William Essex Jr. was raised in San Diego, California and in January 1966, he enlisted in the Army.  Upon his completion of Boot Camp, he was assigned to military intelligence. While in military intelligence, he made the discovery that it did not include any of the ‘Secret Agent’ stuff he had been promised, so he decided to make a change and volunteered for infantry Officer Candidate School in the fall of the same year. 

Essex continued to engage in what the Army had to offer and in February 1967, he applied and was accepted to Jump School.  After Jump School, he decided to go through Special Forces Training where he also completed a Vietnamese Language course.  He had the mindset to be a strong soldier so he qualified in every rifle, sub machine gun, and machine gun used by every nation in the World as well as studied land navigation, map reading, patrol tactics, guerrilla warfare and counterpart relations.

In February 1968 Essex arrived in Vietnam and was attached to the 5^th Special Forces Group in Nha Trang. On his third day, their location changed to Moc Hoa where they would provide a blocking force for the 9^thInfantry Division.  When the 9^th infantry linked up with them, Essex and the blocking unit were strafed three times by model B Huey gunships.  The strafing luckily skipped Essex and his NCO but wounded a soldier that was with them as the result of “friendly’ not so friendly’ fire”.  However, a bullet tore off the inside edge of Essex’s ammo pouch on his right side.  The bullet then somehow made a 90 degree turn and took off the back of his ammo pouch that spun him around when he felt the burn of the bullet and knocking him off his feet.  The medic that examined him was shocked to not find any wound.

During his tour in Vietnam, Essex faced an experience at a canal junction about 2 kilometers south of his camp where the Viet Cong (VC) would move supplies and troops after dark when it was considered a free fire zone and anything moving on the canal had a high chance of being engaged and destroyed. During a night operation, Essex and his troops stopped a sampan on the river when the driver came up with an AK-47 assault rifle, and shot him waking up the nearby VC company. The VC responded with rifle fire and grenades.  Essex and his troops responded only with grenades so that their location was not directly pinpointed by their gun fire. 

After Vietnam and time spent with the San Diego Sheriff’s Department, Essex found his way to Utah, and joined the Utah National Guard’s 19^th Special Forces unit.  

According to Essex: “I treasured my combat experiences, the people I knew, and the fire hose dose of adrenaline and despite the challenges that resulted from his tours in Vietnam, even knowing what I know now, given the chance to do it again, I would in a heartbeat”.