Dear Jim:

After all these years, I still think of you. I never said good-bye to you. I went over to graves registration to make a positive ID of you after you were killed. I was the only one in the “Cowboys” who knew you enough to make the ID. I think I was still in shock when I saw you. You were lying on the ground or on something (don't really remember which), but you looked like you were asleep. I wanted to give you a shove and tell you to get up and come with me....We had things to do. We had just got in-country less than two weeks earlier. You couldn’t be really dead. Not you. You were flying right behind me. Why wasn’t it me instead of you? You were a better pilot than I was, you were a better pool player than me. You were better than I was in so many ways, but you got killed and I didn’t. Why?

Believe it or not, I heard from your wife last month. Stan Perry, one of our old classmates, had your wife’s address in California and sent it to me by email. We didn’t have email when we were together.

I thought I had not got in touch with her to tell her what happened to you, so I wrote her a letter and told her briefly how you died and that you did not suffer. I also told her what a neat guy you were and how everyone thought so much of you. It was all true. She left a voice mail for me telling me that she received the letter and that your daughter was there to read it too. She said that I had written to her 35 years earlier as well. I didn’t remember. She said it was very nice to receive such a nice letter. It was something I know you would have done if our roles had been reversed.

Don’t know if you ever knew what killed you, Jim. It happened so fast. As a quick reminder, we were on our first operational flight after being checked out by the company’s IP. We were headed over to some place to pick up some 173rd Abn troopers in a secured place and drop them off at another secured place. It wasn’t supposed to be any easier than that.

It was early morning and foggy. We started our descent into the airfield when lead couldn’t figure out exactly where to go, so he made the mistake that led to your death. He circled the airfield at 500 feet with us all in trail. We flew right over a village that had a VC sniper in it who opened up on the four a/c in our flight. I was chock 3 and you were 4 flying right behind me. The sniper hit chock 2, missed my aircraft and hit you. You were hit in the head and killed, from what I was told, almost instantly.

It’s a long story after all of that. I won’t bore you with it. It was the end of the story for you, though. Sorry you had to go, partner. You were one of the good guys from day one. They say the good die young. Maybe you got your pass early. Hope so.

Just wanted to say “good-bye” Jim. Let’s have a beer together one of these days when I get topside. I guess I won’t really say good-bye. I’ll say until we meet again.

Your friend,

Tony