AP TV--
41 years later, first POW killed by Viet Cong is honored in Ark.
PERRYVILLE, Ark. (AP) _ The first P-O-W killed in Vietnam was
honored today in a ceremony in Perryville.
Harold George Bennett was executed by the Viet Cong 41 years
ago. The State Department described the killing as a "wanton act
of murder." Bennett was from Perryville.
Bennett's sister, Eloise Wallace, said: "It means a great deal.
I don't know just how to express it."
Senator Blanchg Lincoln presented Bennett's family with a Combat
Infantryman'3 badge, National Defense Service medal, Vietnam
Service medal, Prisoner of War medal, U-S Army Good Conduct medal
and the Purple Heart.
Senator Lincoln said: "So many of our soldiers come from rural
areas and he was a real salt of the earth person. When you stop and
think, so many of our heroes are."
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1st POW Killed In Vietnam Is Given Honors - Washington Post
By Annie Bergman
Associated Press
Saturday, April 22, 2006; A09
PERRYVILLE, Ark., April 21 -- In what the State Department called a "wanton act of murder," the Viet Cong executed Harold George Bennett of Perryville 41 years ago, after Bennett injured a soldier while trying to escape from a prison camp for the third time.
Bennett, the first U.S. prisoner of war put to death during the Vietnam War, was remembered Friday for his long-forgotten "courage and honor." A fellow soldier quickly documented Bennett's heroism, but recognition efforts stalled.
"It means a great deal. I don't know just how to express it," said Eloise Wallace, 85, Bennett's sister.
Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) presented Bennett's family with a Combat Infantryman's Badge, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Prisoner of War Medal, Army Good Conduct Medal and Purple Heart.
At the ceremony, Lincoln said of Bennett: "In the jungles of Vietnam, he displayed courage and honor before and after he was captured by the Viet Cong after a furious firefight. Before being captured, Sergeant Bennett twice called off American helicopter pilots who were attempting to rescue him and his radioman because he wanted to save them from being shot down."
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Perryville POW honored - Today's THV, KTHV TV Little Rock, 4/21/06
The first prisoner of war killed in Vietnam was honored on Friday in a ceremony in Perryville.
Harold George Bennett was executed by the Viet Cong 41 years ago. The State Department described the killing as a "wanton act of murder." Bennett was from Perryville.
Senator Blanche Lincoln presented Bennett's family with a Combat Infantryman's badge, National Defense Service medal, Vietnam Service medal, Prisoner of War medal, U-S Army Good Conduct medal and the Purple Heart.
"It means a great deal. I don't know just how to express it," said Bennett's sister, Eloise Wallace.
"So many of our soldiers come from rural areas and he was a real salt of the earth person. When you stop and think, so many of our heroes are," said Senator Lincoln.
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Perryville POW Awarded Purple Heart 41 Years after Death - KARK Little Rock, 4/21/06
( Air Date: 4/21/2006 )
41 years after his kidnapping and execution in Vietnam, Perry county native Staff Sergeant Harold George Bennett gets the honor he deserves.
At a ceremony today in Perryville, Senator Blanche Lincoln presented Bennett`s family with a purple heart and several other service medals for his duty in Vietnam. Bennett was the first POW executed at the hands of the Viet Cong.
For the past 15 years, Page Gaffigon of Virginia has been wearing Bennett`s POW bracelet. Gaffigon drove overnight to present the family with this gift, which he found by chance in Texas.
“I want people to understand that not only was he a Christian,” said Bennett’s brother Dicky. “He was a soldier and if he were sitting here, he would say you`re wasting your time, I`m just a common soldier, but he wasn`t."
Staff Sergeant Bennett`s remains have never been recovered. Right now, the family is working closely with Senator Lincoln to hopefully award him the congressional medal of honor.
41 years later, first POW killed by Viet Cong is honored in Ark.
By ANNIE BERGMAN
Associated Press Writer
PERRYVILLE, Ark. (AP) _ In an act described by the State
Department as a "wanton act of murder," the Viet Cong executed
Harold George Bennett of Perryville 41 years ago after Bennett
injured a soldier while trying to escape from a prison camp for the
third time.
Bennett, the first American prisoner of war put to death during
the Vietnam War, was remembered Friday for his long-forgotten
"courage and honor." While a fellow soldier quickly documented
Bennett's heroism, steps to recognize Bennett fell through the
cracks.
"It means a great deal. I don't know just how to express it,"
said Eloise Wallace, 85, the oldest of Bennett's eight brothers and
sisters, and one of four surviving siblings receiving medals on the
family's behalf. "I just wish my mother could've lived to have
heard it."
His grieving mother, who called Bennett's death "the most
horrible thing in the world," died in 1978.
