Capt. Lynn Kartchner, Battalion Commander, Army Corps of Engineers in Vietnam has died
My medic in Vietnam, Bac-xi Bernard informed me this week that my Company Executive Officer in Fort Lenord Wood Missouri , Lynn Kartchner had died. He was one smart son of a bitch, a big tall bully looking man, full of mirth and brains and did not tolerate fools at all. In the early days, he loved his sauce and when in his cups, he gruffly and loudly told it like it was, which made his already massive presence even more intimidating.
He was a frequent attendee of the annual Soldier of Fortune Elk Camp. He and I hunted black bear up in Alaska, and he was on the cover of SOF Magazine.
Kartchner hated those he thought were bad guys as much as he disliked those he considered were intellectually challenged big mouths.
He told us of his chasing drug and human traffickers at the border, and he made headlines with his bravado.
During the time he was a gun shop owner, Lynn headed to the Southern border at nightfall with a spotlight to help the border patrol catch drug smugglers, CS Monitor wrote.
He had seen a buddy die – perhaps at the hands of a smuggler – It was payback time.
Mr. Kartchner is setting up on random nights on the property of six local ranchers along the border. With him is a military searchlight fitted with night-vision scopes and a siren. The idea is simple: Find smugglers and call the border patrol – and if trouble starts, be ready, CS Monitor wrote.
“If they shoot at me, I will shoot back,” Kartchner says of intruders. “And if I see them bringing up a weapon I’ll shoot them before they shoot me.”
He graduated U of Arizona with degrees in mining and chemical engineering; he was also a licensed Civil Engineer. Lynn served as a battalion commander, Company A, 864th Army Engineer Battalion in Vietnam, 1970-71, where he built 66 kilometers of QL-1 Coastal Highway.
His engineering accomplishments for the region have been many according to a Press release. Mr. Kartchner has worked for Douglas twice, 1997-2000, and 2016-2019. He has enjoyed the projects he got to engineer, like removing the underpass and constructing the entryway onto G Avenue, closing the prison sewer plant and constructing a sewer line to the City Wastewater Treatment Plant, expanding the Plant, converting streetlights to LED, transitioning the garbage collection to one-man trucks and building the first Flood Control project, with several more underway, and setting up the City to do its own chip-sealing. While not employed by the City, he designed a sewer system for the old Hospital, which is now closed, and several other systems. He has designed hundreds of retaining walls, parking decks, house additions, and building rehabilitations in Bisbee and Douglas
Underneath it all, Lynn was a kind man. He drove to Boulder to visit when concerned about a health episode I was having. He cheered up the office with his booming voice and wit. Rest in Peace Old Buddy, you made a big presence. …. RKB