ADAMS, Warren, sixty-two, first sergeant, Delta Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cav in the Ia Drang, retired in 1968 as the best-educated command sergeant major in the Army. Joseph Galloway was a civilian reporter at the Battle of Ia Drang. DIDURYK, Myron F., commander of Bravo Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cav in LZ X-Ray and LZ Albany, completed his tour in Vietnam with Bravo Company in 1966, and later returned to Vietnam and the 1st Air Cavalry Division as a major. The machine gunner was mowing them down. After they were airlifted out of the combat zone, McDades men were joined by the 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment. Hear Bruces story. Terms of Use | A young United Press International reporter, Joseph Galloway, became the only civilian decorated for gallantry during the war, awarded a Bronze Star with V device for valor for carrying a wounded soldier off the battlefield under intense fire. His last project on active duty was researching and writing a history of the all-black 24th Infantry Regiment during the Korean War. The problem was it had to be applied by a country that was much more willing for it to be applied for the long haul. We . Why I wasn't killed, I couldn't say.". Muscogee County, He and his wife live in Phoenix, Arizona. Please reset your password. He retired from the Army as a staff sergeant in 1976, and now serves in the Alabama National Guard. MERCHANT, Dick, fifty-four, assistant operations officer, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, served a second tour in Vietnam in 1968 as Lieutenant Colonel Matt Dillons battalion executive officer. He went home to Anderson County, South Carolina, where he is a deputy sheriff. Unlike Viet Cong guerrillas, the northerners were prepared to stand and fight. Sign up to receive a daily email of today's top military news stories from Stars and Stripes and top news outlets "It looked as if our best bet was to make for the copse of trees in the clearing, so I pointed my men in that direction and said, 'we need to get over there.'". Major Bruce P. Crandall's UH-1D helicopter climbs skyward after discharging a load of infantrymen on a search and destroy mission. Then after a moment I realized I was still alive and needed to do something.". The majority of the 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, under the command of Lt. Col. Robert McDade, didnt enter the fight until X-Ray had already been relieved by Moore. Surprisingly, Adams, Beck's buddy who was shot in the head, was among the. Of the 500 men present as part of the 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 155 lost their lives, and just 84 were immediately able to return to active duty. If you yield to it, it will absolutely paralyze you. LAVENDER, David A. Within an hour, they came under attack for the first time by North Vietnamese regulars, launching a four-day battle that killed hundreds of Americans and perhaps more than 1,000 Vietnamese and changed the course of the Vietnam War. Today, Doc Shucart of Landing Zone Albany is the chief of neurosurgery at Tufts University Medical School. Becoming a Find a Grave member is fast, easy and FREE. They died thinking that their loved ones would never know how they died. JEANETTE, Robert J., fifty, Ghost 4-6, weapons-platoon leader, Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cav in the Ia Drang, lives in Monsey, New York, a suburb of New York City. After several routine lifts into the area, https://www.vvmf.org/Wall-of-Faces/857/ELIAS-ALVAREZ-BUZO/, https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLK63b6Cn53unPuhknan6Y4fJwl-F5v14o, https://www.vvmf.org/The-Wall-That-Heals/, https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLK63b6Cn53unMMj-yZYEch0RuYy1YN1zl, https://vvmf.wordpress.com/2015/11/07/he-spent-14-hours-in-the-air-rescuing-wounded-in-the-ia-drang-valley/, https://www.stripes.com/news/special-reports/vietnam-stories/1965/ia-drang-valley-where-the-us-truly-went-to-war-1.376662, https://www.facebook.com/VietnamVeteransMemorialFund/videos/2239219906358006/, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLyBazkpUFQ, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sx1rzDNcFmE, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKtWX9TDFYc, https://www.military.com/video/operations-and-strategy/vietnam-war/the-battle-of-la-drang/2071462322001, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIAEcZ29aG4, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdDYNI7V0co, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7-U0FBiYUU, https://www.docsteach.org/documents/document/battle-la-drang-valley, https://whut.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/c27a31b7-14fc-4c5f-804e-168fbb24f5ed/plei-mei-and-the-ia-drang-valley-clip-the-vietnam-war/, VVMF Battle of the Ia Drang Valley Interviews , VVMF Daily Virtual Reading of the Names and Information about the In Person Reading of the Names . Your new password must contain one or more uppercase and lowercase letters, and one or more numbers or special characters. They have four children and five grandchildren. Omaha, JOHNS, Barbara Geoghegan, fifty, widow of Lieutenant John Lance (Jack) Geoghegan of the 2nd Platoon, Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, killed in action in X-Ray, married Lieutenant Colonel John Johns in 1969. Translation on Find a Grave is an ongoing project. Freeman won a battlefield commission in the Korean War. He had . On February 26, 2007, President George W. Bush presented Crandall with the Medal of Honor for his actions in the Ia Drang Valley. Nearly 70 percent of the battalions soldiers were killed or wounded before airstrikes, artillery and reinforcements drove the North Vietnamese into nearby Cambodia. They have