Bruce Oliver, a Marine Corps veteran of two-and-a-half tours of duty in Vietnam in the late 1960s and a tour in Iraq as First Sergeant of the 118th Field Artillery of the Georgia Army National Guard almost 40 years later, was honored by VFW Post 7764 in Reidsville at the regular meeting Monday night, July 8, 2024.
Bruce is currently residing at the Carl Vinson Veterans Memorial Hospital in Dublin, Georgia, as a result of a stroke that he suffered about a dozen years ago. Monday night, he looked stronger than he has in sometime, as he maneuvered his automated wheelchair among admirers. His wife, Rita, brought him to the meeting, and he received a rousing greeting from old friends and other veterans who are well aware of the Bruce Oliver story.
“I just got this electric wheelchair,” he said with a grin. “It has two modes; rabbit and turtle. I found out that you don’t operate in the rabbit mode in close quarters. The first time I got in it, I ran over just about everything in my room before I could change it from rabbit to turtle mode. But, I’m learning.”
Most local veterans have heard Bruce’s story. He graduated with the Class of 1966 after a standout career as a 155-pound center and linebacker on the Reidsville High School (RHS) football team. As a linebacker, he broke his Uncle E.B. Cowart’s record of 126 tackles in a season for the Tigers. Bruce made 129. After graduation, he joined the United States Marine Corps and found himself in Vietnam in the fall of 1966. He would serve a second tour, and then, when his younger brother, Dennis, joined the Marines in 1969, Bruce volunteered for a third term so Dennis would not be required to serve so soon out of boot camp.
Like Bruce, Dennis was an outstanding athlete at RHS and very popular among students and faculty. As was his nature, he volunteered to serve in Vietnam in Marine Recon, and he was killed his third week in country. His death was devastating to the close-knit North Tattnall community. Lisa Trim was in the 9th grade and remembered that Mr. Marvin Findley (her bus driver) stopped their school bus in front of the courthouse and told the students that the flag was at half-mast because Dennis Oliver had been killed in Vietnam.
Bruce got out of the Marines in the mid-1970s and returned to South Georgia where he began a career in law enforcement. But he missed the military life and joined the Georgia Army National Guard and became a part of the 48th Brigade at Fort Stewart. He went on to become First Sergeant of the 118th Field Artillery out of Savannah. In 2005, the 118th was activated to go to Iraq, but due to his age, Bruce would not be required to deploy. True to his nature, he immediately decided to go, mostly because he believed his combat experience in Vietnam would help save lives of his soldiers. Surely, it did. The 118th returned in 2006 with no fatalities.
Bruce and Rita’s son, Jerome Register, was one of the soldiers who deployed and returned safely. Miraculously, Jerome served on convoy security duty continuously during a time when roadside bombs were taking many American lives.
Bruce’s tactics of using multiple routes at varying times and constantly changing the speeds of the convoys while maintaining variable spacing between vehicles helped keep the enemy off balance and protected his soldiers.
Quartermaster Ronnie Thomas read the award, and Commander Ronnie McCall made the presentation. John Wingate, a 1966 classmate and Army Purple Heart recipient for wounds in Vietnam, and Jackie Trim, a Marine Corps Vietnam Purple Heart recipient, who went to Marine Bootcamp with Bruce and the late Tommy Taylor, stood on either side of Bruce during the ceremony.
Quartermaster Thomas ended with, “Bruce Oliver is the epitome of the military patriot who serves even when that service is not required. For his dedicated service to his community, the State of Georgia, and the United States of America, VFW 7764 presents him with this certificate of achievement and proudly claims him as a native son.”
VFW members jumped to their feet and gave him a rousing ovation. It was well deserved. VFW 7764 Chaplain Jackie Trim said it best. “This was a really good meeting.”
