Two Souls Indivisible (27 page)

But Halyburton was elated by the raid, despite its failure. It showed that his government was doing something to help. His hopes that Nixon, once in office, would strike quickly and boldly had faded. For two years nothing had happened. The Son Tay attack, however poorly planned, lifted the morale of all the prisoners.

Also lifting Halyburton's morale were the packages from home, the first arriving on February 12, 1969. Marty had sent it two years earlier, but the authorities had inexplicably held it. It included red socks, a roll of Life Savers, and four pictures of Marty and Dabney. The package told him two things: Marty knew he was alive and she hadn't remarried. Subsequent packages brought him vitamin pills, pipe tobacco and cigarette papers, soap, a toothbrush, toothpaste, and small towels.

Equally important were Marty's letters, one of which arrived on the personal note cards of "Mrs. Porter Alexander Halyburton." (Most of her communications came on special telegrams, designated by Hanoi, which had only seven lines.) For several years Marty was told she could not send any letters, but she was finally allowed to write one in May 1969. Porter received it seventeen months later. "My dearest Port—" it began.

Where do I begin except that this is the day I have prayed for and dreamed of. There is so much I want you to know, but you're the writer not I.

My love for you is as strong as our happiest days together and it has never waned. These four years have changed both of us, but I have no doubt we have survived the most difficult test and that ahead of us will be an even more wonderful life together than we could have previously known.

You know me, the optimist ... I won't deny I never worried, never became impatient, or never discouraged but all in all I've held my head high and felt one day this would all be behind us. Then I have had our wonderful, sweet, beautiful Dabney. She is all of the above and more ... Hurry home my love. I thank God for your safety and with his help may we put aside our separation. I love you my very most sweetest with all of my heart.

Your Marts Forever

Marty tried to protect Porter, telling him in a 1970 letter that his mother had just bought a new piano—two years after her death. And in 1972 he received a letter from Dabney, now seven years old.

Dear Daddy,

I love you Tery is my new dog He is very sweet I had a birthday cookout at Stone Mountain I am taking good care of mommy Teri and Henrietta Love, Dabney

The letters were both uplifting and sobering. While Porter had found
The Good Life,
he knew his real life was passing by.

Fred Cherry's sister had been sending him packages for years, but they were delayed until 1970, and even then he received only a couple. He became acutely aware of what others were receiving, particularly when he was surrounded by other Americans at Camp Unity, which increased his feelings of deprivation. His senses sharpened by his incarceration, he could smell a new bar of Dial soap in another cellblock—he could almost taste it—or the burning of tobacco on the other side of camp. The other inmates, aware of his misfortune, shared their packages with him, leaving pieces of soap, candy, or cookies in the wash area. When he was isolated and forbidden such treats, the other prisoners would try to divert a guard's attention and roll items under the door.

Support came in many different ways. At Camp Unity, Cherry met Navy Lieutenant Giles Norrington, who had heard about Porter's and Fred's "legendary status" shortly after the airman was shot down in 1968. Norrington easily identified Cherry—in their building, there was only one black among twenty-six inmates—but was surprised that Cherry wasn't bigger physically. In fact, he was shorter than Norrington, though the abuse he had endured was obvious. His shoulder was twisted and withered, and a huge surgical scar across his torso looked as if someone had tried to cut his body in two.

Norrington saw Cherry go through good days and bad, the good ones coming on the days when the humidity did not exacerbate the pain in his shoulder. But the bad days were agonizing. Cherry was suffering from a pinched nerve and terrible back spasms, and to relieve the pain, Norrington would gently massage his back, taking great care to relax the muscles. At night he and other men—Bob Barnett or Dick Vogel or Bill Robinson—would lie next to Cherry and take turns rubbing his back so he might find comfort and fall asleep. "He may have been small physically," Norrington said, "but the man was a giant to me and to all who knew him well."