Sen. Blanche Lincoln , D-Ark., presented Bennett's family with a
Combat Infantryman's badge, National Defense Service medal, Vietnam
Service medal, Prisoner of War medal, U.S. Army Good Conduct medal
and the Purple Heart and noted Bennett's rural roots.
"So many of our soldiers come from rural areas and he was a
real salt of the earth person. When you stop and think, so many of
our heroes are," she said.
Radio Hanoi reported in June 1965 that Bennett was executed
after the execution of captured Viet Cong guerrillas and that
others "must pay for their blood debts." Those who researched
Bennett's case said Bennett was killed after trying to escape
captors who had imprisoned him at Binh Ghia six months earlier.
"Bennett could not accept being held as a POW," said Charles
Crafts, a radio operator held captive with Bennett until his
release in 1967, in testimony given to support the medals. "I
believe he would have preferred being killed while attempting
another escape."
The effort to award Bennett began again more than two years ago
by a group called The Friends of the late U.S. Army Staff Sergeant
Harold George Bennett, led in part by Col. Doug Moore.
Moore and the group gathered paperwork and witness testimony to
build their case, and with Lincoln as congressional sponsor, were
able to receive approval from Congress for the medals.
"Harold Bennett was just such a man," Lincoln said. "In the
jungles of Vietnam, he displayed courage and honor before and after
he was captured by the Viet Cong after a furious fire fight. Before
being captured, Sgt. Bennett twice called off American helicopter
pilots who were attempting to rescue him and his radioman because
he wanted to save them from being shot down."
A veteran from Desert Storm, the 1991 conflict in the Mideast,
surprised the Bennett family Friday by bringing it a
prisoner-of-war bracelet that bore the dead soldier's name. He had
researched Bennett's case after buying the bracelet 15 years ago.
"When I found out that they were honoring his family, it sent
shivers up my spine and I decided that I would drive 1,000 miles to
give the family the bracelet," said Page Goffigon of South Hill,
Va.
Though he didn't know it until he began researching Bennett's
service, Moore, originally from Marked Tree, was one of two
helicopter pilots who had attempted to save Bennett.
As infantry advisor to the Vietnamese 33rd Ranger Battalion,
Bennett volunteered to lead his company in an air assault at Binh
Ghia. Moore had flown Vietnamese casualties to Saigon on the day of
the battle, and refueled the helicopter and flew back to see if
anyone else needed help.
By then, Bennett's company had walked into an ambush, and
Bennett, along with Crafts and the few surving rangers, were about
to be captured.
"I was probably two or three miles out and I heard on the
radio, the guy on the ground, say 'They're here now. My people have
laid their weapons down,"' Moore said in a telephone interview
from his home in Virginia. "I started to slip in to treetop level,
but I could hear over the radio, whoever, this voice on the ground
saying, "Negative. Don't even try it, you'll get shot down. Thanks
a lot for your help and God bless you."'
Moore said members of the group were happy they were able to
give Bennett the recognition, and that no one could explain why the
process took so long. Many said it appears the case was simply
overlooked.
While Bennett's family say the awards are long overdue, they
agree that the recognition is an affirmation for their brother.
Dick Bennett, the youngest of the nine siblings, remembered his
older brother as a tough soldier. All four Bennett boys served in
the military, Dick Bennett said, but Harold was the toughest of the
bunch.
"He's one of the kind of people that the only thing he gave
them was name, rank, serial number and a hard time," Dick Bennett
said.
Dick Bennett and another brother, Dock Bennett, were serving in
the Domincan Republic when they received word that their brother
had been executed. He said no one in the family had heard from
George, as they referred to him, since his capture.
Both Dick Bennett and Wallace said they vividly remember the day
they were told their brother was dead, though the news came a bit
later for Wallace.
"We were in a rural area where we didn't have electricity or
telephone so they came and got me," Wallace said. "At least one
of my brothers was there with my mother at the time so she wasn't
by herself."
And while the family is happy with the medals their brother was
awarded, Moore said the group is launching a second effort in hopes
of Bennett receiving the Congressional Medal of Honor.
"From what I heard that day, he deserves some higher level
award for heroism," Moore said.
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Publication: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette;
Date: Saturday, April 22, 2006 ;
Section: Arkansas;
Page: 15
Soldier’s valor belatedly honored
Perryville native was executed by Viet Cong captors in ’65
BY HEATHER WECSLER ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT GAZETTE
PERRYVILLE — More than 40 years after U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Harold “George” Bennett became the first American prisoner of war to be executed in Vietnam, his family received military recognition of his sacrifice.
Bennett’s surviving brothers and sisters — Dick Bennett, Eloise Wallace, Laura Sue Vaught and Peggy Williams — received a framed display of the soldier’s posthumous awards Friday at a ceremony inside the Perry County Court Building. The event attracted a standing-roomonly crowd of more than 100.
