1965: Kenneth Roraback and Rocky Versace, Vietnam War POWs
5 comments September 26th, 2015 Headsman
According to a UPI wire story from Saigon which ran in American newspapers beginning Monday, September 27,
The Viet Cong said they executed two American prisoners Sunday … Although the broadcast did not say so, the executions apparently were in retaliation for the deaths Thursday of three anti-American demonstrators. The demonstrators were convicted by a military tribunal of engaging in terrorist activities and put before a firing squad in a soccer stadium at Da Nang.
An earlier execution of a Viet Cong terrorist by the government June 24 brought an announcement from the Communists that they had executed Sgt. Harold G. Bennet[t], a captive from Arkansas.
The two men shot on September 26 — whose names are garbled in the initial news report, since “the names were received phonetically” — were Sgt. Kenneth Mills Roraback and Capt. Humbert Roque “Rocky” Versace.
In 2002, Versace would be posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor — the first Vietnam War soldier so decorated on grounds of unwavering defiance as a POW.
On this day..
- 2014: A Barawe bigamist - 2020
- 1939: Javier Bueno, Asturian socialist newsman - 2019
- 1879: Anthony Blair - 2018
- 1946: Hong Sa-ik, a Korean general in the Japanese army - 2017
- 1568: Leonor de Cisneros, chastised wife - 2016
- 1904: Newly caught Herero prisoners-of-war - 2014
- 1803: Joseph Samuel survives three hangings - 2013
- 2003: Vignes Mourthi, framed in Singapore? - 2012
- 1778: James "Sandy Flash" Fitzpatrick - 2011
- 1913: Joe Richardson lynched - 2010
- 1764: Lt. Vasily Mirovich, for attempting to topple Catherine the Great - 2009
- 1396: Thousands of knights of the Last Crusade - 2008
Entry Filed under: 20th Century,Cycle of Violence,Execution,History,No Formal Charge,Occupation and Colonialism,Shot,Soldiers,Summary Executions,Torture,U.S. Military,USA,Vietnam,War Crimes,Wartime Executions
Tags: 1960s, 1965, congressional medal of honor, kenneth roraback, pows, rocky versace, september 26, vietnam war
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