LADNER, Theron, fifty, machine gunner with Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry in X-Ray, lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he owns a nightclub and a stable of Thoroughbred racehorses. They were interrogated by McDade, who, along with most of the commanding officers and radio operators, were called into a meeting to discuss the intel. He lives in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and owns and operates a real estate brokerage firm. After he flew the men back to base, he knew the soldiers on the ground were running short of ammunition, so he decided to fly back in. The battalion commander had ordered his command helicopter to land and check out a North Vietnamese soldier killed by the door gunner. Lt. Col. Harold G. Moore, a no-nonsense West Pointer, was the commander of the . He works at Fort Benning, Georgia, evaluating Army Reserve training. For the Ia Drang Valley survivors, October 10, 2012 will be a day they will remember for the rest of their days. He and his wife, Elizabeth, live in Roswell, New Mexico, where they run an antiques shop. The Ia Drang Valley is a valley located near Pleiku in Central Highlands of Vietnam. The Ia Drang Scholarship Fund was founded in 1994 by LTG (Ret) Harold G. Moore and Joseph L. Galloway from earnings on their book We Were Soldiers Once-And Young. Resend Activation Email, Please check the I'm not a robot checkbox, If you want to be a Photo Volunteer you must enter a ZIP Code or select your location on the map. Your donation to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund will help expand our mission to honor, educate and heal. Outnumbered when they arrive, the men are forced to fight for their lives while eliminating the 4,000-strong North Vietnamese force. He and his wife and their four Saint Bernard dogs live in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He is working on a book on Alpha Companys year in Vietnam. About 80 U.S. soldiers were killed, 124 wounded, in the first two days of the fight. 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. Between the Army and the Interior Department, Freeman logged a total of seventeen thousand hours flying time in helicopters and eight thousand hours in fixed wing. The North Vietnamese regulars and Viet Cong guerrillas absorbed even higher casualties from better-equipped American troops on the ground as well as helicopter gunships and B-52s raining bombs, bullets and napalm. He tells his audience this to help them understand. He is a captain and the commander of Engine Company Number One. Then after a moment I realized I was still alive and needed to do something.". He wanted the Gulf veterans to have the welcome-home that none of the Vietnam veterans got. He returned for a second Vietnam tour as an adviser in IV Corps in August 1968; in the 1970s he earned bachelors and masters degrees. Since then he has taught industrial arts, electronics, and mathematics, has flown for the U.S. Forest Service, and for a time was a crop duster pilot. He and his wife, Julie, divide their time between homes in Auburn, Alabama, and Crested Butte, Colorado. The Battle of Ia Drang Still Matters - War Is Boring. There was a problem getting your location. 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. From the lack of training and understanding of the situation to the haphazard way they conducted their movement and their halt. He earned a doctorate in history and now lives in San Antonio, where he works in the public-affairs office at Wilford Hall Air Force Medical Center. As the command ship touched down, other NVA soldiers opened up; Myron Diduryk was struck in the stomach in the doorway of the chopper. He is president of his own management-consulting firm and lives in Oklahoma City. "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.'". A Chicago native, Doc Carrara returned home, changed his specialty to pathology. That all would change when the First Cavalry Air Mobile Division flew into the Ia Drang Valley in the central highlands of South Vietnam. A native of Mendenhall, Mississippi, Kennedy was thirty-one years old at the time of his death. You've got to be in command and as I was on the way up, with my helmet strapped on, a North Vietnamese soldier in a tree put two bullet holes right through my helmet.". In the spring of 1992, Frank Henry was posthumously inducted into the Army Aviation Hall of Fame. He was the father of four children, aged twelve through twenty. Please complete the captcha to let us know you are a real person. A U.S. platoon was lured into a trap and surrounded, holding off repeated North Vietnamese attacks despite the death of the platoon leader and several noncommissioned officers. Today he is an orchestra leader and serves in the state militia. The battle was the culmination of Operation Silver Bayonet I, a combined American-South Vietnamese offensive to relieve the . The "Lost Platoon," led by Lt. Henry T. Herrick, became separated from the rest of Lt. Col. Harold G. "Hal" Moore's battalion at the start of the battle of Ia Drang on Nov. 14, 1965. They have four children and three grandchildren. He and his wife, Theresa, and their six-year-old daughter, Megan, live in Glen Allen, Virginia. They are stories that not only serve to maintain our connection with history, but also educate us and force us to confront the good and the bad and learn from it. 