Ernest Lee Blackwell takes Stolen Valor to the grave

| October 14, 2013

Scotty sends us his research on Ernest Lee Blackwell from Joliet, Illinois who passed in APril this year, but not without leaving tall tales behind, according to his obituary, he was born March, 1956 (a year before I was born) and went to Vietnam where he spent time as a POW while in Vietnam from 1973 – 1976;

Ernest Lee Blackwell obit

Yeah, well, here’s his FOIA;

Ernest Lee Blackwell FOIA

And his assignments;

Ernest Less Blackwell 2-1

So his story is exactly true, except for a few minor details, like he didn’t join the Army until after the Vietnam War was over, he was never a POW and his dates of service are completely wrong.

But being a canvas repairman in Germany is exactly like being a POW in Vietnam.

Category: Phony soldiers

42 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
LebbenB

I feel sympathy for the family, to find out their recently deceased loved one was a fake must be a pretty harsh blow.

John Robert Mallernee

I didn’t know the Army had guys to run sewing machines.

I thought they farmed that out to civilian contractors.

It reminds me of the jokes we used to tell about “Mess Kit Repair” when I was in III Corps NCO Academy at Fort Hood, Texas, and they were teaching us the Military Method of Instruction.

Green Thumb

@1.

Yeah.

Hayabusa

“Fabric Repairman”?

Well, that is certainly a high-risk-of-capture MOS. I wonder if SERE was part of his AIT. LOL.

TheCloser

Unless his sisters are 20 years younger than him, how could they not know that he was never in Vietnam, nor a POW?

I wonder if he’s one of the 400+ fake POWs getting extra VA money as a result of their lies?

PintoNag

@5 It’s called a lie by omission. The sisters knew; they just never called him on it.

Mike

Laundry specialists are still around.

Bobo

There was a QM section at Camp Victory who did clothing repair when I was there. They would fix the jacked up ACUs that would tear in a few weeks.

Just An Old Dog

“During the Vietnam War” would have been a stretch, but acceptable.
As far as being a POW, anyone that has ever had a GP tent fall on them while putting it up can be traumatized.

ArmyVet

The same with this guy…

His obituary claims he was a Medal of Honor recipient. Unless, he changed his name, I haven’t found mention of him receiving the CMOH yet.

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/myrtlebeachonline/obituary.aspx?n=Earl-Adams&pid=167416677

Just An Old Dog

@10, wonder of wonders, there is no Earl Adams on the roster of Tuskeegee pilots either.

O-4E

Fabric Repair even…must have scored real high on the ASVAB

That MOS has since rolled up into 92S and is still the lowest required scoring job on the ASVAB to get into in the Army

I dare say in the entire military

riflemusket

Did you notice the 95 Charlie mos? Prior to being a fabric repair man. Maybe during training at Fort McClellan they locked him in a Cell and they said this is what it feels like to be a pow. There you go pow mystery solved.

2/17 Air Cav

@5. Bullshitting is an art that is acquired through much practice. I’m not referring to the ‘shootin’-the-breeze’ type of bullshitting but the lying liar brand of bullshitting. Thus, a sibling of an inartful bullshitter knows that the bullshitter bullshits so sending this guy out all wrapped up in bullshit seems appropriate.

Just An Old Dog

Went to the link @ #10, Theres a place to “report news” I reported their obit on Earl Adams was bullshit.

ArmyVet

Maybe POW is a slang term used by Fabric Repairman for Piece of Wool.

Hondo

ArmyVet: according to the CMoH Society Website, precisely one individual with the last name “Adams” received the MoH during World War II.

http://www.cmohs.org/search-results.php?q=ADAMS&x=0&y=0&rank=&organization=&division=&company=&conflict=

His first name wasn’t “Earl”.

MCPO NYC USN (Ret.)

I would think that as a Fabric Repairman, most certainly he felt tortured and confined in terms of career options and advancement. Therefore, his claim as a POW may be legit.

For 5 Extra Points:

What was the Navy’s equivilent rate, where did work and what was the name of 2 locations where they worked?

Poetrooper

@13 Army Vet: Sadly, newspapers can’t be held to account for fact-checking obituaries. They simply print what’s sent to them by families unless the deceased is someone of public interest in which case they may use a professionally written obit. And I doubt that any of them would print any sort of retraction, fearful of being sued by outraged (or opportunistic) family members.

What’s really sad though is that any man would want to leave a legacy so obviously proved phony.

