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Special Operations.Com
USMC Force Recon
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COURAGE IN THE CORPS: 'MARINES TAKE CARE OF THEIR
OWN'
MARINE CORPS BASE, Camp Pendleton,
Calif. (4/29/97)-- Retired Marine Maj. Bruce "Doc"
Norton received the Bronze Star at 1st Force Reconnaissance
here April 29 for service in Vietnam.
Norton received the award for "heroic
achievement in connection with combat operations against
the enemy from September 1969 to April 1970,"
his citation reads. Alex Lee, a retired Marine lieutenant
colonel, and Norton's former platoon and company commander,
presented the award on behalf of the Chief of Naval
Operations for the President of the United States.
"I feel as if I've come home,"
Norton said as he stood before current members of
1st Force Recon. "This is just a reinforcement
that Marines take care of their own."
The citation reads further, "He
served as an example to the team members with his
calm, capable response to the situation, both in fighting
effectively against the enemy and giving medical assistance.
Because of his proven leadership abilities under fire,
Petty Officer Norton was officially elevated to leadership
positions normally held by Marine noncommissioned
officers."
"Men like Norton, no matter how,
always did it," Lee said of Norton's performance
27 years ago. "With nine percent dead and 43
percent wounded, we fought our butts off."
Lee's original award recommendation
for Norton was lost and his second, in 1972, was refused
because "the war was over," he said. He
wrote a four-page letter to the Chief of Naval Operations
explaining the situation and who Norton was. When
the award board voted for the last time, they unanimously
agreed to the medal.
Norton began his career at Newport
Naval Hospital, R.I., as a ward senior corpsman and
an emergency room corpsman. He volunteered for duty
in Vietnam and was soon assigned to 3rd Force Reconnaissance
Company, where he served along the demilitarized zone
and the Laotian border. After completing the Naval
Scuba School and the Army Basic Airborne Course, he
was reassigned to 1st Force Reconnaissance Company,
where he was later wounded and evacuated to Naval
Hospital Yokosuka, Japan.
After discharge Norton enrolled as
a candidate in the Marine Platoon Leader's Course.
When he graduated from the College of Charleston,
S.C., he was commissioned in 1974 as a second lieutenant
and given his first assignment as a platoon leader.
Eventually returning to the reconnaissance
community, he was stationed as a deep reconnaissance
platoon leader with 3rd Reconnaissance Bn. He was
later transferred to Infantry Training School and
served as a company commander, the chief of tactics,
and finally the S-3 officer for the school.
Norton soon become a student at the
Amphibious Warfare School in Quantico, Va. Upon graduation,
he became a company commander with 3rd Battalion,
1st Marines. He was transferred in 1988 from the Maritime
Prepositioned Ships Program at Blount Island, Fla.,
to serve with the Training and Education Branch, Quantico,
Va., as the military construction representative until
his reassignment to Marine Corps Recruit Depot San
Diego.
Retired in 1992, Norton remained in
San Diego and became the MCRD Command Museum director.
He has also published four best-selling novels and
released a fifth in November 1996. (Cpl. Christopher
Wilke, MCB Camp Pendleton)
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