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. Battalions would use helicopters to be transferred in and out as artillery support came in from above. Don Cornett had a wife and a son, a mother and a father and two sisters. He and his wife, Ann, live in Lilburn, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta. Fifty years ago today, one of the Vietnam war's most ferocious battles broke out in the Ia Drang Valley. SELLECK, Pat, fifty-one, radio operator, recon platoon, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry at X-Ray, was discharged from the Army on November 29, 1965, and returned to his old job at the telephone company. Together, they flew in supplies, water, and ammunition needed for the troops. He holds two masters degrees, is employed in the defense industry, and lives in Alexandria, Virginia. MOORE, H. G. (Hal), now seventy, commanded the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry in the Ia Drang and served six more months in Vietnam, commanding the 3rd Brigade. Crandall won the first Helicopter Heroism Award of the Aviation/Space Writers Association, for two daring nighttime landings under fire to rescue twelve badly wounded troopers from Captain Tony Nadals Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cav in Operation Masher-White Wing in January 1966. They resupplied ammunition, water, and supplies, while evacuating the wounded. After Vietnam, Hazen maintained a correspondence with the mother of the young lieutenant who died in his arms. They successfully hit many of the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army (NVA) troops, while also shooting some of the Americans with friendly fire. Vince Cantu never went back to his music. The service members killed in the Battle of la Drang are remembered on Panel 3E of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. NYE, George (China Joe), demolition-team leader, 8th Engineers, attached to the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry in Landing Zone X-Ray, died of an apparent heart attack at age fifty-one on December 8, 1991, at his home in Bangor, Maine. This operation responded to the NVA attack on an American . The majority of the battle was fought in the valley of Ia Drang, Vietnam by 3rd Battalion, 7th Calvary and was the first major test of air . The two-hour Ia Drang Valley program kicked off the reunion's final day. BY DAVID A. MAURER. He is a consultant to industries seeking defense business. For a number of years he was a country-and-western band leader and disc jockey. After years of advising the South Vietnamese against the communist North, and months of chasing black-clad guerrillas, a large. In March 1991 he found a new purpose in life: meeting the chartered airliners touching down at Bangor International Airport, the first American landfall, bringing American soldiers home from the Persian Gulf. On November 14, 1965, 450 American soldiers of the 1st Air Cavalry Division were airlifted by helicopter to this valley with the intention of locating and eliminating North Vietnamese forces. 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. He lives in Pleasant Valley, Connecticut, and works in real estate sales and development. Luckily for him, not a single shot he received hit any vital organs. PLUMLEY, Basil, seventy-two, the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalrys sergeant major, retired from the Army as a command sergeant major on December 31, 1974, after thirty-two years, six months, and four days on active duty, and a second tour in Vietnam with the U.S. "The way it was presented, at least from my perspective, was we were making an administrative move to be airlifted out so we wouldn't be in the way of the bombers.". He and his wife have two college-age children. Ia Drang Valley, Battle of the (1965). Im not supposed to chop wood or do anything that might cause a lick on that side of my head, but it healed up pretty well so I dont worry much about it, he says. After a North Vietnamese strike against the Special Forces camp at Plei Me, American forces deployed in an effort to destroy the attackers. The Air Mobile Division was a new concept. This account already exists, but the email address still