Poetrooper

My comment was for @10 not @13…

ArmyVet

@19 Poetrooper: I understand that as they have dozens coming in every week. Although, the ‘Legacy.com’ website has this person listed among true CMoH recipients.

http://www.legacy.com/memorial-sites/medal-of-honor/

charles w

@18, Sail Makers Mate? Uss Constitution? Just a wild ass guess.

MrBill

@21 – Legacy.com obviously doesn’t fact-check either. Just looking on the first page of their MoH listings – when compared to the official list of recipients at http://www.cmohs.org/ , only two out of the nine names on Legacy’s first page were actual MoH recipients.

CC Senor

@10 Tuskegee Airmen did receive a congressional medal and folks may have gotten confused about the nomenclature. I’ll give the folks the benefit of the doubt.

http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=16892

Roger in Republic

MCPO, I’d gguess they might have a sail maker or two at the Navel academy. They have a fleed of sail boats there. Of course the bark Eagle might have a sail maker, or a cross trained DC.

Roger in Republic

“They have a fleet of sail boats” I need to turn a light on!

NavCWORet

They indeed were called Sailmakers and they worked in the Sail Loft aboard ship. We actually still had a Sail Loft about my first ship, the USS MISSISSIPPI (CGN 40), decommissioned in 1995. Yes, a nuke Cruiser had a Sail Loft. We used it for maintaining our signal flags and doing chair upholstery and such as that. Small items and heavy duty sewing machines and thread with canvas or Naugahyde material.

CI Roller Dude

Facts, math and a few good questions will bring them out everytime.

ExHack

SO here’s my burning question, which may be QED: Can the dead be enrolled in the tourney?

Perhaps there needs to be a “Walking Dead” bracket, of SV fakers whose fakery fineries outlive them.

2/17 Air Cav

@29. Hmmm. I would say that if the decedent is a confirmed poser right up to his expiration date, then yes, he is eligible. On the other hand, if his poserhood traces to his obit w/o an established history of being a lying liar prior to being pulled from the shelf, then no.

Hondo

2/17 Air Cav: TSO runs the tourney, so he’ll make the call. But I believe past practice has been to exclude the dead from consideration. I’m pretty sure Ballduster’s taking tourney top “honors” over Soup a couple of years ago was an aberration – his demise wasn’t known until well after he received the award the year he “won”.

NHSparky

@27–so where’d you keep the naugas?

2/17 Air Cav

@31. Um, I was joking, Hondo.

Hondo

Didn’t catch that, 2/17 Air Cav. Mea culpa.

Hondo

NHSparky: I heard they raised them on the USNA’s farm. (smile)

MCPO NYC USN (Ret.)

Sailmaker. Sail loft or sail locker will do.

5 points awarded to those who got it.

NH: I was one of the dumasses at a tender age of 17 who was convinced by an old and hairy BT1 that naugahide was indeed produced from hybred miniture cow like creaturs. Standing no more than 3 feet high, the nauga’s hide reduced the cost a expensive leather goods around the world.

MCPO NYC USN (Ret.)

@ 25. I would say cross trained BM before DC. Plus, all work done aboard USCG Ship EAGLE is conducted by Midshipmen, probably supervised by enlisted Sailors.

Veritas Omnia Vincit

@4 he did in get SERE training every canvas repairman learns Sewing Equipment Repair & Evaluation

Eagle Keeper

Take it to the grave, answer to your Maker.

Just An Old Dog

http://www.scnow.com/news/politics/article_9f4a1f74-a4a8-5512-8843-71be061e8798.html

Apparently Mr Adams has been on the news back in 2009 where he was reported as being an MOH winner also… probably has a lot to do with the news reporting that the Congressional Gold medal that was awarded to the surviving Tuskegee Airmen was “The Congressional Medal of Honor.”

Hondo

Just An Old Dog: could well be the case. The list of Tuskegee Airmen that’s available on-line specifically does state it was pilots only. Support crew and/or instructors who weren’t assigned to a combat squadron aren’t listed, but were probably covered by the intent of that medal and are considered “Tuskegee Airmen” as well.

I probably have enough for a FOIA on the guy, but I think I’m going to pass. Records will almost certainly be in “archived” status (I’m guessing he was discharged shortly after World War II, which is now more than 62 years ago) – and I really don’t feel like spending $75 to get a copy (that’s the current fee for getting records pulled from archival storage).

YN1/DEPUTY

my buddy was a parachute rigger in the Navy, he had to learn to sew I guess to repair parachutes. But mainly we traded with him to make us cool storage bags for crap. I still have what looks like a flight bag that the pilots would use to put their helmets and stuff in. He also for a pack of cigs would hem our uniforms.