Keith Mather

        My mother gave me an address and phone number of the War Resisters League. I met up with these people and they introduced me to other AWOL GIs. A connection, finally! All these people with short hair, all AWOL, all doing the same thing — resisting the war. People at WRL suggested the idea of taking sanctuary in a church. Out of that idea came chains connecting our arms with those of priests and ministers. This represented the bonds between man, and between the clergy and these AWOL servicemen. We became known as the “Nine for Peace.” At the close of the service, we were arrested by the Military Police. ​All the Army guys were sent to Presidio. They paraded NCOs by to look at us — “Oh, these are those peace freaks” and “We’re going to send you off to Vietnam anyway, we’re going to take you out and put you on an airplane tonight.” That scared us. I heard somebody talking about this guy sitting there in his cell in his underwear, refusing to wear his uniform. I’m going, all right, there’s people here resisting. We started to network.

​​        Richard Bunch was a disturbed kid who had been to Vietnam and was in prison on an AWOL charge. The guards would withhold his psychiatric medication. I didn’t know him well, but I spoke to him briefly several times and then the next thing I knew he was murdered by a prison guard. It scared the shit out of us all. We were all nervous, itching to get out, and itching to figure out what happened. There was a miniature riot, people were going, “it ain’t worth it anymore, they’re killing us.”​

        Then they had a memorial service. We all went because he meant something to us. He was one of us, not one of them. The chaplain stated it was justifiable homicide. We started throwing chairs in every direction and yelling. We knew then that the chain of command was trying to cover up the murder. We realized we had to do something. We decided to do something at roll call after chow. A name was called, a couple people shuffled, so I took a step and I brushed a guy aside. I heard steps behind me so I kept walking. We got over to the lawn; I turned and half the formation was coming toward me. We all locked arms and sat down. From that time on we were known as the “Presidio 27.” Walter Pawlowski stood up and read the list of grievances. The captain ordered us to get up and then opened the book and started reading us the mutiny act. About that time, about 60 MPs arrived. They got us inside. Walter and I were thrown into solitary confinement and named as the ringleaders right off the bat. We felt we could do a lot of damage if we took away their two star defendants, so after solitary we started planning our escape. Christmas Eve day 1968, we bailed out of a window while we were putting our work tools away and jogged off the post.​​ 

       On New Year’s Eve we went to Canada. I lived there until 1980 when I came back to live with my two children. In 1984 I was going along like there was nothing wrong. I got a call that someone had found my driver’s license. When I went to the police station to get it, they arrested me on my old warrant. They took me to the Presidio, then to the stockade at Fort Ord, and then to Fort Riley, Kansas. I was 38, in prison with 20-year-olds. While I was imprisoned former Presidio 27 and others campaigned to get me released. After serving four months I was released from the military in April 1985. My dishonorable discharge states I had been in the military for 17 years and 2 months.