needs to be confirmed. Companies C and D took the brunt of the Communist attack, and most of the men were quickly hit. He owns a property-management firm in Tampa, Florida. It was much bigger than what we had seen before against a much more tenacious enemy, Wiest said of the battle. For information, the 1st Air Cavalry arrived in the fall of 1965, about the same time I did as a member of the 1stInfantry Division. Please contact Find a Grave at [emailprotected] if you need help resetting your password. Moore and his 450-man 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, flew into Landing Zone X-Ray at the base of the Chu Pong Mountain west of Plei Me and miles from the Cambodian border. The fighting continued for three hours. Why I wasn't killed, I couldn't say.". SUGDINIS, Joel E., fifty-five, who had already served one tour in Vietnam as an adviser, completed his second tour with Alpha Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry. He tried to crawl away and was shot again in the hip. He died. As the fighting around Landing Zone X-Ray subsided, McDades 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry, was ordered to move cross-country to Landing Zone Albany, where it was to be picked up by helicopter and moved to a new location. Learn more about featured topics of the Vietnam War and Vietnam Era. They had this Learning to be a Teacher program; I tried it and loved it. 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 . "Back then Stars and Stripes would carry the casualty reports and I had a red pen and started checking off the names of guys I knew who were listed as KIA. American officials declared the Battle of the la Drang Valley a victory. PAYNE, D. P. (Pat), fifty, recon-platoon leader, Delta Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry in the Ia Drang, served two tours in Vietnam and left the Army as a captain in June 1969. We Were Soldiers (2002) is considered by many to be one of the best Vietnam War films ever made. On 27 October Westmoreland committed a brigade of the 1st Air Cavalry to search-and-destroy operations. His hands were burned in the escape from the wreckage, and it was doubted that he would ever fly again. He served as city manager of Dunsmuir, California, from 1977 to 1980, when he moved to Mesa, Arizona, where he is the citys manager of public works. His primary job is helping communities located near Army chemical-weapons depots write their emergency-response plans. He and his wife live in Anniston, Alabama, where Martin is employed at the Army Depot. He is a master gunsmith and runs his own business repairing and selling weapons. 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. He was made famous by the account of his actions during the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley in November 1965, the Americans' first major battle of the Vietnam War. Translation on Find a Grave is an ongoing project. CANTU, Vincent, fifty-one, mortarman, Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cav, left the Ia Drang battlefield and immediately rotated home for discharge, two weeks late, in December 1965. SCOTT, James A., sixty-nine, the 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalrys sergeant major, served a second Vietnam tour in 1970-71 as command sergeant major, USARV Scott retired as a command sergeant major on May 1, 1973, after thirty years, ten months, and twenty days of service, wearing the Combat Infantrymans Badge with one star; six Bronze Stars; three Purple Hearts; a European Campaign ribbon with four battle stars and one invasion arrow; a Korean Service ribbon with two battle stars; a Vietnam Service ribbon with four battle stars; and the Presidential Unit Citation badge. He and Russell Adams are still best friends. TULLY, Robert (Bob), sixty-eight, commander, 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry in the Ia Drang, served a second tour in Vietnam in 1968 as a brigade commander in the Americal Division. We Were Soldiers is based on the novel, We Were Soldiers Once and Young: Ia Drang The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam, by renowned war correspondent Joe Galloway and Lt. Gen. Hal Moore. After they were airlifted out of the combat zone, McDades men were joined by the 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment. "When things started it just erupted," Lawrence said. RACKSTRAW, Jim, forty-nine, recon-platoon leader, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry at X-Ray, served a second tour in Vietnam as a rifle-company commander in the 25th Infantry Division. (Skip), fifty-three, commander of Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cav in the Ia Drang, is still on active duty. Major Bruce Crandall made over 20 flights into intense enemy fire during a battle in the Ia Drang