Gulf Breeze Vietnam vet still mourns man who took his place on fatal patrol 50 years ago

Joe Farley didn't really know Bobby Ray Williams. He only met the young Okie once ? on the morning Williams died in the jungles of Vietnam on a fall day in 1970.

But Farley, 76, of Gulf Breeze, has mourned Williams ever since. And in many ways, he's been haunted by him too.

U.S. Army 1st Lt. Bobby Williams, 24, of Lawton, Oklahoma, died on Sept. 29, 1970, after a patrol squad he was leading was ambushed. Gunfire rang out and Williams ? the only member of the squad who was hit ? was killed.

Farley was supposed to lead that squad. He was supposed to be where Williams was.

Instead, Farley was still recovering from a gruesome wound he had received on Sept. 10 when he stepped on a trap that sent a sharp knife of bamboo ? often coated in feces or other substances to cause infection and illness ? ripping into his left calf. He spent a few weeks back at camp but was back in the field on Sept. 29, still nursing a wound that would later earn him a permanent scar and a Purple Heart.

"We had just received a new platoon leader, Lt. Bobby Williams and he was brand new in country, no more than a week at that point," Farley said, standing at the Wall South at Veterans Memorial Park where Williams' name is inscribed along with nearly 60,000 other U.S. service members who died in Vietnam. "He and the captain talked, and they decided it would be all right for me to not go on that mission."

Farley wasn't there. But he knew what was happening.

"I could hear everything on the radio because we had it open,'' Farley said. "We were hearing what was going on and, well, they got ambushed and ..."

Farley stopped talking. He can still hear it unfold in his mind. For so many years, he tried to lock the horrible memory inside. His wife of 52 years, Patti, didn't even learn the tragic story of Lt. Williams until no more than 10 years ago. She knew he was shaken by what happened in Vietnam and suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. But for so long, neither she nor their three children, knew the cause of Farley's deep pain.

"I had a really bad PTSD episode about 10 years ago and that sort of changed everything," said Farley, who spent a career in the hospitality industry after leaving the service upon returning from Vietnam. "I got the help I needed, which is so important, and finally got my head on pretty much straight, and then I could start talking about it and that made all the difference in the world."

Every year, Farley and his wife attend the Memorial Day Ceremony at Veterans Memorial Park.

"I do not miss a Memorial Day Ceremony here,'' he said. "The ceremony should not be missed by anyone who lives in Pensacola. I have two grandchildren and we've introduced them to it and have tried to teach them the importance of not forgetting these guys. They need to be remembered for what they did."

Farley has always remembered. Again, his voice weakened and trembled in places, but he was determined to get the words out.

"Bobby was killed and the way that I've always looked at it is if it wasn't for him, I probably wouldn't be here. Fifty years later and it still gets me like this. I kept it bottled up for so long, just buried it. I didn't need to talk about it and no one needed to know, but it was always there."

Those conflicting emotions are still there.

"To be honest with you, I only met him that once," Farley said. "I didn't know him at all."

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In recent years, his wife Patti has helped him look into Williams' short life. He was only 24 when he died.

They've discovered a few things about Williams through online research:

Williams graduated from Douglass High School in Lawton, Oklahoma, in 1964, and attended college at Langston University in 1964-1965. He entered the service in late 1965 and was commissioned as an officer in 1969.

"We know where he's buried," Patti Farley said. "We're planning on visiting someday. We'd really like to."

She said talking about Williams and his death has definitely been hard for her husband but has helped him to find some comfort and peace.

"You think about it," Patti Farley said. "We took a whole bunch of young kids, and we threw them into Vietnam and then said 'OK now, you can come home and we're just going to throw you back into society without any preparation.' It's been tough on him and for so many veterans."

Farley said despite the hardships, he's had a rich, fulfilling life. He knows Williams never had the same opportunity.

"I mean, I can't complain," Farley said. "I have a wonderful family, a great wife and kids. I had a wonderful 50-year career in the hospitality industry and I've been one of those lucky ones who got up every morning and loved going to work because I loved my job. But there were hard times, for sure."

And though he speaks of Bobby Ray Williams of Lawton, Oklahoma, more frequently now, it's still hard. Healthy for him, but hard.

"Even this morning Patti asked me if I was going to be all right,'' Farley said, referencing meeting and talking with the Pensacola News Journal. "I said, 'No, but I'm going to do it because it needs to be done.'"

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Gulf Breeze Vietnam veteran honors fallen officer on Memorial Day