Unlike their fathers and grandfathers who served in the First and Second World Wars, the generation of soldiers who returned from Southeast Asia were greeted by an apathetic, and in some cases, even hostile nation. There were no ticker-tape parades, no mass celebrations. Only an embittered sense of how much the war had traumatized the United States. But as time passed, the mood of the country changed. Amid a renewed sense of national optimism, Vietnam veterans were increasingly shown the respect and honor accorded to veterans of other wars. In November 1982, the country formally recognized their sacrifices with the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Etched in the immense black granite walls of the monument are the names of the 58,216 men and eight military women killed in the war. Each year tens of thousands of visitors to “The Wall” leave photographs, flowers, personal belongings, and letters in memory of those who died. One of the poems left most frequently at the Wall was written by Michael Davis O’Donnell, a young helicopter pilot from Springfield, Illinois. The untitled poem was actually part of a handwritten letter O’Donnell sent to his best friend, Marcus Sullivan, who had served as a combat engineer in the war from 1967 to 1968 and had returned to the United States. O’Donnell’s poem has been published before, but the full letter, below, has not. It was also the last letter Sullivan ever received from his friend; Maj. Michael O’Donnell’s helicopter was shot out of the sky on March 24, 1970, during a rescue mission. His body was never recovered.
9:00 PM
2 Jan 70
Dear Marcus,
I guess we are not very good correspondents. I have raced thru the month of December and found I was not entirely unhappy to see it leave. I am, right now, in the middle of being positive I was never anywhere except Pleiku, Vietnam this whole lifetime and am sorry to report that I’ve already played the same good times over and over and they are beginning to fade out. I think you must know what I mean. It’s hard to make the old dreams last—especially when you have no one to make the new ones with.
At any rate I should not complain, it could be much worse, I could be a combat engineer or something.
I enjoyed the poems you sent me, I really did. I have typed them up and added them to A Leaf of Life.
I have written a few new things. I will send them later. I do want to give you this one I wrote last night:
If you are able
save a place for them
inside of you …
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving
for the places they can
no longer go …
Be not ashamed to say
you loved them,
though you may
or may not have always …
Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own …
And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call this war insane,
take one moment to embrace
those gentle heroes
you left behind …
1 Jan 70 MDO
I am convinced this will be worst or the best year I have had. Ask me this time next year. Let me wish you a good year and when you have the time write me and take care of yourself.
Until that time,
Michael
Visits to the Wall are understandably painful but often cathartic for family members of those who died in Vietnam. On June 6, 1968, Theresa O. Davis, from Quincy, Massachusetts, learned that her nineteen-year-old son, Richard, a Green Beret with the Fifth Special Forces, was killed near the Cambodian border. Mrs. Davis had lost her husband, also a serviceman, ten years earlier, and the death of her eldest son was overwhelming. The heartache never subsided but, after going to the Wall to find his name, Davis wrote a letter to Richard expressing how much she loved him and how deeply he was missed. (“Gold Star Mothers,” alluded to by Davis in her letter, date back to World War I, when the mothers and wives of men killed in battle began wearing a black band with a gold star in memory of their loved ones.)
Dear Dick,
You were my first born. With your laughing eyes and mischievous grin, you stole my heart. I remember you as a little boy—the forts you built, the adventures you took, the “rescued” critters you brought home—and the friends that surrounded you. I’ll never forget, when you were twelve years old, you stood so proudly beside me as they played taps for your Dad, and gave us his flag.
My darling son, you were the brave one—you tried so hard to be a father to your younger brothers and sisters.
But you grew up so fast. As soon as you were out of high school, you signed up for the Special Forces—and you were so happy when they accepted you. How proud you looked when you came home on leave wearing your Green Beret. Captured forever in my mind, is the image of your final hug, as you raced for the plane that would take you to Vietnam. You didn’t say too much in your letters—but I knew you were in danger, because you always used to tell me “what you don’t know, won’t hurt you.” I found out later—on June 6, 1968, you were on a team with some South Vietnamese soldiers, and your group was pinned down under fire. You were hit several times before you died. You were only 19 years old.
There are no words to describe how I felt. I was so empty—but I had to put up a front for your brothers and sisters. Little Kevin was only seven. He kept saying it wasn’t fair—he’d already given up his Daddy. I pretended to be brave. But inside, the empty space just grew larger.
It’s been a long time my son. I still miss you. I will always miss you. Sometimes I look at your friends that you went to school with, and I wonder what you would be like now; what my grandchildren would have been like. But you will never come back. You’re gone forever.
