THE WALL OF FACES

Wish I could have met you and got to know you, from all accounts of our family you were a great man.Semper Fi and God Bless !!

There is a place
Not far from here
Where spirits walk
And heroes live
And honor still resides.

It is a wall
With names inscribed
Of those who served
When they were asked...
The brothers of my youth.

I go there still
To walk and think
About my life,
And what I've done since
And things that might have been.

There is a debt
I can't repay
Too many lives were spent.
And one man's life cannot suffice
To make their deaths worthwhile.

But there is hope
In the memory
Of those we leave behind
Who know the price that freedom brings
Who can carry on in kind.

I send you now
To touch a name
So the vision can be passed
Remember there is honor still
It is for you to see it lasts.

They are not dead
And have a wish
As all old soldiers do
The reflection you see before you now
Is their wish to live in you.

My dad has always made sure Russel’s memory is alive in our family. He will forever be revered and honored by the Schneider family.

You were a little more than a month older than I when we started our lives in this world. Having served in Navy, aboard a destroyer (DD-886) in the Vietnam War, I was in the Gulf of Ton Kin about the same time as you were in Quang Ngai. I'd like to believe we shared some of the same hopes and dreams of young men at that time I can tell you the world of today is NOTHING like we'd expected. With deepest appreciation, thank you for your service and your sacrifice in Vietnam, Russell.

On May 22, 1967, A Company, 1st Battalion, 35th Infantry, 25th Infantry Division, was conducting search and destroy operations near Duc Pho in in Quang Ngai Province, RVN. At 6:00 AM, as the company entered the small village of Dien Troung (4), an outbreak of automatic weapons occurred. First and Second Platoons became heavily engaged in open rice paddies on the north side of the hamlet. Third Platoon and the company command group moved across Highway QL-1 and entered the northwest corner of the village but were stopped by intense enemy fire. The entire company was now pinned down with the command group suppressed in a peanut patch. Thirty-two hours later, and after the liberal use of gunships, airstrikes, some 2000 artillery shells, and three more rifle companies, A Company was finally able to break contact and withdraw. Artillery and air power was then placed on the village. On the 23rd, B Company, 1/35, entered the village at noon and became heavily engaged. At 2 PM, Company C moved into a blocking position nearby. Company A now occupied a position west of QL-1, with three platoons on line. At 4 PM, B Company, 2/35th was assaulted onto a hill southwest of Dien Truong where it also moved into blocking positions. The enemy continued to fight throughout the night as artillery pounded their position and gunships and flareships screened the open ground to the north. The next morning, following three airstrikes and behind a smokescreen, Companies A and B assaulted the village. They met only minor contact, and by 3 PM the village complex was occupied. A total of eighty-seven North Vietnamese Army soldiers were killed, one captured, and forty-nine weapons discovered. Ten Americans died in the engagement. They included (from B/1/35) PFC Kenneth G. Worman, SP4 Leonard A. Morgan, SP4 Moses L. Poindexter, and PFC Ronald W. Ward; (from A/1/35) PFC Harry J. McGuire III and SP4 Robert L. Murphy; and (from HHC/1/35) PFC Merlin F. Caldwell. SSG Pedro A. Cruz, from the 19th Psychological Operations Company, was killed while doing broadcasting over loudspeakers when village was attacked. And PFC John A. Mietus and PFC Russell D. Needham, from A Troop, 2nd Squadron, 17th Cavalry, 101st Airborne Division, were lost as their unit responded to the battle. Morgan, Ward, and McGuire were each posthumously awarded the Bronze Star medal for bravery. [Taken from coffeltdatabase.org]