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
- 1939: Javier Bueno, Asturian socialist newsman
- 1879: Anthony Blair
- 1946: Hong Sa-ik, a Korean general in the Japanese army
- 1568: Leonor de Cisneros, chastised wife
- 1904: Newly caught Herero prisoners-of-war
- 1803: Joseph Samuel survives three hangings
- 2003: Vignes Mourthi, framed in Singapore?
- 1778: James "Sandy Flash" Fitzpatrick
- 1913: Joe Richardson lynched
- 1764: Lt. Vasily Mirovich, for attempting to topple Catherine the Great
- 1396: Thousands of knights of the Last Crusade
Interesting that only the officer got the metal, but not the enlisted one !
Dear Lawguy,
What is the “it” that you are referring to?
The retaliations. You kill one of ours and we’ll kill one of yours thing. Normally, it just makes it even nastier.
I wonder if it worked?
I guess that question above should have been posted as a reply.