Taking Stolen Valor to the grave
AverageNCO sent these two obituaries to Mary a few weeks ago and she sends us their records today. The first is Leslie Bernhardt of Oregon. The obit says;
Les Bernhardt passed away March 27, 2013.
He graduated in 1969 from Mapleton High School, and then enlisted in the U.S. Army, where he eventually became a door gunner. He fought through two tours in Vietnam and was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for bravery in action.
He was also the recipient of the Silver Star, Bronze Star, Purple Heart and a Vietnamese Ranger Ribbon.
His FOIA says that, yes he made ONE tour of Vietnam and another to Germany, no Silver Star, no Bronze Star, no Purple Heart;
The second obituary is about Howard J. Brinkerhoff in Upstate, New York. The obit says;
Howard J. Brinkerhoff, 65, passed away on Wednesday, April 3, 2013 at the Stratton VA Medical Center in Albany after a long illness. Born in Oceanside on April 14, 1947, he was son of the late Howard T. and Catherine Schaffer Brinkerhoff. Howard was raised and educated there, and enlisted in the Marines at age 17. He served in combat in Vietnam and was a Prisoner of War, receiving the Navy Cross and the Purple Heart. Howard was a life member of the VFW. He resided in Greene and Schoharie counties since discharge from the Marines. Howard was a man of honor and distinction, and he will be greatly missed.
His FOIA says that he deployed to the Dominican Republic in 1965 before going to Vietnam, but no indication that he was ever a POW, no Navy Cross, but there is a Purple Heart and an Air Medal;
I really hate these because the only people we can cause pain are the bereaved families, however, it reminds the phonies who have been bragging all their lives about their phony service to come clean while they’re alive so that the last memory families have of their departed is not that they were bald faced liars.
Category: Phony soldiers
Short version of all this for the families involved:
Most of us served. We honor the service of all who served. Apparently your father/uncle/cousin/whatever served honorably and for that we honor him.
What we do not honor is lying about a service record either by the individual veteran or anyone else.
If you need assistance discovering that a service medal with 2 bronze star devices is NOT a Bronze Star Medal, we will gladly help explain it to you. But we will NOT apologize for telling the truth or for calling out those who lie about their records or the records of others.
We do not know if your loved one lied about his record or if you misunderstood that record. We may never know. But what has been posted here is the truth. If you have materials which might alter our understanding of the truth, then present them to us. Until you do, our conclusions are based upon hundreds of years of collective service experience among the veterans here and those who hold all our official records.
For something like this (obituary), newspaper articles are hearsay, not proof or evidence. The proof is in the NPRC files.
People frequently tell ‘sea stories’ about what they did in the service. Most of them have a 1% basis in fact, the remaining 99% is just storytelling. When people start telling stories about what they did ‘in the Nam’, a healthy does of skepticism is warranted. I have run into people who claimed they were over there but when asked about when they were there, said ‘1978’, when it was illegal for US citizens to even be there.
And furthermore, since I have a very good friend who served 5 tours there as a combat cameraman and only skims over what he saw and did, I am disinclined to believe people who make grandiose claims unless they have something besides a DD214, which can easily be altered, as backup.
Newspaper articles are NOT evidentiary. They are hearsay.
All true, Ex-PH2. But given the above comments by family members, it seems to me that this guy was telling “tales of heroic derring-do” and apparently “rockin’ the lie” to his family for years. Based on documentary evidence, much of what he was telling them was either misunderstood badly or was bogus as hell.
I won’t blame the newspaper here, and I won’t blame the family. Unless the guy is literally that one-in-a-million bona fide decorated hero who fell through the proverbial crack, records wise, he’s the source of this issue. He either exaggerated wildly or didn’t make the truth plain enough.
And as is often the case, the family he left behind are the ones who get to deal with the fallout from his being exposed.
@51&52……very well said.
I’m thinking that it’s getting to the point where the issue of stolen valor should be addressed in core values classes in recruit training.
I’ve been thinking about Bernhardt all day. He showed up at Ft. Lewis one week before me. He arrived in Vietnam in May 1971. I arrived there in Feb. 1971. He flew. I flew. Why anyone who served there doing the job he did would make up tales of daring do is beyond me. As gunners and crew chiefs we were highly respected. No need for all the bs about two tours, medals, The most unbelievable part of the whole story is the crash and the 20 mile hike out saving a buddy. There were no friendly lines things were not static, just base camps and jungle. I just don’t understand