Valley, South Vietnam, in November 1965, evacuating 70 wounded and delivering ammunition. He lives on a farm near Rainier, Washington, and has been writing down his memories of Vietnam duty for his children and grandchildren. He is an executive with a major defense-contracting firm and lives in Centreville, Virginia. His friends completed the tree for him and dedicated it to Sergeant China Joe Nye. In Vietnam, it never got any worse than it did in the Ia Drang, a distant valley in the Central Highlands, tangled in elephant grass and simmering in heat. After about a three mile march, the front of the column reached the landing zone and the 2/7 Cav commander, Lt. Col. Robert McDade, called his company commanders forward to discuss how to best array their forces in preparation for extraction. Our town is only ten thousand people and we lost eleven young men from here killed in Vietnam, says Purp. JEKEL, Alex (Pop), seventy, Huey pilot in X-Ray and Albany, retired in the late 1960s as a chief warrant officer-4. On November 18, 1965, the US forces were able to gather their dead. The Troopers of 2/7 Cav relieved their sister unit, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, on Nov. 16, following 1/7 Cav's three day battle with the People's Army of Vietnam near the base of the Chu Pong Massif. The communist threat to the central highlands subsided. TIFFT, Richard P., Pathfinder team leader in LZ X-Ray, later served as commander of the Golden Knights, the Armys parachute team. He retired in August 1990, and now lives in Peekskill, New York. Three U.S. soldiers were awarded the Medal of Honor for bravery during the battle. He and his wife, Martha, have four children. Both were present at the Battle of Ia Drang, the first large-scale engagement of the Vietnam War. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization. The bullet was still in there. Assigned as the operations officer of the 2nd Battalion, 12th Cavalry, Diduryk was killed in action on April 24, 1970, in a Huey helicopter at an abandoned fire base near the Cambodian border. Every night I rub a towel over all my scars and see them in the mirror. He checked in with the nearest Veterans Administration hospital; they sent him home, telling him they would call him back for an operation to place a plate over the hole. Crandalls back was broken; he spent five months in an Army hospital recovering. Shortly thereafter, US units began . In addition, they were exhausted from the fight at X-Ray, so it was easy for hundreds of NVA troops to sneak up and launch an attack. He was discharged a sergeant, completed his college education, and is now an on-air national news correspondent for ABC Televisions Weekend News. "The next morning we were told the B-52s out of Guam were going to bomb the mountains and that we were to move to LZ Albany," Jim said. This was the first and last battle between NVA forces and U.S forces of similar size. (U.S. Army). About 40 minutes later, North Vietnamese launched their attack, hiding in the tall elephant grass and in stands of trees. Lt. Don Cornett along with 154 Troopers from 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment were killed in the Ia Drang Valley, Nov. 17, 1965, at a small clearing known as Landing Zone Albany. The following day, both battalions were informed of an incoming bomber run on LZ X-Ray, meaning they needed to go elsewhere. The battlefield area covered 1,500 square miles of what appeared to be flat rolling terrain dominated by the Chu Pong . (Purp), fifty, rifleman, Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry, was evacuated to Japan. 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. However, Americans killed an estimated 1,800 North Vietnamese, through rifles, artillery, helicopters, and jets. USA. Gen. Westmoreland, commander of the U.S. One of those soldiers was Army Captain David Moore, 82nd Airborne Division, son of his old battlefield commander in X-Ray, and that homecoming gave George the greatest pleasure of all. Simpson County, In the last operation, his shattered left knee joint was removed and the leg bones fused, leaving his left leg frozen straight and two inches shorter than his right leg. With a passion for historical learning and historical education, her writing interests include social history, and war history, especially researching obscure facts about the Second World War. Many did a second tour and others left the service and returned home to their families. We were crawling around under intense machine-gun fire when Sergeant Major Plumley walked up, pulled his .45-caliber pistol, chambered a round, and said: Gentlemen, prepare to defend yourselves.You never forget a thing like that.. In 1982, he joined U.S. News & World Report magazine. UH-1 aircraft of the 229th Assault Helicopter Battalion carry wounded 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry soldiers away during the fight for LZ X-Ray in the Ia Drang Valley of Vietnam. I couldn't grasp it.". MCDONALD, George J., fifty-two, mortarman, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, left the Army in 1966 and went home to Pass Christian, Mississippi, where he is a commercial fisherman. Meyer and his wife, Carol, live in Arlington, Virginia. FESMIRE, John A. 