Aiken County veteran returns to heal, walk across America

Bill Bengtson, Aiken Standard, S.C.
·4 min read

Nov. 11—VAUCLUSE — Military veteran Dusty Dawson has set foot on six continents (Antarctica being the exception), serving in a variety of roles, and his current work environment may be one of Aiken County's most peaceful public places.

That one-room, wooden structure, a few yards from Vaucluse Pond, dates back to 1895 and South Carolina's oldest continuously operating post office.

Dawson has been "delivering" for Uncle Sam, in one way or another, since the 1990s, and is legally known now as Robert James Carvajal-Dawson Jr.

The "Dusty" part, he noted, came his way while he was serving as an infantryman with the First Infantry Division, in Fort Hood, Texas, in 1999, "and it stuck."

The North Augusta resident is "a 25-year active-duty veteran of the Army and Marine Corps and spent a short time in the Navy Reserve," in his words, from when he introduced himself this year in a successful bid for election as president of American Legion Post 71, in North Augusta.

He grew up in a military family, starting life in Orange, California, and developed a solid grip on geography over the next few decades, beginning his military career as a combat engineer.

"I was stationed in Germany twice, stationed in Norway. Also been to Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, Kuwait, Denmark, Germany — it was West Germany when I was stationed there. Also Sweden, Amsterdam ... Lichtenstein, France, Italy, Greece and then, on the Pacific side, I've been in the Philippines, Guam, Thailand and that's it."

Venezuela, in addition, has played a huge role in Dawson's life, as the mother country of his wife, Ruth, who hails from the town of Maturin.

He also served in a handful of roles over the decades, he confirmed.

"I started out as a combat engineer. I was that for two years, and then I was in the infantry for 15 years, and then I finished up with the Signal Corps. I got medically 're-classed' to Signal. I did my last nine years there, and I retired as a master sergeant."

He was at Fort Gordon from 2007 to 2010 and grew fond of North Augusta in the process. On Oct. 1, 2015, a month after his retirement, he launched into what he called "Freedom Walk USA," in an effort to adjust from military to civilian life.

The problem, he said, was PTSD — post-traumatic stress disorder, defined by the Mayo Clinic as a mental health condition that's triggered by either experiencing or witnessing a terrifying event. "Symptoms can include such flashbacks, nightmares and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about the event," the summary notes.

Dawson's therapy involved possibly a lifetime's worth of mileage.

"I was walking 100 miles in every state to include Washington, D.C.," he wrote. "I was using this time to transition from the military and time that I needed to adjust to being a civilian who was dealing with severe PTSD."

Donations from his walk went to the Wounded Warrior Project and the National Coalition of Homeless Veterans. He also noted, "Secondly, I walked to see America and meet the people I served all those years for."

Social media helped him connect with 3,500 people who "followed" him, helping lead to donations of more than $12,000 for Dawson's chosen charities, as he logged more than 5,500 miles over the course of well over a year.

He wrote, "My PTSD got better, and I like to say now that I have PTSG, with the 'G' standing for 'growth,' and an awareness and understanding how how I can help others diagnosed with that, too, which led me back here to Augusta and North Augusta at the end of 2016.

Dawson, an Eagle Scout, re-established his connection with the Boy Scouts of America, and he and his wife have both served as local leaders in the program since 2018. The couple's wedding ceremony took place in November 2019 in Post 71's headquarters, with Scouts among the neighbors in attendance.

Vaucluse's postal clerk, in addition to his Monday-through-Saturday duties in Vaucluse, also became known for his work as a fitness instructor and his time as a Red Cross volunteer helping at Fort Gordon, at Dwight D. Eisenhower Army Medical Center, in aquatics fitness and physical therapy.