For one Navy corpsman embedded with 2/9 in Vietnam, a reunion decades later with the Marines he served alongside—including the first patient he treated on the battlefield—affirmed the bond that has defined the Marine-corpsman relationship since the inception of the U.S. Navy Hospital Corps in 1898. As today’s corpsmen train for the future fight, they also strive to uphold the legacy of those who came before.

The bond between Fleet Marine Force corpsmen and Marines has only strengthened over the years as “Docs” are often the differences between life and death on the battlefield. In honor of the 122nd birthday of the U.S. Navy Hospital Corps on June 17, we are featuring personal accounts of those who answered the call “Corpsman Up!”.