Bennett’s honors now include the Combat Infantryman’s Badge, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Prisoner of War Medal, U.S. Army Good Conduct Medal and the Purple Heart.
If he had lived, Bennett would be 65.
“I want to say thank you to you for sharing your brother with our country,” U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., said to Bennett’s siblings. “He was an example of what a soldier can be, should be and will be forever.” Lincoln’s office worked with the Army to ensure Bennett and his family received the recognition she said was long overdue. She also has applied to the U.S. Department of Defense for Bennett to receive the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military distinction.
“The true test of heroism is being willing to lay down your life for others,” Lincoln said. “He more than passed that test.” Bennett, a Perryville native, grew up as one of nine children in a family with a history of military service. His father had served in World War I, and his three brothers also served in the Army. In 1957 he enlisted and received his basic training at Fort Chaffee. He eventually became a paratrooper with the 101st Airborne Division.
He re-enlisted in 1960 in the hope of serving overseas, and three years later received Special Forces training. As an Army Ranger, he volunteered to go to Vietnam and became an infantry adviser to the 33rd Vietnamese Ranger Battalion.
On Dec. 29, 1964, Bennett and his unit were airlifted to the South Vietnamese village of Binh Gia, which was under assault by the Viet Cong. Most of the villagers were North Vietnamese Catholics trying to escape communist forces.
Enemy forces overran the South Vietnamese unit and captured Bennett and his radio operator, Pfc. Charles Crafts.
Bennett twice called off American helicopter pilots who were trying to navigate through the combat zone to rescue Bennett and Crafts.
Retired Army Col. Douglas Moore, who grew up in Marked Tree in northeastern Arkansas, was a medevac pilot who tried to carry the Americans to safety. Over the radio, he said, he could hear that Bennett was in “deep trouble.” “The gunship driver was trying to get [Bennett] to move to a clearing off to his southwest,” Moore recalled during a phone interview from his office in Fairfax, Va. “He said, ‘I’ll land and I’ll pick you up.’ “The sergeant, who turned out to be Bennett — we had no idea who he was at the time — said ‘Negative, all you’ll do is get shot down. They’re all around me down here and there is no way you can do it.’ “When I heard that, I called the gunship and said I have a smaller and lighter aircraft. Let me try to pick him up if you’ll save enough ammunition to cover us.
“Bennett broke in at that time and said, ‘Don’t even try it. All you will do is get shot down yourself.’ “I started letting down and had the crew slide the door back and get their weapons out. I was about two or three miles out. What I intended to do was swoop in across the treetops and hit the ground and jerk him out of there.
“But he came on the air and said, ‘Well, they are here now. My little people’ — meaning the Vietnamese that he was with — ‘have laid down their weapons, and they want me to turn my radio off. Thanks a lot for your help, and God bless you.’” Those were his last words to his would-be rescuers. Moore said the gunships drew heavy fire and had to leave after running out of ammunition and fuel. By then, Bennett and Crafts had been taken into the jungle.
Crafts survived the ordeal.
But the Viet Cong executed Bennett in June 1965, in part for injuring a guard in one of three escape attempts. According to an Associated Press account at the time, the U.S. State Department called Bennett’s death a “wanton act of murder” and said it was retribution for the execution of Viet Cong guerrillas convicted of terrorist activities in South Vietnam.
The Army posthumously promoted Bennett to staff sergeant in August 1965.
“That poor family, the only thing they got when they were notified of his death a year or so later, was a Purple Heart, none of the other awards he should have gotten,” Moore said. “But we get too critical about that. That was a time when the U.S. military was just starting to go into Vietnam. Americans had just sent a bunch of troops over there. So it was a time of flux and a lot of things just got overlooked.” Moore was among a group of veterans called “The Friends of the late U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Harold George Bennett” who approached Lincoln two years ago to ensure Bennett and his family received the honors they deserved. Moore also has joined in seeking a Medal of Honor for Bennett.
Eloise Wallace said she hadn’t known before Moore’s group began its campaign that her brother had qualified for so many awards.
“It is such an honor that so many people have tried to make sure he received these awards,” she said.
The family didn’t receive just military honors Friday.
Page Goffingon, who picked up Bennett’s POW bracelet 15 years ago in an Army surplus store, drove from his home in Virginia on Thursday when he learned of the ceremony from Crafts. Goffingon gave photos of Bennett and the bracelet he has worn for 15 years to Bennett’s family.
“George meant a lot to a lot of people,” Dick Bennett said. “He was a man who loved family, loved children and hated the Viet Cong. His fellow POWs told me that when he was captured, he would only give his captors four things: his name, his rank, his service number and trouble. That sounds like George.”