They gave you a Silver Star. Now they call me a Gold Star mother. I spend a lot of time with the other Gold Star mothers. Every Monday night, a group of us go to the homeless shelter for Vietnam Vets. I know if it was you in that position, I would want someone to do the same for you. I guess that’s what moms do. A lot of the guys have family problems. When they came home from Vietnam, they just couldn’t talk about it; and they alienated themselves from their parents.
We try to give them support—talk to them like a mother would talk to a son. One of them even came over and asked me if I could sew some buttons on for him. I did, but I also asked him, “Have you called your Mom, have you called your Dad?” They think their family doesn’t want to hear from them. But when they do call, and go visit, the healing can begin.
We also go to the Vietnam Memorial whenever we can. We can tell when one of the vets is having a hard time. Even now, so many of them feel guilty because they came home, and our sons didn’t. We give them a hug, and tell them it’s not their fault; we’re glad they’re home. Dick, I’m sure wherever you are up there, you approve of what I’m doing. You were such a people person; always trying to help someone.
Besides, when I go to the Wall, it’s almost like you’re there with me. Each time I run my fingers over your name on that cold, granite wall, I can feel the warmth of your laughter as if you are saying, “It’s okay, Mom. I’m here.” I know I will never hold you in my arms again. But I will forever hold you close to my heart because you will always be my firstborn—my shining star.
Love, Mom
All letters and artifacts left at the Wall are collected, catalogued, and preserved by the National Park Service, National Capital Region. Duery Felton Jr., a park service curator (and a Vietnam veteran himself), was organizing a container of memorabilia gathered at the Wall when a small photograph and letter left by another Vietnam veteran caught his attention:
Nov 18, 1989
Dear Sir,
For twenty two years I have carried your picture in my wallet. I was only eighteen years old that day that we faced one another on that trail in Chu Lai, Vietnam. Why you did not take my life I’ll never know. You stared at me for so long armed with your AK-47 and yet you did not fire. Forgive me for taking your life, I was reacting just the way I was trained, to kill V. C. or gooks, hell you weren’t even considered human, just gook/target, one in the same.
Since that day in 1967 I have grown a great deal and have a great deal of respect for life and other peoples of the world.
So many times over the years I have stared at your picture and your daughter, I suspect. Each time my heart and guts would burn with the pain of guilt. I have two daughters myself now. One is twenty. The other one is twenty two, and has blessed me with two granddaughters, ages one and four.
Today I visit the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in D.C. I have wanted to come here for several years now to say goodbye to many of my former comrades.
Somehow I hope and believe they will know I’m here, I truly loved many of them as I am sure you loved many of your former comrades.
As of today we are no longer enemies. I perceive you as a brave soldier defending his homeland. Above all else, I can now respect the importance that life held for you. I suppose that is why I am able to be here today.
As I leave here today I leave your picture and this letter. It is time for me to continue the life process and release my pain and guilt. Forgive me Sir, I shall try to live my life to the fullest, an opportunity that you and many others were denied.
I’ll sign off now Sir, so until we chance to meet again in another time and place, rest in peace.
Respectfully,
101st Airborne Div Richard A. Luttrell.
Felton instantly knew he had to include the photography, as well as several lines from the letter, in an upcoming publication the National Park Service was assembling called Offerings at the Wall. In 1996 a good friend of Luttrell’s saw the book and shared it with Luttrell, who had not seen the photograph and the letter since he had left them at the Wall seven years earlier. Suddenly confronted with them again, he broke down and cried. The pain of the memory was so great that Luttrell realized it might never go away unless he tried to return the photograph to the daughter of the slain Vietnamese soldier. Although he realized that, without an address or even a name, the odds of finding someone in a country of 80 million were astronomical, he was determined to try. Luttrell contacted Felton, who flew to Illinois and personally returned the items. And then, with assistance from the Vietnamese Embassy in Washington, Luttrell was able to convince newspapers in Hanoi to publish the photograph with an accompanying article. Miraculously, a copy of the paper made its way to a tiny farming village where the family of the soldier recognized it. Several days later Luttrell received a short, translated letter, forwarded from Vietnam by fax, written by a woman identified only as Lan. The message read:
Dear Mr. Richard, the child that you have taken care of, or through the picture, for over 30 years, she becomes adult now, and she has spent so much sufferance in her childhood by the missing of her father. I hope you will bring the joy and happiness to my family.
Luttrell immediately responded and asked Lan if he could visit her in Vietnam. She said yes, and in March 2000 Richard Luttrell traveled to Vietnam—the first time he had been back in thirty-two years—and found himself face-to-face with Lan in her village. The moment she saw him, Lan burst into tears and embraced Luttrell. “I’m so sorry,” he said to her, also crying. Lan forgave Luttrell, and the photograph of her and her father now rests on a small altar in Lan’s home.