platoon sergeant, William Campbell (“Wild Bill” to his friends), was a veteran of Korea and countless barroom brawls in most of the ports between Naples and Yokohama. He fit the Hollywood image of a Marine sergeant so perfectly that he seemed a case of life imitating art. Six feet three inches and two hundred and twenty pounds of pure mean, he believed in the Marine Corps the way a Jesuit believes in the Catholic Church, and felt only disdain for the Navy, the Army, the Congress, motherhood, and officers—in that order. It was a sight to watch him walking down a street, straight-backed and
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