There Are No Alibis

The next time you think life is a series of “Maggies’ drawers” and you find yourself looking downrange for alibis, picture this.

Sergeant James Gill, 26, minus a leg and an eye, with a body peppered by shrapnel after taking the brunt of an improvised explosive device in Iraq five years ago, is still wearing the trappings of a rifleman and is a member of the U.S. Marine Corps Combat Shooting Team that blew the doors off competition at the Royal Ma­rines Skill and Small Arms Meet in England in October 2010.

“I was raised to believe there is no free lunch and you got to work for everything you have,” said Gill. When Jim Gill left San Antonio in 2004, he had no idea how brutally true those words would become. But life is what you make it, and Marines like Jim Gill just don’t give up.

It was April 2006 and for Gill, a 21-year-old lance corporal 0311 rifleman, life was about to change forever. Ma­rines were still in Iraq. Gill had been in country with 3d Battalion, Third Marine Regiment less than three months and was on a foot patrol at Al Haqlaniyah in Anbar province west of Baghdad.

The Marines entered an abandoned hotel and moved toward the stairs. “We were going to set up overhead fire and overwatch on top of a building,” he said. “I was the lead man into the building, and heading up, I didn’t trip anything. I didn’t touch anything, but I saw the ordnance they [insurgents] had rigged on the stairs. I believe it was command detonated. There was enough time to push the rest of the squad back down.

“I was backing away. I was the only one with a direct view, and I wanted to be able to identify what it was.

“That’s when it detonated.

“Anything that wasn’t covered with ar­mor got shrapnel. I immediately lost my left eye. Shrapnel tore through my foot and took out the bones to my ankle and severed the artery.

“After the blast there was confusion. I didn’t know where I was. I had been knocked around. I was actually facing down at what was left of the collapsed stairs and I was on fire.”

Gill called to his buddies for help and they came quickly. “I tried to pick myself up. My ankle gave way and I collapsed. That’s when they started dragging me out. There was a big trail of blood behind me. They got me out quickly. I think from the time of the blast to the time of my medevac [medical evacuation] couldn’t have been more than 15 minutes. They put me on a vehicle to get me to the LZ [landing zone] and then it was a short flight of three or four minutes.”

He remembers talking to his buddies and platoon commander while he was be­ing put on the “bird.” “I let them know I’d be back. I didn’t know when, but I knew I was going to be back.” He also was adamantly telling everyone: “Don’t notify my family unless I’m dead.”

At the aid station they stabilized him, pinned his leg in place and put him under. “I woke up once in Germany and again in Maryland.” Gill said he was being treated at the National Naval Medical Center Bethesda, Md., within 24 to 48 hours of being wounded. His parents were there too. Although initial­ly upset—he was concerned about his mother being able to take the news of his injuries—he was glad they had been notified. His parents were concerned, yes, but they were there to help him.

“We were a lower-middle-class family. My dad had been a naval aviator. He raised three of us with military values. My grand­father was a Seabee during World War II, and I had an uncle who was a Marine in Vietnam. I’d seen that military mindset in my dad and how he prided himself in everything he did.

“I was raised to understand that the things that are most valued in life you cannot buy. I valued my family and hoped someday to have my own.”

Texas-born and -bred, he was brought up with American values. “I wanted to be the guy on the front lines doing things. The Marine Corps is the toughest route. I wanted a big challenge, the excitement and ultimately self-sacrifice. I’d pretty much had everything handed to me up until that point. It was an opportunity for me to repay my debt to society.”

As far as the nation was concerned, Gill’s debt was paid with interest and he was going to need his family’s support and then some.

He hadn’t really realized the extent of his injuries. The doctors at Bethesda gave him “an option. They said, ‘We can rebuild your ankle and your foot, but you are going to be walking on a fused ankle. You can go through six to 18 months of surgeries and rehabilitation and you’re still going to have limited use. Or we can amputate, and six months from now you will be walking.’ ”

Gill had run track, played football and was a Marine rifleman. That could all be over. “I said: ‘Cut it off.’ ”

They did, and the rehabilitation was more than painful; it was a tempting wave of depression and self-pity.

“Being severely injured and in a hospital bed for a long time, you go through a period where you get down on yourself and say: ‘What can I do?’ Even when you come out of the hospital, you’re without a leg, in a wheelchair and having other people helping you.

“I didn’t like that. I’ve always been independent. So you adapt. You don’t just box yourself up … and I didn’t feel I had done my part in the Corps.”

He was very close to home when he was sent to Brooke Army Medical Center, Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio. “It is a top-rate facility. They helped me through different phases. The patient care and the Marine staff were very supportive and designed to take injured Marines and return them to duty or return them to civilian life. That means they have to recover. The care I got was outstanding.”

At BAMC he was asked: “What are you going to do?”

He said retirement was brought up often. “I was 21 years old. Retirement was a word that I didn’t understand.” He watched other injured Marines and other military personnel: the things they did, their attitudes and how they went about handling their lives.

“I learned that what happens is my decision,” he said. “It is my life. I’m in control. I am not going to let somebody dictate what I do.”

He also found out the Marine Corps is willing to allow any Marine injured in the line of duty to remain on active service if he or she is capable and there’s a job for which they qualify.

“I wanted to stay in the Marine Corps and function in the Marine Corps. I didn’t want a desk job and just collect a paycheck. I wanted to go out and contribute.”

