THE WALL OF FACES

Never forgotten.

HOOAH

Thank you for your service to our country so long ago sir. As long as you are remembered you will remain in our hearts forever….

You will forever remain in our hearts and prayers

Dear PFC Nathaniel Irving, Thank you for your service an Airborne Qualified Infantryman. Saying thank you isn't enough, but it is from the heart. Please watch over America, it stills needs your strength, courage and faithfulness. Rest in peace with the angels.

SGT Kenneth C. Hess, PFC Nathaniel Irving, and PFC Don A. MacPhail were Airborne-qualified infantrymen serving with K Company, 75th Infantry, 4th Infantry Division. On February 5, 1969, Company K team 3-C with Hess, Irving, MacPhail, and a Montagnard scout named Ju Hmok were inserted to monitor a jungle river valley in Pleiku Province. Patrol leader SGT Hess radioed on the second day that he was feeling ill, but declined extraction. On the morning of February 8th, the four-man patrol reported that everything was normal and they were waiting at the pickup zone. No further contact was ever made, and aircraft searches failed to locate the team. On 10 February, two companies of the 1st Battalion, 35th Infantry, were landed in the area. On the following morning, the advancing infantrymen mistook Ju Hmok--the missing patrol’s Montagnard scout – for a “wounded but armed NVA soldier” and killed him at a distance. That same day, the aero rifle platoon found the remains of PFC Irving, and a grave containing the body of SGT Hess. Eight days later, the 35th Infantry captured NVA Sgt. Do Van Luong of the 95B NVA Infantry Regiment. The captive stated that a wounded American wearing tiger-striped camouflage, with reddish-brown hair and a mustache, was being carried on a stretcher to the North Vietnamese B-3 Front headquarters. The description of the prisoner matched PFC Don A. MacPhail--who was returned after the 1973 cease-fire agreement. The following are further comments about the ill-fated patrol by SGT John Serrano (Mil. Ret.), Company K team 3-C from July 2000: I was there and in the same Company K. SGT Kenneth Hess was a good friend of mine, as well as the other teammates. The Montagnard (Ju Hmok) that was killed by friendly fire was right. PFC Nathaniel Irving was killed in a way that only a NVA would kill. The reason we didn’t get any radio contact was because a grenade had landed between SGT Hess’s neck and the radio. That’s why we had lost radio contact. If you knew the NVA and their ways, you would know that they never put anyone in a grave. The part about PFC Don A. MacPhail was right. He was a POW and then returned in 1973. The Montagnard (Ju Hmok) was also my scout. I had let him stay behind because he had just gotten married, but they needed a scout so they took Ju Hmok. SGT Hess only had two weeks to go before he was to go home. [Taken from coffeltdatabase.org and k75ranger.com]