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daddylabyrinth: a digital lyric memoir

Steven Wingate, Author
INCITING INCIDENTS, page 3 of 8
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MILITARY MAN

AWOL. Insubordination. These are the kinds of things I would expect from a badass like my dad. He didn't seem like the military type at all, so I've wondered why he joined up in the first place. Was there a brush with the police, followed by a plea-bargain that involved joining the Army and straightening out? 

When I look at this picture, I don't see a guy who's interested in straightening out. I see a smirk, an anti-authoritarian streak a football field wide. No doubt any true military man would have noticed it. He's seventeen in this picture and has seen plenty of trouble already. Probably enough to know that he liked it, was drawn toward it. 



But one way or another he joined the 9th Infantry Division of the U.S. Army at Fort Dix, New Jersey in1949. He lasted two months and twenty-six days before he found himself being court-martialed. His timeline reads thusly:

  • 19 May 1949: entered active duty
  • 28 July 1949: convicted of a 10-day AWOL and a 2-day AWOL (summary court-martial)
  • 20 September 1949: convicted of possession of an unauthorized pass and breaking restriction (summary court-martial)
  • 1 November 1949: confined post stockade, Fort Dix, New Jersey
  • 22 November 1949: called to stand before a Board of Officers re: "undesirability"
  • 14 December 1949: convicted of willful disobedience and a 16-day AWOL (trial by general court-martial). Sentenced to two years confinement (ultimately reduced to one)
  • date unknown: entered the United States Disciplinary Barracks at New Cumberland, PA
  • 30 January 1950: Dishonorable Discharge executed
  • 3 July 1950: Parole granted
  • 3 August 1950: parole date (I assume he left New Cumberland that day)
  • 3 October 1950: expiration of sentence; release from parole granted

I've gleaned this from a number of documents here in the labyrinth, including some not listed above:


Did the military experience scar him? Some think so (my mom ran a campaign to get him cleared from his Dishonorable Discharge, for instance), but he was scarred long before the Army came along.   

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