A little history
most people will never know.
Interesting
Veterans Statistics off the Vietnam Memorial Wall
There are 58,267
names now listed on that polished black wall, including those added in
2010.
The names are
arranged in the order in which they were taken from us by date and within each
date the names are alphabetized. It is hard to believe it is 36 years since the
last casualties.
The first known
casualty was Richard B. Fitzgibbon, of North Weymouth , Mass. Listed by the U.S.
Department of Defense as having been killed on June 8, 1956. His name is listed
on the Wall with that of his son, Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Richard B. Fitzgibbon
III, who was killed on Sept. 7, 1965.
There are
three sets of fathers and sons on the Wall.
39,996 on the
Wall were just 22 or younger.
8,283 were just
19 years old.
The largest age group, 33,103 were 18 years
old.
12 soldiers on the Wall were 17 years
old.
5 soldiers on the
Wall were 16 years old.
One soldier, PFC
Dan Bullock was 15 years old.
997 soldiers were
killed on their first day in Vietnam ..
1,448 soldiers
were killed on their last day in Vietnam ..
31 sets of
brothers are on the Wall.
Thirty one sets
of parents lost two of their sons.
54 soldiers
attended Thomas Edison High School in Philadelphia . I wonder why so many from
one school.
8 Women are on
the Wall. Nursing the wounded.
244 soldiers were
awarded the Medal of Honor during the Vietnam War; 153 of them are on the
Wall.
Beallsville, Ohio
with a population of 475 lost 6 of her sons.
West Virginia had
the highest casualty rate per capita in the nation. There are 711 West
Virginians on the Wall.
The Marines of
Morenci - They led some of the scrappiest high school football an d basketball
teams that the little Arizona copper town of Morenci (pop. 5,058) had ever known
and cheered. They enjoyed roaring beer busts. In quieter moments, they rode
horses along the Coronado Trail, stalked deer in the Apache National Forest. And
in the patriotic camaraderie typical of Morenci's mining families, the nine
graduates of Morenci High enlisted as a group in the Marine Corps. Their service
began on Independence Day, 1966. Only 3 returned home.
The Buddies of
Midvale - LeRoy Tafoya, Jimmy Martinez, Tom Gonzales were all boyhood friends
and lived on three consecutive streets in Midvale, Utah on Fifth, Sixth and
Seventh avenues. They lived only a few yards apart. They played ball at the
adjacent sandlot ball field. And they all went to Vietnam. In a span of 16 dark
days in late 1967, all three would be killed. LeRoy was killed on Wednesday,
Nov. 22, the fourth anniversary of John F. Kennedy's assassination. Jimmy died
less than 24 hours later on Th anksgiving Day. Tom was shot dead assaulting the
enemy on Dec. 7, Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.
The most casualty
deaths for a single day was on January 31, 1968 ~ 245
deaths.
The most casualty
deaths for a single month was May 1968 - 2,415 casualties were
incurred.
For most
Americans who read this they will only see the numbers that the Vietnam War
created. To those of us who survived the war, and to the families of those who
did not, we see the faces, we feel the pain that these numbers created. We are,
until we too pass away, haunted with these numbers, because they were our
friends, fathers, husbands, wives, sons and daughters. There are no noble wars,
just noble warriors.
Please pass
this on to those who served during this time, and those who DO
Care.
I've also sent
this to those I KNOW do care very much, and I thank you for caring as you
do.
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