Sorry, long post: Here are a couple of more shots from twin-bro that feature Randall Model 14. Notes are included integral with photo. RVN north of Ban Don


Apr. 1978 - Gene says he had Randall and 9mm under coat in this picture… which was the day the news arrived of the overthrow of Da'ud in Kabul by the Parcham communists in coup in Afghanistan.


Re Wally - questions about previous pictures: Weapon in my right hand is a military issue 7-round 12 gage pump shotgun. Why? Oh… various reasons… short one-day medical patrol into village, possible shoot bird or rabbit on way, good weapon in bunkered village. Here is another example held by my friend, SSGT Lonnie Holmes, SF A-253 '68, later Dr. Lewis Holmes, UCLA, ('cuse me!).


Notice the important non-issue re-hydration ration on hood of jeep.

I also had an M-1 carbine slung on other shoulder… (note: I was not issued an M-16 until I was transferred to Ben Het about half way through my tour. Even then, I still carried the M-1 carbine on a lot of missions because that is what our strikers were armed with.)

Re: Randall attached to BAR sling upside down. This was scuttlebutt good method of carrying knife. But in Vietnam, the usual heavy undergrowth terrain was a defining factor. Anything on the front of your equipment would hang up in the brush and you would find yourself on your back quickly. (I’ll post a picture later if I can create one).

Plus … if you had to suddenly hit the dirt, anything on front of gear inhibited “low” movement. We rarely carried grenades, etc., attached to the front as the troops in WWII and Korea had done. (see below) We did not hack our way through the forest, but tried to move like smoke… flow around the thick stuff.

Below - Lt. Gene H. Williams, 3/508PIR pathfinder stick commander, Normandy. Typical WWII airborne rig.


Another reason… rumor passed around that some guy had hit the dirt and his knife had been jammed upward, penetrating the sheath and wounding him. I don’t know if it was true … wild stuff like that was often BS’d around … but it was just simpler to carry it on the belt thereafter.

Other things about Randalls at the time. As noted, the so-called carbon-tool blades would accumulate rust daily, sometimes by the hour. More than a few SF troops traded or sold their Randall carbon-tool blades to new guys coming in… and then ordered stainless replacements. The Solingen blades were good, but were very difficult to sharpen to a fine edge because of the hardness. You basically had to choose… edge and rust=lots of work, or edge=lots of work and no rust.

In the debates, some questioned the Randall cold-worked, oil-hardened steel composition (O1-grade? less nickel, tugunsten, more carbon?) at the time because of the rust issue ... but truth is that everything not blued rusted in the field there is always a trade off in material selection. It was just part of life in Vietnam … and owning a Randall was one of the cult-requirements of Special Forces in Vietnam.

Finally, unlike twin-bro, on my last couple of long (1-2 week) missions I left the Randall in my bunker. Why? We were operating in a very steep mountainous AO .. the tallest in Vietnam.. up to 8,000 ft.. Climbing Montagnard-style, straight up, straight down, would just about wear your butt to where you didn’t care if you got shot.

Each mission I lightened the load I was carrying until it was an absolute minimum. In the end, sick with dysentery and physically weaker, I decided if I needed a big heavy knife, I could use one of my striker’s homemade items (see below). I have one of those knifes … I’ll post a picture of it later if anyone is interested. I still carried my beloved Randall on the shorter medical patrols, etc.



Sorry for the length of this post. Some more pictures of Randall-in-use may be forthcoming. By the way... on the stamped id on Gene's Soligen blade knife... I haven't seen that composition very much on the net. Was this the common one for these blades? I think my blade lacked the word "stainless", I just can't remember...


Afghanistan about 2007 - Randall not shown, but other pics with it forthcoming