Over the weeks, Cherry never complained, but Norrington assumed he was suffering because he occasionally saw a tear fall from his cheek onto the rice mat. What he didn't know was that that tear had nothing to do with pain. Cherry cried, but they were tears of gratitude, of disbelief. That so many men—all strangers, all white—would stay up all hours of the night, slowly massaging his back and receiving nothing in return, reinforced his experience with Halyburton and the other POWs while defying so much of his own history as a black American. What he had often been denied—equality, respect, recognition—was now given to him in abundance.

Cherry cried, just as he had cried with Halyburton. But they were tears of revelation. He had found a more perfect America in a prison camp than he had ever found in America itself.

By 1969, Marty may have known that Porter was alive, but she feared he would be forgotten. Some wives believed their husbands might be abandoned completely.

Their concerns arose in part from the peace movement, which seemed willing to sacrifice the POWs to end the war. That tack appeared more plausible as monthly demonstrations, starting on October 15, stunned the country by their size and intensity. A noontime rally in New York's financial district attracted 50,000, while the New Haven Green drew 30,000. Some 50,000 found their way to the Washington Monument, and 100,000 appeared at the Boston Common. Both politicians and peace activists called for variations on the same theme: "unilateral withdrawal," "immediate withdrawal," or "a timetable for withdrawal."

The antiwar movement did no favors for the POWs, whose re-lease would not be hastened by the unconditional withdrawal of troops or diminished pressure on the North. But the protesters weren't the only concern for the wives—some were worried about their own government, particularly the policy of Vietnamization. Sybil Stockdale, who founded the National League of Families of American Prisoners and Missing in Southeast Asia, wrote to Nixon that deescalation could sacrifice the POWs "because there may be no specific end to the war."

Begun as a kind of wives' club and support group, the League turned into a highly mobilized lobbying organization. Its principal goal—to raise Americans' awareness of the POWs and urge humane treatment for them—was not welcomed by the Johnson administration, which tried to downplay any discussion of the prisoners. But the League organized a drive that sent two thousand telegrams to the White House on Nixon's first day in office, and it found allies in the new administration, whose Go Public campaign for the POWs coincided with the wives' objectives. The organization sent delegates to Paris during the peace talks in 1969 and to other capitals (Oslo, Geneva, Vientiane) where the governments might be helpful. Having operated from Stockdale's home town of Coronado, California, it moved its headquarters to Washington, D.C., in 1970.

Marty's involvement with the League began in 1967 and deepened with time. Still in her apartment in Decatur, Georgia, she initially wrote daily letters to U.S. senators or congressmen and, with other wives, visited Senator Edward Kennedy and other members of Congress who they feared wanted to end the war at any cost. Their message was simple: America must not leave its boys behind, and the country should never accept an end to the conflict without a full accounting of all POWs and MIAs. The pleas were highly personal and emotional, but the war was so divisive, most of the politicians wouldn't commit to anything; they didn't even want to address the POW issue.

Marty did not consider herself an activist. She had no public speaking experience or media training, and she was not one to ask questions or press an opinion. Her involvement was strictly personal. But as the wives drew attention to themselves and their cause, the media sought out poignant stories of resilience and hope, and Marty was a compelling figure. As Betty Olmstead, Stan's wife, said, "She was just this real cute, vivacious little blonde, and she was raising Dabney by herself."

She was profiled in newspapers and on television, with images of Dabney on a swing set or in a sandbox and with descriptions of her husband's memorial service. Marty was a portrait of sweetness, vulnerability, and loss. In a 1971 documentary, she sat demurely on a couch and described the odd life of a young woman who is neither single nor partnered: "I can't really fit into any group socially. I'm sort of the fifth wheel for bridge. I don't fit with married couples or singles ... People who meet me are a bit embarrassed."

Marty said that Dabney, now six, kept her father in her thoughts. "She knows that the time in Vietnam is just the opposite of the time here, so when it begins to get dark at night, she says, 'Daddy is waking up now.' And my thought is, 'What does he have to wake up to?'"

The time difference was Marty's one consolation. Each morning when she got up, she told herself that Porter was preparing for sleep and would be free of misery. That thought—when you're sleeping, you can't be suffering—helped her get through her own day, every day.

