When was jimi hendrix in the army

Today, many people know he pioneered the use of a guitar as an electronic-sound source and have heard about his setting his Fender Stratocaster on fire in concert. However, it is less well known that this guitar virtuoso was a soldier in the U. Born James Marshall Hendrix, he was brought up in Seattle in an unstable home of fighting and alcohol, his parents divorcing when he was nine. Hendrix lived with his father, rarely seeing his mother afterward.

Music was his sanctuary, and his father gave him his first guitar at In the early s Hendrix was a high school dropout, and he faced charges from law enforcement regarding stolen cars. Hendrix was given a choice, facing either prison or joining the military. To the surprise of his family, he decided to enlist in the U.

Army, which he did on May 31, , at He completed eight weeks of basic training at Fort Ord, California, and was assigned to the st Airborne Division, where he was stationed in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, arriving in November of that year. Not caring, Hendrix remained true to his calling and continued to play the guitar. They work you to death, fussing and fighting. His father obliged and sent the guitar to Fort Campbell.

Jimi Hendrix is undoubtedly one of the greatest guitarists to ever step on stage. But when he was a young, dumb kid, he was given the choice of going to war or going to jail — he chose the Army.

One of the rumors that has persisted is that Jimi Hendrix was discharged for displaying homosexual tendencies. Some say he put on an act in order to avoid going to Vietnam. This can be easily disproved by the fact that he was already out of the Army by the time President Kennedy signed the Foreign Assistance Act — he had no real reason to believe that American troops would be sent to Vietnam to stop the fall of Communist dominoes.

The simple fact is that his discharge documents say otherwise. He barely passed PT standards, was a sub-par marksman, and he got in trouble three times for missing bed checks on three different weekends.

To be honest, that sounds a lot like an average year-old private — a lazy, apathetic troop who skims by doing the absolutely bare minimum.