Come gather 'round friends and a story I'll tell,
About William Brakefield, you may recall well.
He stood up for freedom, now he's in a jail cell,
But someday freedom is coming.
Bill was a lad, only nineteen years old,
When he went off to college in the Michigan cold,
But he left for the army because he was told,
That's where he'd get better training.
Fort Devens, Massachusetts, became home for Bill,
But he soon learned the army had only one will:
To train men to die and to train men to kill,
And that's not what Bill was in for.
So he deserted one evening into the dark night,
But never would he be a prisoner of flight,
So he made his stand public and challenged the might,
Of the entire United States Army.
A sanctuary on campus was given to Bill,
But only a symbol of valor and will,
Against those who imprison and against those who kill,
And one hundred and eighty stood with him.
The police came one morning and took us away,
And now in the stockade Bill Brakefield must stay,
But the words of the hero all folks can say:
Someday freedom is coming.
About William Brakefield, you may recall well.
He stood up for freedom, now he's in a jail cell,
But someday freedom is coming.
Bill was a lad, only nineteen years old,
When he went off to college in the Michigan cold,
But he left for the army because he was told,
That's where he'd get better training.
Fort Devens, Massachusetts, became home for Bill,
But he soon learned the army had only one will:
To train men to die and to train men to kill,
And that's not what Bill was in for.
So he deserted one evening into the dark night,
But never would he be a prisoner of flight,
So he made his stand public and challenged the might,
Of the entire United States Army.
A sanctuary on campus was given to Bill,
But only a symbol of valor and will,
Against those who imprison and against those who kill,
And one hundred and eighty stood with him.
The police came one morning and took us away,
And now in the stockade Bill Brakefield must stay,
But the words of the hero all folks can say:
Someday freedom is coming.
inviata da Alessandro - 19/4/2010 - 11:50
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Testo trovato su Mudcat Café
Si veda anche al proposito la canzone Fort Dix Stockade di Bob Lusk, anche lui detenuto a Fort Dix ma prima della rivolta.
Il diciannovenne Bill Brakefield disertò nel 1968 ma, invece di provare a scappare in Canada, decise di rendere pubblica la sua decisione. Per qualche giorno riuscì ad evitare l’arresto rifugiandosi nel City College di New York, ma il 7 novembre la polizia fece irruzione, prese Bill e i commilitoni che avevano condiviso la sua lotta e li consegnò alle autorità militari.
All’epoca le corti marziali lavoravano senza sosta: nel 1969 furono celebrati quasi 80.000 processi per diserzione, con il 94% di condanne! E nelle prigioni militari i soldati pacifisti o, comunque, non disposti ad andare a farsi ammazzare o ad uccidere in Vietnam non se la passavano bene…
Quella che segue è una testimonianza dello stesso soldato Brakefield:
“Howie (Sergeant E6 Davidson) has a particularly disgusting habit of putting people in straps. He thoroughly enjoys this practice of medieval torture.
Straps consist of putting a prisoner on his stomach, putting your knee (in Howie’s case this is over two hundred pounds of pressure) in the small of the prisoner’s back to hold him down, then taking his arms and legs and strapping them together somewhere up behind his shoulder blades. Howie then likes to laugh and says, “Talk back to me now, mother-fucker!”
Il 5 giugno 1969, Bill e altri 200 “disertori” imprigionati a Fort Dix misero in atto una rivolta contro i soprusi quotidianamente subiti - vere e proprie torture, come abbiamo visto - e le pessime condizioni igienico-sanitarie e di alimentazione. La risposta della polizia militare fu durissima: centinaia di agenti con armi antisommossa e baionette innestate entrarono nel campo sparando gas lacrimogeni. I prigionieri furono selvaggiamente percossi e nove di loro furono seriamente feriti. Lo stesso Bill Brakefield fu picchiato fino a perdere conoscenza.
38 disertori, individuati come capi della rivolta, furono processati e condannati a tre anni di carcere militare.
Quando la guerra in Vietnam terminò, il numero complessivo dei disertori e degli “AWOL” (absent without leave) aveva raggiunto la cifra di 500.000…