|
LTC Jose LeRoy
Chacon was born in 1931 in Penasco, NM, to Emilia Martinez y Griego and Gregorio
Chacon y Baca and is a great-grandchild of legendary Civil War hero MAJ Rafael
Chacon y Lopez, who commanded Union troops at the Battle of Valverde in 1861.
Growing up in New
Mexico’s mountains prepared LeRoy well for his military career. While in high
school, he was assistant scout master for Troop 512 when he and about a dozen
Boy Scouts set out on a 14-mile trek through the Sangre de Cristo Mountains that
would test his determination and character.
The late autumn
trip would take the young scouts to an 11,000-foot altitude, so each scout
dressed for cold conditions as best they could. Many wore long-johns, some
dressed in two pair of jeans. They expected a light cover of snow, and a few
boys tied strips of burlap canvas around their shoes to help warm their feet.
None had specialized winter clothing.
Each scout brought
a little food – mostly tortillas filled with potatoes or beans - enough for a
snack. Their provisions included matches, hunting knives, and an ax, which LeRoy
brought.
Local Forest
Rangers dropped the troop at the trailhead and left, intending to meet them at
the finish that afternoon. Shortly after beginning their trek, the scouts found
themselves slogging through fresh, chest-high snow. Alone in the wilderness, the
scouts made a life-or-death decision to continue to the preset rendezvous.
Their choice reflected self-confidence and their desire to earn merit badges
that would qualify some as Penasco’s first Eagle Scouts.
The next 15 hours
were a struggle for survival. The troop set up a schedule with each scout
breaking snow for 15 minutes. By afternoon, near exhaustion and worried, they
had made little headway. They were hungry and cold; the temperature was below
freezing; and sweat began turning to ice on their bodies.
At that point,
LeRoy took over, breaking trail for more than six hours with only an occasional
short rest. By midnight, the cold, exhausted and hungry scouts reached the
summit, and again LeRoy stepped up to lead. Using the ax he brought, he cut
firewood and made fires to warm the scouts.
The boys rested
briefly and ate their meager food. They decided to change their route and follow
a ravine down to a road, where they were rescued early the next day.
This unforgettable
experience in the lives of the scouts might have had a different outcome had
LeRoy not been with them.
LeRoy graduated as
valedictorian of his high school class and, having proven his leadership skills,
followed his brother, Jose Andres, to West Point.
After graduation,
LeRoy completed Airborne, Jumpmaster and Ranger training at Ft. Benning, GA,
training that would be critical for survival during his first Viet Nam tour in
1963–64 as an advisor to a Vietnamese Infantry battalion.
Worry about
survival kept LeRoy awake at night during his first few weeks in combat, but
after concluding that this just wasted energy, he resolved to simply face each
day as it came. He found great inner peace by relying on his determination and
training to lead the men he advised while accepting that, ultimately, his fate
rested in God’s hands.
LeRoy was often
the only American embedded in the Vietnamese unit he advised. During patrols,
which regularly lasted several days, he ate sticky rice balls just as his
Vietnamese soldiers did. They supplemented this with food from hamlets along the
way, but going into villages risked that his team would be betrayed to the Viet
Cong. During firefights, the Viet Cong sometimes used bullhorns to declare that
they would spare the lives of South Vietnamese soldiers who turned over their
American advisors.
During one night
patrol, it was so dark each man had to reach out for the soldier in front to
stay together. His team was ambushed as they crossed a rice paddy, and bullets
buzzed by LeRoy’s head, the closest he had ever felt. They “cracked” as they
whizzed by, and he felt the heat from some rounds. Suddenly, he was alone in the
rice paddy. His team had scattered, but, using his training and faith in God, he
made his way safely back to camp.
In 1968 he
completed the Command and General Staff course at Ft. Leavenworth, a course that
he later taught in Spanish at the School of the Americas (SOA) in Panama. The
SOA provided training to high-ranking military officers from Latin America, and
students in LeRoy’s classes later became presidents of two Latin American
countries.
LeRoy refined his
Vietnamese at the Defense Language Institute in 1971 and returned to Viet Nam
for a second tour before retiring from the military in Texas. Genuinely modest,
he never spoke directly of his role in saving the lives of his fellow boy scouts
and seldom mentioned his Viet Nam experiences.
After retiring
from the Army, LeRoy built a real estate business buying and reselling
foreclosures. He loved doing the repair work himself, but his greatest
satisfaction was helping others achieve home ownership, especially those who had
no one else to help them. True to the values he was raised by, he put service to
others above desire to acquire wealth for himself.
His clients were
often poor, and many did not speak English. LeRoy often used his fluency in
Spanish and Vietnamese in his business. At some point, he began making wishing
wells for the properties he repaired, and this became his trademark.
At the time of his
death, LeRoy also had begun making wishing wells for family and friends; this
unfinished task will be carried on by his children and grandchildren.
Papa, as he was
called by his family, forever will be missed by his wife Flora; their six
children: Theresa, David, Patty, Joe, Mona and Larry; and their grandchildren:
Michael and Adam Martinez, Ryan and Scotty Rogers, and
Maddie and Zoey Chacon.
—David A. Chacon, son
| 