Marty's responsibilities grew. By 1969, she was named the League's coordinator for southeastern states, which required her to keep state coordinators informed of POW developments. She was also on the League's board of directors and flew to Washington every three weeks for meetings, sometimes at the White House. Like Marty, most of the wives had never visited the White House before, and the seat of national power was impressive. Each time they were carefully checked through the outer and inner gates, a Marine was holding the door for them at the west wing.

In 1968 Marty received a call from an acquaintance's father, an attorney, who had seen her in the press and asked if she would speak at a function. She agreed; the engagement was six months away, and she didn't give it much thought. But soon he called again. The schedule had changed, and now he needed her to speak the following night.

Marty had never given a speech before and didn't know whom she'd be addressing. She wrote down some notes but, scrambling to find a babysitter, had little time to be nervous. She assumed it would be a small group.

Picked up and taken to a hotel in downtown Atlanta, she walked into a ballroom with six hundred people and saw a bank of microphones in front of the podium. She had missed the dinner—probably a good thing. She discovered she was at a meeting of the American Bar Association, whose clout and prestige put her on edge. As she waited in the wings, the man introducing her reminded the audience who was supposed to speak tonight—"Bobby Kennedy."

Bobby Kennedy!
Marty couldn't believe it, and she trembled as she walked to the lectern and began to speak. Knowing that Vietnam had polarized the country, she carefully avoided any opinion about the war. She didn't talk much about Porter either, as she didn't want to elevate his status above that of the other prisoners. She spoke instead about how she learned of his death and reclassification.

"When he was dead, I had talked myself into believing that he was better off dead," she said. "But now I believe that Porter being alive is much more difficult. I believe it's a fate worse than death."

She said she had not received any letters from her husband, nor had the government of North Vietnam ever released its list of prisoners. "Regardless of your feelings about the war, these are Americans," she said. "All we ask is that North Vietnam adhere to the conditions of the Geneva Conventions, that they identify the prisoners they hold, and they protect them from abuse. That's all we ask."

Perhaps her most affecting comments were about her daughter. At the time, two-parent households were the overwhelming norm, particularly in middle-class suburban communities; divorce was stigmatized, and single motherhood was beyond the ken of many people. Marty knew that talking about Dabney drove home the POW ordeal. It was not about troop withdrawals in a remote jungle conflict but about one little girl "who has never seen her father." That was the tragedy.

She ended her ten-minute speech by telling her audience not to pity her. "The time that Porter's been away has gone slowly for me, but I can't even know how it must go for him," she said. "I've got Dabney and everything else I need, except him. He has nothing."

She was astonished to receive a standing ovation. She couldn't believe that a room of high-powered lawyers, all strangers and probably all men, had completely accepted her. She realized she could speak anywhere and it would be easy.

Within days she began receiving other requests, from rotary clubs, church groups, county fairs, and college students. Her speeches were short—no more than fifteen minutes—but emotional. Audiences were always sympathetic, with professional and well-educated groups asking good questions. But in rural areas, well-meaning but less sophisticated crowds didn't understand how Americans could be held overseas. "Why don't you just call him up?" one woman asked her.

Marty was one of the few POW wives in Atlanta, so anytime a development occurred, the media called her, and she became an increasingly familiar face and voice. Strangers approached her on the street and wished her well. She was asked to appear at candidate forums so that would-be officeholders, both Democrats and Republicans, could bask in her celebrity. Georgia's governor jimmy Carter, elected in 1971, appointed her to the Veterans Affairs Commission, and she was invited to receptions at the state house. One time, she mentioned to Carter that the League was printing POW bumper stickers, and the governor said that every state-owned car would display one. Georgia then printed its own POW stickers, and Marty happened to be at the state house on the day Carter unveiled them at a press conference. When she overheard that the governor needed a car for a photo op, she volunteered hers, a battered Audi she had on loan from the dealer. It was, for Carter, a publicity coup. Who better to promote your POW sticker than a POW wife? He and Marty were photographed and filmed putting the sticker on her car. As the prisoners' saga played out over the next few years, the governor's office called Marty a number of times for the latest developments and for advice on how Georgia could promote the issue.