A SOLDIER'S HEART

A veteran recollects his traumatic experiences serving in the Vietnam War and the emotional reverberations appearing long after in this memoir.

Gauvin grew up in northern Maine, raised in a strictly Roman Catholic/French Canadian family. The sudden death of his father, Hector, loomed large over his teenage years. When the author attended St. Thomas University, he was shiftless and distracted, no longer the hardworking student of his high school days. He decided to enlist in the Army under the impression that his chosen specialization—X-ray technician—and a longer enlistment would keep him out of Vietnam, where war raged. That proved false; he was sent to Saigon in 1968 and assigned to the Wound Data Munitions Effectiveness Team. This “exclusive team” studied the wounds of fallen American soldiers. In effect, it meant the performance of autopsies on the warriors, work so ghastly and demoralizing it was generally kept a secret. The experience exacted a terrible emotional toll on Gauvin, a suffering he recounts both candidly and poignantly: “After a year in Vietnam, I feared I had lost the foundation of beliefs I had built my entire life upon. Was there really a God? And if there was, WHAT THE HELL WAS HE THINKING?” The author would marry, start a family, and find financial success, but he was dogged by PTSD, a condition that expanded from mood swings to “all-out rages.” In addition, he was diagnosed with diabetes, a disease that may have been tied to his exposure to Agent Orange while in Vietnam. Gauvin’s struggle is lucidly conveyed—he paints a painfully vivid picture of both the horrors of war and the grim consequences. And while the core of his book is a familiar one—there is no shortage of literature on either the Vietnam conflict or its aftermath—his discussion of his work for the WDMET distinguishes his contribution to the genre. For those in search of a different perspective on the ghastliness of that complex war, this memoir is an instructive and affecting remembrance.

A powerful war account, eye-opening and moving.