Part 1, Chapter 6 Summary

In early June of 1969 Lewis checks back into the hospital for his second hand surgery, this time on his right hand. Both the thumb and little finger of this hand are useless stubs, and Dr. Sandzen decides to remove what was left of the little finger and reattach it to the end of the thumb stub to hopefully give Lewis a longer and more useful thumb. He warned Lewis that this type of operation wasn't always successful, but as the two digits were already useless at this point, Lewis had nothing to lose.

Dr. Sandzen then took Lewis aside in confidence and showed him a letter. It was written by the navy surgeon general in Washington advising his subordinate commands to retire as quickly as possible all active-duty Vietnam vets who had been injured beyond the point of being able to...