“Contribute what?” he asked himself. “Coming from an infantry background, my choices were limited. All I wanted to do was return to an infantry unit. But I am not ignorant; the majority of jobs in the Corps require you to be deployable.”

He chose to stay in, and the detachment from the Wounded Warrior Regiment helped him look for a new assignment.

“Under the parameters of the Permanent Limited Duty Program I still maintain height and weight standards. I do PT. I’ve been running, and I’ve got [the three-mile run] down to about 26 minutes.
He looked at different jobs and realized: “If I can’t deploy and have a direct impact in what’s going on overseas, then the next best thing is to get involved training Marines. I started looking at instructor billets. But that got put on hold because I had another surgery about two years into my stay at BAMC.”

He’s had two surgeries: The amputation and then a revision to the amputation, which meant a little more of his leg was removed. “The revision was done because I had a bone infection, which almost cost me my knee and probably a good portion of my upper leg, but they were able to get that under control.”

Now, what was he going to do with his future? At BAMC Gill met others who set examples by running marathons with missing legs … “I thought if these guys can do it, why can’t I?”
He thought hard about what endeavor he could throw himself into and succeed and set an example for others who have been seriously wounded.

Every Marine is a rifleman. Gill had not forgotten that. Yet, aside from a little hunting, “target plinking” with a .22, firing the range in boot camp and requalification, he hadn’t been particularly interested in shooting.

However, “In boot camp the Marine Corps Marksmanship Program was some­­thing I caught on to really well. I understood the concept and shot High Expert.”

Consequently, once Gill received a prosthetic and became ambulatory, he started going to the local gun clubs. “I bought my own firearms. I had an AR15, a couple shotguns and handguns. I started shooting during weekly sessions of competition. I was a good shot, and I liked it. I started doing it more and more.

“It actually worked out pretty good because rather than sitting around, I started shooting competitively in the civilian world. I was limited as to what I could do, but I wanted to find something that made me feel like a Marine again. I’m a rifleman, so the best choice for me was to go to the range and shoot.”

It worked out. As he worked at his shooting, he also got into the different firearms, reloading ammunition and the accoutrements and mechanics essential to the art of competitive marksmanship.
“I wanted to be the best. It helped with my rehabilitation. I no longer had the time to get down on myself or dwell on my injuries. It was, ‘Hey, I can function now. I have something I can do and I’m doing it.’ ”

Over time, he became very good when it came to shooting. “I kind of stood out in the crowd: People watched the ‘peg leg’ shooting.” Civilian shooters in South Texas took note. By 2009, several gun clubs were sponsoring Gill, ensuring he had the gear needed to be even more effective in competition. He was putting a lot of time and energy into travel, driving and shooting matches.

That’s when he met with the U.S. Marine Corps Shooting Team at a match in New Mexico. Members approached him, saying: “If you’re shoot­ing in the civilian world and doing it well, but still on active-duty status and trying to find a job, we’ve got this combat shooting team started. Why not come to our team?”

He became a member of the U.S. Marine Corps Combat Shooting Team in 2010 based at Weapons Training Battalion, MCB Quantico, Va., and he has worked hard to be more than a member on the team roster. “I don’t do anything differently than any other Marine. If it’s time to hump a pack, I’m going to do it. I don’t get any special treatment. They requested me to the team specifically for my experience in the civilian competitions.

“There’s lots of Marines currently serving with numerous injuries, but they have to be able to demonstrate they can do the things the Marine Corps wants. I put a lot of time in at the range. It actually upset my wife at how much time I spent on the range. To me it’s a full-time job.”

He met his wife, Crystal, several months after he was wounded. “I saw myself as this horrible monster and was afraid to go out on dates. But she was able to look past my physical flaws.” She was a graduate of Texas A&M, and he met her after requesting a song over the radio. “I had to give my phone number,” he said. “She heard the broadcast and waited for about a week before she called.
“She told me she was drawn to the fact that I was a Marine,” he said, smiling, “and I claimed to be clean cut at the time. We talked every now and then, went on a few dates and hit it off.”

It all led to marriage and eventually four children.

All marriages have some “issues.” “The time I spend shooting is still an issue with Crystal. It bothers her how much I obsess over my job. I have to be there during the day, and there’s physical therapy. But in my free time, I’m on the range, practicing shooting, shooting in competitions and instructing other shooters.

“I’m getting ready to go to Small Arms Repair School, and eventually I’ll be go­ing to the Precision Weapons School. My additional duties on the team are to act as a coach. I am also responsible for maintaining our fire­arms and developing our firearms.”

Something says that no matter what happens, Sgt Gill has the character and backbone to handle it. Yet, he knows there are no guarantees.

“Most duty stations are three years. As much as I would love to go back out to the operating forces, if you put me and any other Marine side by side, the Corps is obviously going to take the Marine who is deployable. But because of that, I free an infantryman for the operating forces, and that allows me to be here a little bit longer.

“At some point or another, there’s go­ing to have to be a career change. That’s why I want to market myself as much as I can. I want to be the most proficient with what I’m doing. I want to be an expert in my field.”

It goes back to his upbringing and practicality. “The big thing is my family. I’ve got children. I want to protect them and want them to grow up understanding that nothing is free. I want them to earn what they have because it means more when you work for it.”

He takes one shot at a time with the confidence of a seasoned Marine rifleman. “It feels really good to be where I’m at because of what I had to go through to get here.”