The phone rang in Pete Ferrari’s 1950s ranch-style home on Crestview Drive, and a man was on the other end of the line.
He said he had served in Vietnam with Pete Ferrari’s nephew, Sgt. Arnold Jay Ferrari, who was killed by a mortar shell on March 31, 1968.
Jay Ferrari had given his given his camera to the man on the phone, once U.S. Marines Pfc. Donald J. Gillespie, now just Don Gillespie of the Philadelphia suburb of Erdenheim, Pa.
Ferrari had been unable to find film in Vietnam for the Cannon Dial 35. Shortly before he died, Ferrari gave the camera to Gillespie to take to a rear base for safekeeping.
In his short time in Vietnam, Sgt. Ferrari, a 26-year-old volunteer from Napa, Calif., had earned the respect of his Marines. He was killed after less than three weeks in Vietnam when a mortar shell landed near him at the platoon barracks in Khe Sanh.
After Sgt. Ferrari’s death, Gillespie tried to put the camera in Ferrari’s duffel bag to be sent home with his remains. When he was prevented access to Ferrari’s surviving effects, Gillespie kept the camera.
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I’m happy to be able to return this camera to you after 45 years. I can’t believe it has been that long. It has sat in my dresser drawer for 40-something years and each time I saw it, I thought about that time in my life. For me it was another lifetime, but a time I have carried with me all these years. I’m very sorry for the loss your family suffered with the death of Sgt. Ferrari. For the short time I spent with him in Vietnam two things that I recall about Sgt. Ferrari was how he cared for his Marines, and he was the kind of NCO that never asked anyone to do anything he would not. I was a 19-year-old Pfc. when I met him. Sgt. Ferrari was the newly assigned platoon sergeant. I had been in country about four months when he came to our platoon in mid-March ’68 and it was during the height of the siege of Khe Sanh.
– Excerpted from Gillespie’s letter to Pete Ferrari, Oct. 23, 2013
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Gillespie volunteered for service out of high school. He wanted to prove himself in the mold of his father and uncles, who had served in World War II.
Gillespie was sent to Khe Sanh, where the North Vietnamese Army was laying siege to a Marines position. The siege lasted 77 days,
Gillespie later learned there were about 40,000 NVA soldiers surrounding 5,000 Marines. The NVA would lob in mortar shells and pepper the base with gunfire every night.
He could hear NVA soldiers through the walls at night, attempting to tunnel their way into the Marines’ base.
Carpet bombing by American B-52 bombers kept the North Vietnamese at bay.
“When Sgt. Ferrari arrived, he got there in the thick of it,” Gillespie said. “When he got there, it was really, really bad.”
Gillespie came to like Ferrari. In Khe Sanh, a small group of Marines would be sent to patrol outside the fence line at night to provide early warning if the NVA attacked. Most noncommissioned officers avoided the dangerous assignment, Gillespie said. Ferrari volunteered for it.
“He was the kind of guy that wouldn’t ask somebody to do something unless he’d do it himself,” Gillespie said. “He was dedicated, and he cared for his troops.”
Ferrari was killed when he stepped outside a bunker and was blasted by a mortar shell.
“When he was killed, I couldn’t put the camera in his bag because they wouldn’t authorize it,” Gillespie said.
“They sent all my stuff home. When I finally arrived home and started going through my things, this camera was there.”
Gillespie searched in vain for Ferrari’s family members for many years. Finally, he came across a mention of Sgt. Ferrari on the website of a California high school where Ferrari had graduated. A staff member at the high school was able to get Gillespie in touch with Sgt. Ferrari’s surviving family.
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Jay Ferrari, who had previously served in the Marines Corps Reserve, volunteered for active duty and was sent to Vietnam in 1968.
His uncle, Pete Ferrari of Durango, also is a veteran, having served in the U.S. Army in Europe during World War II. He was proud when his nephew volunteered for Army service. So was Bonnie Sawyer of Seattle, Pete’s daughter and a cousin to Jay.
“He felt a sense of duty, and he had friends there (serving in Vietnam),” Sawyer said. “He was very, very proud to be a Marine.”
Pete Ferrari is 95 years old and has deep roots in the Durango area. He only rarely saw his nephew Jay, who grew up in Napa, Calif., on visits to Durango.
Bonnie said Jay was like a brother to her. She received a letter from Jay shortly after he died.
Gillespie’s call to Pete Ferrari saying he had the camera seemed to come out of the blue.
“We were both thrilled,” Sawyer said. “After all these years, it’s still emotional.”
After finding Pete Ferrari, Gillespie hesitated for a few days before mailing the camera.
“Sending the camera was kind of hard because I had it for so long,” Gillespie said. “It was like something I could touch. I had a hard time actually mailing it off. I wanted to send it back, but I didn’t want to send it back, you know? Now, I’m happy. I’m happy his uncle got it.”
Pete Ferrari was glad to receive the camera and some photos and maps Gillespie sent along with it.
“It gives you some background on what you’re missing,” he said.
The camera did not contain any film, so any photos Jay Ferrari took in Vietnam remain lost to history. Gillespie sent the Ferrari family some photos of himself at the platoon barracks near the spot where Jay Ferrari was later killed. Gillespie, a youthful Marine, stands in front of a wall of sandbags. Khe Sanh’s Hill 861, an infamous site of bloody combat during the war, can be seen in the distance.
Gillespie was wounded by a grenade on May 6, 1968, and was sent to Japan to recuperate. That September, the Marines shipped him back to Vietnam, where he was soon shot in the calf. That finally earned him a ticket home.
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“If anything, I hope you get comfort in knowing Sgt. Ferrari is remembered by all who served with him. He did his duty without hesitation and with much devotion. He truly is an American hero.”
– Excerpted from Gillespie’s letter to Pete Ferrari, Oct. 23, 2013
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Gillespie went on to a long career as a Philadelphia police officer and later a Pennsylvania state investigator. Like many Vietnam veterans, Gillespie, now 64, has mixed feelings about the war.
“I’ve always been proud that I served,” he said. “I have some questions about it now. I was always proud to do my duty, and I was always proud to have been with those guys that I was with over there. I think about those guys every day.”
In 2010, Gillespie returned to Vietnam along with his sons to visit Khe Sanh, where he had fought. Vacationing in Vietnam during peacetime, Gillespie said, was “very weird.”
“It’s very peaceful up there now,” he said. “It’s beautiful up there – the mountains.”
cslothower@durangoherald.com
