I didn't grow up thinking I'd become a soldier. I grew up with music in my ears, a tight-knit family by my side, and dreams that reached beyond the horizon. But like many young men in the 1960s, I found myself boarding a ship headed for a land I'd never seen, for a war I didn't fully understand. I was just a teenager when I stepped into Vietnam - full of fear, full of questions, and carrying with me only what I could fit in my duffel bag... and what I kept in my heart.
Motown & Vietnam is not just a book. It's a piece of my soul. It's a journey into memory - raw, unfiltered, and as honest as I know how to be. It tells the story of what it was like to be a young Black man during one of the most turbulent times in American history. It tells of the days aboard that ship, the nights filled with the sound of war - and how, somehow, through it all, the music of Motown never left my mind.
Motown wasn't just the soundtrack to our youth. It was our shield, our companion, our therapy. While the world felt like it was breaking apart, those songs reminded us of who we were - of joy, of struggle, of rhythm, of hope. For me, hearing Smokey, Marvin, Diana, or The Temptations was like holding a piece of home when everything else around me felt foreign and dangerous.
This book also tells the story of my family - the ones who stayed behind and prayed. It speaks to the legacy of Black families who sent their sons off to war, hoping they'd return, knowing the odds. It reflects on brotherhood, on loss, on resilience, and on what it means to survive something that changes your very core.
As the years passed, I realized that my memories - like the ship now docked and rusting on the James River - had their own place in history. I wrote this book to give those memories form. I wrote it because some stories deserve to be told before they fade away. I wrote it for the young men who never got to come back. I wrote it for those of us who did - and are still trying to make peace with it.
If you've ever lived through something hard and come out the other side holding onto music, memory, and your humanity - this book is for you.
And if you've never heard these stories before... lean in. Because this is a piece of American history told not from a textbook, but from the heart of someone who lived it.
- Melvin P. Moy
