My family has stood on this soil for longer than any tree you might set your eye upon.
The men folk of my clan have served in every war since the founding of this great nation and many fought the great battles pre-dating it.
Since this is Veterans Day on the eve of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, allow me to briefly share some names and exploits of my forbearers so that their service may not be lost to history.
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Charles Michel de Langlade (1729-1800) was a fur trader and war chieftain for the French crown. My very great-grandfather was born at Fort Mackinac Island to a Frenchman of minor nobility and an Ojibwe woman.
Said to be a veteran of 99 battles, Langlade led the Native troops during the French and Indian War and defeated the British forces at the Battle of the Monongahela, which included a young George Washington.
One compatriot, Amable De Gere, described the warrior Langlade this way:
“…never saw so perfectly cool and fearless a man on the field of battle… when his gun barrel had got so hot, from repeated and rapid discharges, that he took occasion to stop a little while that it might cool, when he would draw his pipe from his pouch, cut his tobacco, fill his pipe, take a piece of punkwood, and strike fire with his steel and flint, and light and smoke his pipe, and all with as much sang froid as at his own fireside; and having cooled his gun a refreshed himself, would resume his place, and play well his part in the battle.”
After the fall of Montreal in 1760, the King of France ordered Langlade and his Native rangers back to Fort Mackinac where, as commandant, Laglade surrendered the fort to the British to whom he would plead allegiance.
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William David Marshall Sr. (1800 – 1884) was an ordnance sergeant by rank, but also came to be known as the “commandant” of Fort Mackinac by endurance.
When my grandfather disembarked the ship from England in 1823, the U.S. Army put him in a saddle and put a rifle in his hand. A veteran of the Black Hawk and Mexican Wars, Marshall was transferred to Fort Mackinac in 1843, where he continuously served until his death.
During the Civil War, the soldiers stationed on Mackinac Island were sent to fight in the South. The only man remaining at the fort was Old Sarge. Imagine the village women seeing him stride by in his blue woolens and yellow piping while whispering among themselves, “There goes the commandant.”
Marshall’s son, also named William, was assigned to the 4th Michigan Calvary of the Union Army, the regiment that captured Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy. Davis was apprehended while trying to escape through the swamps of Georgia disguised as a woman.
The younger Marshall (1834-1907) returned home and became a lighthouse keeper as did many men of the Marshall clan.
The older Marshall was 83 years old when he passed on, making him to this day the oldest active serviceman in American history. His obituary made the front page of the New York Times on May 21, 1884. The headline read: “Sixty Years of Special Service.“
Indeed.
Marshall’s historic legacy has never been officially acknowledged.
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Charles Royal LeDuff (1939 – 2013), my old man, served in Nam.
He never talked much about it.
All I really know about my father’s military career is that he enlisted in the Navy and stepped off a ship in Danang in 1965.
Before he passed, he sent me a jumbled bag of bars and ribbons and medals he’d earned.
I wonder what he did over there?
Larry Wilcox, a friend of mine who also fought in the “Working Class War” put it this way: “The rules of war were clear for me in Vietnam—kill or be killed—and within that chaos, a moral society granted us the reckless freedom of conscience where we could scribble outside the lines of morality and enjoy a diabolical flirtatious affair with power and vengeance and its mutants.”
When Larry got back to the states, he got into the entertainment business. His most famous role was that of Jon Baker in the television show “CHIPS.”
When Pops got home to Detroit, he drove a truck for Wonder Bread.
Recollecting the troubles of ’67, my father told me, “Son, the bread truck don’t show up in a riot or a war.”
That’s worth remembering. My respect to those who serve, have served, and shall one day serve. Your legacy is great.
Charlie LeDuff is a reporter educated in public schools. Follow him on X @Charlieleduff.
