News-Info-Alerts

Re: Former POW Retires After 2 Decades of Veteran Service

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: January 27, 2003

"Veterans Services director to retire
Doss has helped the county's vets for years
By Jeff Burlew
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER


Dale Doss, a former Navy aviator who spent five years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, is retiring this week as director of Leon County's Division of Veterans Services.

Doss, 67, has spent the past two decades helping many of the nearly 45,000 veterans living in the county apply for and receive benefits, from medical care and home loans to college educations.

"When a veteran comes in here, I may not have known him ... but I understand the problems that exist," said Doss, who spent 26 years in the military. "And to me, it's very rewarding to help these people."

Doss was born in Birmingham, Ala., and was commissioned as an ensign in the Navy after graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. During the Vietnam War, he was stationed aboard the USS Enterprise and flew 53 successful bombing missions over North Vietnam in a two-man A-6 Intruder.

His 54th mission ended differently.

It was about 3 a.m. St. Patrick's Day, March 17, 1968. Doss, the bombardier/navigator, and a pilot were flying under radar at about 500 mph on their way to bomb a railroad yard in Hanoi when they were hit by barrage fire.

"We'd gone through it many times and were never scratched," said Doss, who was 32 at the time. "It was kind of spectacular, especially at night. I mean, it was almost like day, and the plane was rocking."

Under heavy fire, the pilot ejected, followed by Doss, who landed in a rice paddy. Doss, surrounded by armed civilians and militia members, was captured.

"They were not happy," Doss said. "They really hated me. You could tell that in their eyes."

Doss was stripped, searched for weapons and blindfolded, then led through paths and villages for several hours while people came out of their homes for a chance to beat him.

"A lot of times, I was on my hands and knees, just crawling. And I thought, 'Dale, if you ever stop, you're dead.'"

He eventually was taken to Hoa Lo (pronounced wah low), an infamous prisoner of war camp also known as the "Hanoi Hilton." He was beaten and tortured, tied up and pulled nearly limb from limb.

Doss spent two years in solitary confinement inside a small concrete cell with a window covered with iron bars and bamboo matting that all but blocked out the sun.

He spent his days recovering from torture sessions, exercising, praying and escaping into fantasy. He daydreamed he built three golf courses hole by hole, built and ran an 1800s-style ranch and managed a hotel, where he also dined.

"You realize very quickly that you have to keep your spirit up," Doss said. "If you don't, you're not going to make it."

During his imprisonment, Doss met a prisoner by the name of John McCain, who would go on to serve as a U.S. senator and run for president. The two remain friends and are members of the 4th Allied POW Wing, a group of nearly 600 former Vietnam POWs.

On Jan. 21, 1973, the camp commander assembled all the prisoners and told them they would be released by the end of March. On St. Patrick's Day - exactly five years after he was shot down - Doss returned to the United States.

Hoyt Prindle, a retired Air Force colonel and former professor of aerospace studies at Florida State University, said Doss, like other POWs he knows, has a real empathy for others.

"The guy would have a reason to be bitter, but he's not," said Prindle, who's known Doss for nearly 20 years. "He's always looking to help somebody. That's what I like about him."

Doss didn't retire from the military until 1983, a few years after buying a house in Tallahassee. Though he retires Friday, he plans to keep busy, spending time with his wife, Stephany, and his three grown children.

Doss, who will be honored with a resolution Tuesday by county commissioners, also plans to spend time watching Florida State University athletic events and working in the yard of his second home in Gulf Breeze.

"I may bag groceries," Doss said with a smile. "There is a need in me to keep busy."

Contact reporter Jeff Burlew at (850) 599-2180 or jburlew@taldem.com. "