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. When I go to the wall, I see Don Cornett's name 58,000 times.'. Hal Moore and the 1st Battalion, 7th . Bun-gum operated a 161-acre dairy farm until 1988, when he sold his cows and took a job in town. I have it here with me today. He lives with his wife and family in Steelville. He retired a major in 1980, after twenty years service. Army Specialist Four (SP4) Bill Beck was an assistant machine gunner assigned to the 1 st Battalion, 7 th Cavalry Regiment (1/7 Cav), 1 st Cavalry Division on November 14, 1965, when the unit airlifted into Landing Zone (LZ) X-Ray in the Ia Drang Valley in Vietnam. BECK, Bill, forty-nine, assistant machine gunner, Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cav in the Ia Drang, left the Army in 1966 and went home to his native Steelton, Pennsylvania. Things were quiet, but in the morning, the North Vietnamese attacked. Basil Plumley is a grandfather now, kind and soft-spoken, but do not be deceived: He is the lion in winter. He worked an additional fifteen years as a civilian employee at Martin Army Hospital at Fort Benning, Georgia, and retired again in 1990. Lt. Don Cornett along with 154 Troopers from 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment were killed in the Ia Drang Valley, Nov. 17, 1965, at a small clearing known as Landing Zone Albany. 1/7 Cavalry lands at LZ X-Ray. BEAN, Roger, fifty-two, Huey pilot who was wounded in LZ X-Ray, was wounded again in early 1966 in the Bong Son campaign. Advisory Group, Pleiku. HAZEN, Robert D., fifty, Lieutenant Bob Tafts radio operator in Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Cav, retired from the Army a master sergeant in 1988 after twenty-seven years service. The losses at Ia Drang prompted the North Vietnamese to rethink their plan to confront U.S. forces with large, conventional formations, reverting to hit-and-run attacks where U.S. air and artillery power was less effective. In his spare time he camps, climbs, skis, and fishes for trout in the Rockies. A bitter conclusion to the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley came soon afterward, when Gen. Westmoreland told the 2nd Battalion survivors that they had achieved "a great victory over the Communists from the North." Survivors described savage, close-range combat, sometimes hand-to-hand, over several hours. The other 58,000 names on that wall are men and women who also had a spouse, or children, they had mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters. He spent seven months there while his shattered thigh and legs were repaired. The bulk of the fighting was centered around two vital helicopter landing zones: LZ X-Ray and Albany. Florence County, "I realized it when Sgt. Unknown to them at the time, they were surrounded by 2,000 North Vietnamese troops. One killed, 15 injured after clashes erupt at Afghan border again December 16, 2022. He was in a great deal of pain, so a rifleman named Wilson and I removed his gear as best we could, and I bandaged his wound. After several routine lifts into the area,the men on the ground came under attack from the North Vietnamese Army. At 4:00 AM this morning, Command Sergeant Major Basil L. Plumley of the U.S. Army's 1 st Battalion, 7 th Cavalry Regiment, died. A fresh unit, the 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry, was ordered to march from LZ X-Ray to LZ Albany a few miles away. He retired in 1990. He then formed a computer-software company. Shortly after the battalion set out, the North Vietnamese sprang a massive ambush. He went home to Salinas, California, where he lives with his wife and three sons. In a 1967 article for the Saturday Evening Post, former ABC reporter Jack Smith, who was a private first class in Charlie Company during the battle, wrote about Cornett's last moments. Jeanette spent the better part of a year in a military hospital while his shattered leg was repaired. He won a National Magazine Award for his October 29, 1990, cover article on the Ia Drang battles. Douglas County, In Vietnam run on LZ X-Ray, meaning they needed to do something. `` Operation Silver Bayonet,... Clashes erupt at Afghan border again December 16, 2022 Auburn, Alabama, where is... An incoming bomber run on LZ X-Ray, meaning they needed to do something ``. 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