Marine Corporal Charles “Joe” Brimberry and some of his buddies were “just heading to
a river to get a swim and clean up when it happened.” Deep in Vietnam (Joe was not
sure exactly where), one of the guys near Joe hit a trip wire that exploded a grenade.”
Joe was hit in the arm by shrapnel and “the two other guys were hit worse than I was.”
Joe was flown by chopper to the nearest field hospital to be patched up and then sent to
the USS Repose hospital ship in Da Nang Harbor. The ship would treat over 9,000
battle casualties and 24,000 inpatients while deployed and earned the nickname of
“Angel of the Orient.” Joe noted that “the best thing on the ship was the nurses
onboard. They were older than us young guys and very nice to us.” After two or three
days, Joe was sent back to his unit. When asked what the scariest time in Vietnam
was, he said “night time firefights.”
Charles Joseph Brimberry was born in Indianapolis to Charles and Lenna Brimberry.
His father was a truck driver and later a policeman. He had two sisters. His mom and
dad separated when he was a young man and “dad picked me up from school one day
and took me to Torrance, California.” His mother joined them later and she and Charles
stayed together until he passed away. Joe graduated from North High in Torrance in
1963. Enlisting in the Marines in July 1963, basic training was in Camp Pendleton,
California. He would serve a stint in Okinawa from 1964 to 1965, and then attend cold
weather school in Bridgeport, California which he enjoyed. “We got to camp out, go
hiking and repel. I like all of those things.” He then helped to train reserves for six
months. Part of the 1st Battalion, 5 th Marines, Brimberry and his unit “made an
amphibious landing near Chu Lei, Vietnam in April, 1966 and headed north.”
Returning to his unit after being wounded, Later on, Joe would suffer from “jungle rot.”
Jungle rot was due to cuts or scratches which became infected and turned into painful
sores. Joe was sent back to the hospital on Okinawa and then arrived in San Francisco
to convalesce in December of 1966. He spent his last six months at Barstow, California
as a sergeant of the guard and was discharged on July 14, 1967. Remembering his
time in Vietnam, he said his “girlfriend Patricia Hutson from back home in Torrance
wrote to me every day.” He also recalled that his best friend, Cpl. Albin Barancdyk from
Wisconsin “had both legs blown off and was killed in Vietnam in May 1966.” He said
“the toughest part was writing to Albin’s fiancée that he had been killed.” Joe had
introduced the couple.
Joe and Patricia were married on June 14 th , 1968. They met in church in Torrance
when she was 15 and Joe was twenty. Joe attended El Camino Junior College where
he tested for law school. He was admitted to the West Los Angeles School of Law and
eventually graduated in 1975 with a Doctorate of Jurisprudence. He worked for Hughes
Aircraft for nine years in the Security and Education Department. He and Pat bought a
house in Simi Valley in July of 1976 and Joe went to work at the L.A. County Sheriff’s
office patrolling Beverly Hills for six months. In 1983 he went to work at the Simi Valley
Police Department and worked as a patrolman, swat team member and finally a detective. He said he “had several close calls and an ugly homicide in 1983 lead him to
retire.” Joe and Pat had four children, 2 boys and 2 girls.
Pat was born in Littlefield and “wanted to move back to West Texas” as her parents
lived in Lubbock. Joe laughingly noted that “Texas girls may leave Texas, but after a 35
year vacation, they want to move back home.” Joe went on the 2017 Texas South
Plains Honor Flight after hearing about it from a veteran who went on an earlier flight.
His favorite memorial was the Vietnam wall because he “had friend’s names on the
wall.” He wanted to be remembered for his love of God, family and country.
Respectfully submitted by
Larry A. Williams
Veterans Liaison Co-Chair
Texas South Plains Honor Flight
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