Terry Whitmore
Terry Whitmore (March 6, 1947 – 2007) was an African American Marine who deserted during the Vietnam War.
Early life
Terry Whitmore was born on March 6, 1947[1] and grew up in Memphis, Tennessee. He graduated from high school and then enlisted in the Marines in fall of of 1966.[2] Whitmore believed that he would have been drafted anyway, and voluntarily enlisting meant he might get to stay home for one more Christmas.[3]
Military service and desertion
After enlisting, Whitmore was sent overseas to fight in the Vietnam War. Though he was initially promised a non-combat role on a ship, though this did not hold.[3] By December 1966, he was a lance corporal and was wounded in action near Con Thien. He believed that some of the North Vietnamese combatants intentionally spared his life, instead shooting the White troops he was with. He was sent to Japan to recover, where he was initially told he would not have to return to Vietnam. The orders were changed, though, and he was scheduled to leave Japan for Vietnam.[3] With the help of an anti-war group, he instead traveled across the USSR to Sweden, where he sought asylum.[2]
As of 1968, he was one of eighty US troops who deserted to Sweden, along with thirteen other Black troops.[3]
Personal life
Whitmore became engaged to a Swedish woman while in Sweden.[3] While in Sweden, he joined a basketball team founded by American deserters of the Vietnam War, the Stockholm Stars.[4]
Works
Whitmore was one of the few Black Vietnam War veterans to write a memoir about his experience: Memphis-Nam-Sweden: The Autobiography of a Black American Exile, published in 1971.[5] He was also the subject of the 1969 documentary Terry Whitmore, for Example.[2]
Later life and death
Whitmore returned to Memphis in 2001, and died in 2007.[1]
References
- ^ a b "Terry Whitmore". The Swedish Film Database. Retrieved 18 June 2020.
- ^ a b c Greenspun, Roger (15 November 1969). "Screen: Deserter's Story: Terry Whitmore, for Example' Opens". The New York Times. Retrieved 18 June 2020.
- ^ a b c d e Nilson, Ulf (1968). "Deserters: Fourteen Black Ex-GIs". Ebony. p. 121.
- ^ Kyhle, Henrik (20 January 1974). "War Deserters Become Swedish Cage Freaks". The Tennesseean.
- ^ Loeb, J. (1997). "MIA: African American Autobiography of the Vietnam War". African American Review. 31 (1): 105–123. doi:10.2307/3042186.
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