‘We’re all Joes:’ Onset brunch honors Vietnam veterans

Mar 26, 2023

The life of Pfc. Carlos J. Rose, who was killed in action in Vietnam on May 12, 1969 at age 20, can be summed up in two photographs. 

One, taken in his civilian days, shows him at home, playing the electric guitar with a determined expression on his face. “Carlie,” as he was known, loved music and singing. 

“We used to go around performing at different bar areas,” said his brother Paul. “My brother was a good person.”

When Carlos was 10 years old, he, James and their brother Charlie lost their parents and went to live with their aunt in Onset. When Carlos turned 15, he left school to work in the cranberry bogs. 

“The community loved him,” said his friend Ervin “Tootsie” Russell, who served in the 23rd Infantry Regiment in Vietnam in 1971. “He had an outstanding voice. [He was] a very personal guy.” 

On July 26, 1968, Carlos enlisted in the Marine Corps. Russell drove him to the processing station. Around that time, the second photo, of him in his uniform, was taken. 

“I wasn’t too sure what inspired him [to enlist],” Russell said. “He was definitely a full-fledged Marine when he came home from boot camp. A proud Marine.” 

Both photographs were on display in the Dudley L. Brown VFW Post 2846 in Onset on Sunday, March 26. Since 2008, around the time of Vietnam Veterans Day (which was on Wednesday, March 29 this year), the VFW has held the Carlos J. Rose Memorial Brunch in honor of Rose and three other Wareham residents killed in action during the Vietnam War: Sgt. Ronald L. Bumpus (died Aug. 3, 1967 at age 18), Pfc. Richard H. Arruda (died Sept. 12, 1968 at age 20) and 1st Lt. James A. Crowley (died Oct. 16, 1968 at age 23). 

“They were babies,” said brunch attendee Julia Johnson, whose husband Larry is a Vietnam veteran. “They were babies.”

“It’s necessary for the youth of the community to know the sacrifices of those four Vietnam veterans, and all veterans,” said Russell, who has organized the memorial brunch every year. 

Crowley was a helicopter pilot shot down while flying out of Xuân Lộc, 50 miles north of the city that was then called Saigon.

“He was a very good man,” said his younger brother Patrick. “He was my protector.”

James enlisted in 1966. Patrick said that his brother did it out of “duty to his country.”

When a fellow helicopter was shot down, James came to the rescue, achieving a near-impossible landing under enemy fire. For this and other acts of gallantry, he won a Silver Star and a Distinguished Flying Cross. 

“He was my best friend,” said Tom Foster, who served in Vietnam alongside James. “Jimmy was a natural-born leader. He was corageous, he was self-effacing, he was generous. He was the one man I’d want at my back in a tough situation.” 

In Vietnam, Foster said, the troops had a saying. If the fighting was happening far away, it was “someone else’s war.” To James, it was his war too. He would put himself in danger if it meant saving others. 

When James was killed, Foster escorted his body on its way home to Massachusetts. 

“I feel proud and thankful that the veterans and those who died are finally getting the recognition that they never got before,” he said.

Carlos was on guard duty five miles outside of Da Nang the night he was fatally wounded by shrapnel from a rocket attack.

When his body came back to Onset, it caused shock in the community. 

“He was just a nice kid,” said his cousin, Tiny Babbitt. “I couldn’t believe it… It didn’t even look like him.” 

At the time of Carlos’s death, his son Bill Lopes was 3 years old.

“Sometimes it’s kind of hard,” Lopes said, “because I never got to meet him.” 

One of the event’s featured speakers was Sgt. Albert Price, who served in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2010. Price served as a link between generations. Like the Vietnam veterans he spoke to, he experienced being thousands of miles from the safety of home and the love of his family. He experienced the camaraderie of serving in the military and the pain of losing his friends in battle. 

“We’re all Joes,” Price said. “I feel grateful that we’re all here and we can share this time together, because a lot of people didn’t make it home.”