in Bau Bang village with her children, to
change their entire lives. In this second of five
articles, Herald Tribune Special Correspondent
Beverly Deepe interviews a former Viet Cong
nurse, who tells how her initiation into the guer-
rilla forces changed her life.
"One day I was on a mission
with two of my men; after-
wards we dropped in to see the
12 girl nurses at the hospital
and I saw this one nurse and
I told
my two guerrilla-
comrades she's a very nice girl.
The others said, 'If you love
her why don't you push on
and get her?' I replied: 'All
right, I shall try.'
"My comrades advised me to
see an elder villager and ask
for his help to arrange the
marriage. I took a 10-piastre
(ten cents) tea package when
I went to the elder's home and
told him the problem. The
elder found out about nurse's
background and told her, 'You
know that young man-he's in
love with you. What about
you do you love him?' She
told the elder (yes.'
"So both of us put in duly
typed our requests to our Viet
Cong commanders. Then I was
sent on a two-week mission
and she was also on another
mission. When we both re-
turned, her commander and
my commander got together
with the village elder.
and a private meeting of the
girl I loved and myself was
background of each other and
then we decided firmly to get
married. We both got approval
from our commanders. We set
a date; I typed out 10 invita-
tion cards and she typed out
25 invitation cards, but I also
verbally asked 15 others to
come to the wedding-so about
50 people came.
Mrs. Long, brighter and
more politically conscious than
her husband, explained why
she joined the Viet Cong and
what she did for them:
"In 1961, when I was 18,
I was recruited and sent to
a medical training school for
three months; I did so well
the Viet Cong sent me to
Ho Bo jungle base for six
months' training under a sur-
gical unit. That's where I
met my husband.
Asked why she joined the
Viet Cong, she talked excit-
edly, her eyes sparkled as
though she had spun into a
new exciting world:
"The Viet Cong from the
village executive committee
gave me the propaganda line
that this is a feudal society-
that we had to stand up and
to liberate the country and so
on. I was so happy. I wasn't
afraid. There were so many
people like me-it was fun.
"In 1960, the Viet Cong vil-
lage executive committeeman
asked me to 'struggle'-this
involved seven or eight vil-
lages and if everyone from
all these villages converged at
one time there would be 7,000
to 8,000 people. I was flat-
tered by the Viet Cong. They
had demonstration banners-
'down with'. . . and 'long live'
I didn't make any ban-
ners, but one man who did
was arrested; the executive
committee told me and an-
other girl to go to the govern-
ment district center compound
to ask for the release of the
man. We got in; the one girl
was badly beaten, but I wasn't.
"The man was released.
After the success of this,
many thousand people came
to &
big meeting-there
weren't enough seats for them
all to sit on-I and the other
girl got the seats of honor
and they gave us a big ovation
because the man was released.
The crowd was in the thou-
sands. This was in 1960-
when the military struggle
against the Saigon govern-
ment began.
MARRIAGE
In the autumn of 1963, she
married the village guerrilla
commander. Based in sepa-
rate villages, they received
permission from their Viet
other three times during the
Cong superiors to see each
following 18 months.
other, we would put in re-
quests for seven days leave
every three months," her hus-
band explained. "Generally we
"If we wanted to see each
got only two or three days'
leave instead of seven. The
first time I got leave to see my
wife was for our honeymoon.
The second time was almost
a year later when our baby
was five days old.
"Then we talked of defect-
ing, from the Viet Cong, but
we didn't have the means."
(Significantly, an American
B-52 raid in the Ho Bo jungle
killed three of Mrs. Long's
medical associates, including
her doctor-superior.)
"The third time I saw her
our baby Thao (Herb) was five
months old; I told my wife,
'we have a family now, we
can't go on like this. We had
better give ourselves up to the
government. We have no fu-
ture with the Viet Cong." "
On July 21, this year, the
young married couple walked
two kilometers to a district
town and caught a bus to this
Vietnamese government pro-
Date
1965, Nov. 22
Subject
Mặt trận dân tộc giải phóng miền nam Việt Nam; Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Women; Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, Vietnamese (Republic); Families of military personnel; Nurses; Military nursing
Location
Bình Dương, South Vietnam
Coordinates
11.2164; 106.6579
Container
B4, F6
Format
newspaper clippings
Collection Number
MS 363
Collection Title
Beverly Deepe Keever, Journalism Papers
Creator
Keever, Beverly Deepe
Copyright Information
These images are for educational use only. To inquire about usage or publication, please contact Archives & Special Collections.
Publisher
Archives & Special Collections, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries
Language
English