four children and three grandchildren. It was his positive decision to do something that reinforced my own will to go on.". Scott and Basil Plumley meet most Fridays over breakfast at a local cafe for spirited discussions of the relative merits of their service, their two 7th Cavalry battalions, and other weighty issues. Photo extracted from U.S. Army motion picture footage from November 1965. Tully retired a colonel in 1976. He went home to Salinas, California, where he lives with his wife and three sons. Please enter your email address and we will send you an email with a reset password code. We were caught inside of what was essentially an L-shaped ambush.". BUNGUM, Galen, forty-nine, rifleman in Lieutenant Henry Herricks Lost Platoon, Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cav, left the Army in April 1966 and went home to Hayfield, Minnesota. Unknown to them at the time, they were surrounded by 2,000 North Vietnamese troops. Each option, he warned, had a good chance of leading to a stalemate. DEAL, Dennis, fifty, platoon leader, Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cav in the Ia Drang, left the Army as a captain in 1968 and returned to his native Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Lawrence and Cornett were roommates at Infantry Officer Basic School, roommates in jump school and on the ship together that brought them to Vietnam. Then he somehow managed to crawl away, saying that he was going to organize the troops. Lessons in leadership, in the importance of training, in courage, in sacrifice and in loss. He plays volleyball two nights a week to keep trim and has devoted much of his spare time over the past two years to a detailed study of the part played in the Ia Drang battles by his fellow aviators of the 229th Assault Helicopter Battalion, our beloved Huey slick drivers. He is now an attorney in San Diego, California. Advisory Group, Pleiku. KENNEDY, Glenn F., first sergeant, Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, was killed in action on May 6, 1966, during Operation Davy Crockett in the Bong Son plain. His last known address was Miami, Florida. Shortly thereafter, US units began . For the next four years he was executive vice president of the company that developed the Crested Butte, Colorado, ski area. By the third day of the battle, the Americans had gained the upper hand. The following day, both battalions were informed of an incoming bomber run on LZ X-Ray, meaning they needed to go elsewhere. He and his wife, Kornelia, live in Columbus, Georgia, where for several years Scott taught military subjects to Junior ROTC in the high schools. That all would change when the First Cavalry Air Mobile Division flew into the Ia Drang Valley in the central highlands of South Vietnam. Roger Gregory is a Vietnam veteran, serving in the 1st Infantry Division and is a business owner in Priest River. He is an executive with a major defense-contracting firm and lives in Centreville, Virginia. Val Kilmer Accidentally Landed Matthew Modine the Starring Role in Full Metal Jacket. Since I cant have that, I would like a job working as closely with the Army as possible. He is married and the father of four children. The late Lt. Gen. Hal Moore, author of We Were Soldiers Onceand Young, is said to have closed every speech with the phrase, "Hate the war, love the American warrior." He wanted the Gulf veterans to have the welcome-home that none of the Vietnam veterans got. He is married and has a daughter in college and a son in the U.S. Marines. In 1974 he transferred from the infantry to the military police. Box 159 He tried to crawl away and was shot again in the hip. Among the many survivors of the ambush was 1st Lt. Rick Rescorla, a platoon chief who died Sept. 11, 2001, rescuing individuals from the World Commerce Heart's south tower till it crashed round him. For the next agonizing 26 hours, that small band of Americans was trapped by a ring of hundreds of enemy fighters determined to kill them all. A system error has occurred. MILLS, Jon, fifty-four, Bruce Crandalls copilot in the Ia Drang, retired a lieutenant colonel in 1980. YOUNG, James, fifty-one, rifleman, Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry in LZ Albany, made it home to the family farm outside Keysville, Missouri, on Christmas Eve, 1965, with an Army discharge in his pocket and a quarter-size hole in the side of his skull. James Lawrence, a 77 year-old Vietnam veteran from Alabama, tells people about his best friend and the battle he died in whenever he gets the chance. This praise is largely due to the heavy emphasis director Randall Wallace put on ensuring what he created was as accurate to the real events of the Battle of Ia Drang as possible. After leaving the Army, Braveboy worked as a roofer. Due to a statute of limitations being lifted, Freeman was awarded the Medal of Honor on July 16, 2001. After LZ Albany, Thorpe requested a transfer from his company command to the division public-information office and finished his tour as an escort officer for visiting press and VIPs. Many did a second tour and others left the service and returned home to their families. HASTINGS, Charlie W., fifty-three, forward air controller at LZ X-Ray, retired as a colonel from the U.S. Air Force on March 1, 1992, after thirty years service. They are all Don Cornett to him, his best friend. But UPI sent him back to Vietnam in 1971, in 1973, and again in 1975 for the final chapter. They have a son, who is in college, and a daughter, still in high school. In 2016, he joined a panel of Ia Drang survivors at the Maneuver Center of Excellence, Fort Benning, Ga., to share their experiences with both young and seasoned officers and noncommissioned officers. 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