Ground surveillance radar detected movement just before midnight. The bases’ commander, Lieutenant Colonel Michael John Conrad, responded by ordering his troops to fire into the jungle. He didn’t expect to destroy the enemy, but showing the NVA that surprise was not on their side might deter them from attacking. Cobra gunships strafed the jungle accompanied by gunfire from the base, and the enemy threat melted away. The base remained on alert, but off duty soldiers, such as Sergeant Lemon, were ordered to get back to sleep. Lemon obeyed, but smoked a joint before turning in.
The NVA, however, had not retreated, and at 2:17 AM a hail of rocket fire destroyed Illingworth’s communication tower. Over 400 NVA swarmed out of the jungle as mortar and artillery fire rained across the base, and they breached the American’s defenses almost immediately. Roused from his bed for the second time that night, Sergeant Lemon, a stoned, disillusioned, American solider decided he’d had enough of the enemy’s nonsense, and took matters into his own hands.
Sgt. Lemon staked out a defensive position, and poured gunfire into the enemy with a heavy machine gun until it malfunctioned. Undeterred, Lemon resumed his assault with his rifle, until it malfunctioned too. Many soldiers would flee after their weapons failed, but Lemon opted for a more direct approach, and used hand grenades to fend off the intensified enemy attack. The NVA wounded Lemon with grenades of their own, but his barrage eliminated all but one of the nearby enemy soldiers, and Lemon killed him via hand-to-hand combat… just as a massive blast wave interrupted his psychotic counter-attack by killing American and NVA alike.
Nearly fifty years have passed since Fire Support Base Illingworth fought for its life, and nobody has ever discovered who sent the base forty tons of eight-inch artillery shells it could not use. Colonel Conrad protested when the shells arrived the day before, but to no avail. Illingworth was stuck with an enormous pile of unprotected ammunition piled in the center of the base, which, somewhat predictably, exploded at the height of the battle. The blast shredded nearby soldiers who were fighting hand to hand, and in Sergeant Lemon’s case, compounded his injuries by violently slamming him to the ground.
Undaunted by his wounds or the massive explosion, Lemon carried a seriously wounded comrade to an aid station, gathered up more grenades, and, as he returned to his post, was wounded a second time by enemy fire. Lemon realized they were in danger of being overrun, ignored his growing litany of wounds, and charged the enemy for a second time. He threw hand grenades as he closed, fought hand to hand, received a THIRD wound, and forced the enemy to retreat. This, however, did not satisfy Lemon, who secured yet ANOTHER machine gun, stood atop an embankment completely exposed to enemy fire, and continued strafing the enemy until he collapsed from exhaustion.
Sergeant Lemon retired from the Army nearly two years later, but he left the military with a Purple Heart, an Army Commendation Medal, two Air Medals, a clustered Bronze Star, and the Medal of Honor for his heroically stoned actions at Fire Support Base Illingworth.