What is your most memorable Christmas while deployed?

Remembering Christmas 54 years ago
By Robert "Bob" Kickenweitz

When I was a youth growing up in Scotch Plains, New Jersey, Christmas was pretty much the same year to year other than the presents we would receive. Each year my family would watch a variety of Christmas Shows, Ozzie & Harriet Nelson with David and Ricky, Andy Williams, Perry Como, I Remember Mamma, and of course The Story of the Nativity. On Christmas morning after church, my Aunt and Uncle would drive out from New York City to spend the day and have dinner with us, sometimes my Grandmother and Grandfather would be with us also. My younger brother Edd and I knew that whatever we received as gifts from my Aunt and Uncle there would always be a new pair of slipper socks for each of us, we hated slipper socks but we knew we couldn't say anything other than, "Thank you."

The year I have the most vivid memory of is 1966. This would be my first Christmas away from home, I would not have my family and friends around me, and we would not be having dinner together and for once I wished I could be home to receive those slipper socks. December 25, 1966 found me in Xuan Loc, South Vietnam as part of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment. Our base camp was located about 65 miles northeast of Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, between the jungle and a rubber tree plantation, I really was not looking forward to Christmas that year. I can remember that after dinner on Christmas Eve I went and took a shower, put on a clean uniform and sat down to listen to Armed Forces Radio and to write some letters for my family back home. We also listened to Hanoi Hannah the only other station on the radio. She was the Tokyo Rose of the Vietnam War. She played the best music and in between songs would send out her propaganda message. On this night, she was saying that the Vietcong, (you remember the guys in the black pajamas) would be having Christmas Dinner on the base camp of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment the following day. Now that’s a message that really got our attention.

At about ten in the evening I got up to go over to the service for Christmas Mass. Our Chaplain, Father Egan, his assistant Tony Graziano and whoever else helped, did a superb job in preparing an open field into a beautiful place to serve midnight Mass. They started by taking some beer and soda pallets to construct a floor for our altar, then nailed some plywood on top of the pallets to finish the floor. For the rear walls of the altar, they nailed four by eight sheets of plywood to the floor, then lifting the plywood seven to eight feet high into the air to create the rear walls of the altar. Blue spotlights were used to wash light across the back walls of the altar. A podium with a white cross on the front of it was in the center of the altar.


Off the altar to the left was a confessional with a long line of soldiers and some nurses. The lines were always long at the confessional, everybody always took the opportunity when it presented itself, to go to confession. While more soldiers were filling in the bare spots in the field the Chaplains assistant was playing Christmas Carols on an organ. For some reason while I was sitting on the ground singing with the others around me, I decided to lie back on the ground. Coming from the New York, New Jersey area you never see all the stars that are in the sky due to refractive lights of the big cities. But out here between a jungle and a rubber tree plantation you get to see the Milky Way in its full splendor. I’m not sure if it was my missing of family and friends or if God was telling me in his own way that things would be okay. Looking up into the night sky I saw the most beautiful sight I have ever seen in my life. On the ceiling of our open air church was the same scene the shepherds must have seen two thousand years before, the only thing missing was the star of Bethlehem. The grandeur of the Milky Way in that black sky was absolutely breathtaking. Every Christmas Eve when my family and I go to Mass, inevitability sometime during the service I drift back to that magical Christmas Eve. so many years ago and so far away I'm still filled with a joy only that Christmas could deliver. This year more than any other, I would like to take the opportunity to wish everybody; especially our young men and women of the armed forces a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and that they may feel the magic of that special Christmas.

Robert Kickenweitz
11th ACR HQ & HQ Troop
Oct 66 - Sep 67
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On Christmas 2006, at Kirkuik AB, Iraq, the chaplain and the Top 3 okayed the making of a Christmas tree. We made it out of a steel frame with camouflaged netting and lights, the base commander had a lighting ceremony and we all stood around singing Silent Night and a few other carols.

During a cruise to the Middle East on a destroyer in '93 morale was quite low and there were pro and anti Christmas sentiment on the ship, as we had not been receiving mail regularly for some time. But with a little bit of luck and a lot of help, it turned out to be an okay Christmas.

1980. Went by train from Naples Italy to northern Hollamd for Xmas. My friends family was of a Dutch background. Went thru the alps. Beautiful but cold. Saw a lot of Germany. When we got to our destination his grandmother had us stay upstairs w no heat but slept in a bed w feather pillows. She fought in WW2 w the underground. She did not speak any English. Sat w two nights s coming back. Met a guy from Iraq on train and I think he wanted to surrender to us since we were Americans. Got back to the John F Kennedy (CVA67) and finished our Med cruise. PN2 Mike Rickey

I was stationed in Iceland unaccompanied from 93-95 while my wife, my 3yo, and my son was born on Christmas Day 1993 in Jacksonville, Florida. For my Sons 1st birthday, they flew to Iceland and spent Two weeks enjoying the Snow, extremely high winds, sledding and the blue lagoon. One of my Sailors dressed up as Santa and delivered Christmas gift to my 1year old and my 3 year old. It was great. We even flew to Amsterdam for 4 days to warm up a little. This event helped shape my youngest Sons career path as he is a Navy Seabee and really enjoys it. My other Son is in his last year of Medical School and, as expected, we are both proud of our young men. Merry Christmas to all my shipmates overseas and those at the tip of the Speer. I am proud of every man and woman serving our country. It makes us all better people. Stay Safe.

In 1969 I was serving aboard USS Benner DD 807 on Yankee Station as plane guard for the USS Ranger CV 61 (nickname-TOP GUN). We were notified that a select few members of our crew would be helo- lifted to the carrier for the Bob Hope show. I was standing CIC radar watch while the show went on but in my minds eye, I was on the carrier. The other plane guard was the USS Eversole DD 789. Their crew was similarly given access to the show.

My Christmas memory was kneeling in the sand tactically spaced outside in the embassy compound in Mogadishu with Marine snipers providing overwatch while a Catholic chaplain gave a mass to about 50 of us. Michael Toler LTC USArmy

Beautiful story, I know those kids never forgot your kindness.

1975, 1976 USS INDEPENDENCE CV62, Christmas in Naples duty on Christmas Eve. Went down for Dinner and the Skipper was working the serving line. In the shop one of the guys made wine and we watched movies.

The time my wife was banging another dude.