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ID'd Vietnam helmet--What a career!


trenchfoot
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I recently bought this on eBay from a guy who purchased it from the vets living estate. The mans name is Arvel L Coach Jr, and from what I gathered, he graduated ROTC 1967-68 and was sent to Vietnam as a MP lieutenant. Luckily for me, there's a great website on his unit, the 22nd Provost Marshall detachment, 720th MP Battalion, 18th MP Brigade. It lists him as detachment operations officer on March 5th 1970. He then returned to the US and was stationed as Provost Marshall at Pine Bluff Arsenal when it was being threatened by a violent activist group. After this, Arvel wanted to join the Arkansas Police and get out of the army, which he did so in March 1971, staying in the police force for a very long time. He was involved in quite a bit as a policeman, one being the Cuban Refugee Crisis, where his group defended Fort Smith from a refugee riot. He was even in the USAF with the 188th SF Squadron, serving from 1972 until 1992 as a Lt Col. There is a great interview the Arkansas police did with him that is very long and lists that stuff, but worth the read. Quite a career huh?

 

But here's where things get interesting. Included in the auction was a reunion letter addressed to Mr. Acoach from a former squadmate. The unit reunion was from 2nd Battalion, 28th Regiment, 1st Infantry Division. Whats up with that? Could his MP unit been attached to that unit too?

 

The helmet itself is a late war m1 with a black camouflage pattern. Since the cover is a pain to take off and get perfect again, I don't have pictures. The liner doesn't look to be a match as its painted with medic crosses, but the seller said was found like that.

 

post-163344-0-04169900-1508452804_thumb.jpg

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Nice lid, you outbid me on this. Congrats

 

I was surprised it didn't go for more. The medic liner probably threw people off.

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Nice looking helmet, how is it named? (liner, chinstrap, etc)

That's the thing. It's not named anywhere, but the seller was listing a lot of items from his estate, like 1st infantry division books with Arvel's name in them, and he said it was from the estate. I can't 100% guarantee it's his, but since he is still alive, I may contact him and ask.

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That cover looks very clean - practically unused. Possibly a replacement ?

 

Rich

MP's usually wore liners, so it makes sense.

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  • 1 month later...

Just want to bump the thread back up to see if anyone knows the connection between the 22nd Provost Marshall detachment and the 28th Infantry Regiment. I can't seem to find anything.

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  • 4 months later...

I just found out that Mr. Acoach died in January of this year. I wasn't able to contact him before he passed, but his obituary made me redo most of my research. He was involved in a lot more than I thought and looks to have been an MP only for his last couple months in Vietnam. The 28th infantry regiment connection is probably the unit he served with prior. The cover would have been his when he was an MP, hence the lack of wear. The helmet however, looks to be his from the start and I still can't understand why there are medic panels on the liner. All this made me request research from Geoff. Here are new photos of the camo on the helmet and his obituary.

 

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/186845186

 

 

post-163344-0-22218800-1523543928_thumb.jpg

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