“The thing that made them love us above and beyond was the fact that we were Americans, playing American music, wearing the same uniform that they were, catching all the same crap that they were, every single day of the week.”
Seaman Kenneth Palmer, USN
“My Dad was in the Navy during World War Two and my older brother was in the Navy in the Seabees. When I joined the Navy, he told me as I was going into boot camp, get into a band because I play the guitar...guys in a band get good duty,” Kenneth Palmer shared to a Navy Memorial film crew at the All Seabee Reunion in Hampton Virginia. Little would Palmer know that his love for music would follow him through his service in the United States Navy Seabees and his time in Vietnam. Upon completion of Bootcamp at Great Lakes, Palmer was sent to Gulfport Mississippi. His was then assigned to Naval Mobile Construction Batallion121 just before the Gulf States were impacted by Hurricane Camille.
Palmer vividly remembered the fury of the hurricane, “Our base sustained ninety five percent or better damage, there was nothing left of it. We were in a warehouse that was literately blown apart around us. We started off in in the whole warehouse and by the time we were evacuated by marine armed personnel carriers there was one room left.” He spared no detail recalling the moments inside the warehouse and illustrating the wrath and power of Hurricane Camille.
The destruction 
to the Naval Station was extensive and in the following days, Palmer would learn of an opportunity that would allow him to play music and serve. He recalled, "A couple of days later...we were living in the barracks, it was basically one of the buildings with a roof left...after work one day one of the fellas said were putting a band together when we get in country do you want to try out?” After trying out, Palmer was selected to be part of the band once the battalion arrived in Vietnam. “We started figuring out who knew what song so we started playing songs together and the name of the band was Wasted Blood.” Once the band started to practice a crowd began to grow. Palmer fondly remembered, “It was a real rainy drizzly day…and people started drifting in, sometime during our first tryout there…an Army Sargent comes in… and says hey do you guys want to come and play in our club?” The band Wasted Blood would be asked to play at a number of different locations for U.S. Service Members in South East Vietnam.
As the bands popularity grew Palmer shared, "We played a lot of places, we were sent to some places USO shows couldn't go because it was too dangerous.” He continued with, “Being an entertainer during the war, the big thing was you had USO shows coming in from all different countries. The thing that made them love us above and beyond was the fact that we were Americans, playing American music, wearing the same uniform that they were, catching all the same crap that they were, every single day of the week.” Despite the active schedule of the band, each of the members performed their assigned duties and would use anytime they could to practice and play for their fellow troops and sailors. The contributions of this band and all efforts by Americans to bring a sense of home to those at the front would make meaningful contributions to those who served.
The United States Navy Memorial honors Seaman Kenneth Palmer, USN, featured within this series titled, Tales from the Navy Log, Story of the Month. Each month, this series honors a Veteran’s story recorded by the Stories of Service Program at the Navy Memorial. To learn more about this story and to explore the Navy Memorial Tales from the Navy Log archive, visit the Navy Memorial Stories of Service site.