Blackhorse E-News – March, 2012

INTERMENT SERVICE FOR 1SG KIRBY HUNTER

Kirby’s daughter, Angela Hunter Goodman extends an invitation to all Blackhorse friends in the Fort Knox, Radcliff, Louisville and Elizabethtown areas to join them to celebrate the life of their father at Radcliff Veterans Cemetery on March 9th at 1100 hours. Family contact info: agoodman64@hotmail.com

Our thoughts and prayers remain with the Hunter family. Allons!

_____________________________________

The Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning will conduct a memorial dedication ceremony in memory of SFC Rodney J.T. Yano at 1030 hours, 23 March 2012. General Doc Bahnsen will be the keynote speaker.

All are invited. There are no special requirements to access the dedication site, a Military ID or current drivers license is all that is required. Signs will be posted from the I-185 gate directing guests to the dedication site.

Inquiries regarding SFC Yano’s memorial dedication should be directed to Mr. Scott Fountain at scott.r.fountain.civ@mail.mil

_____________________________________

The Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning will conduct a memorial dedication ceremony in memory of our 40th Colonel, Colonel Jimmie Leach. The ceremony is scheduled for 1400 hours, 23 March 2012.

All are invited. There are no special requirements to access the dedication site, a Military ID or current driver’s license is all that is required. Signs will be posted from the I-185 gate directing guests to the dedication site.

To accommodate our Blackhorse family, Fort Benning has scheduled both the SFC Rodney Yano dedication and Colonel Jimmie Leach dedication ceremonies on 23 March —- SFC Yano’s memorial dedication at 1030 hours and Colonel Leach’s memorial dedication at 1400 hours.

Inquiries regarding Colonel Leach’s dedication may be directed to LTC Matthew Boal at matthew.a.boal.mil@mail.mil.

_____________________________________

Interesting Statistics from the Vietnam Memorial Wall

We received this recently from a friend of The Association. We are re-printing it here verbatim, with some minor edits for clarity.

"Carved on these walls is the story of America , of a continuing quest to preserve both Democracy and decency, and to protect a national treasure that we call the American dream." ~President George Bush

There are 58,267 names now listed on that polished black wall, including those added in 2010.

The names are arranged in the order in which they were taken from us by date and within each date the names are alphabetized.

It is hard to believe it has been 36 years since the last casualties.

Beginning at the apex on panel 1E and going out to the end of the East wall, appearing to recede into the earth (numbered 70E – May 25, 1968), then resuming at the end of the West wall, as the wall emerges from the earth (numbered 70W – continuing May 25, 1968) and ending with a date in 1975.

Thus the war’s beginning and end meet. The war is complete, coming full circle, yet broken by the earth that bounds the angle’s open side and contained within the earth itself.

The first known casualty was Richard B. Fitzgibbon, of North Weymouth, Mass. Listed by the U.S. Department of Defense as having been killed on June 8, 1956. His name is listed on the Wall with that of his son, Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Richard B. Fitzgibbon III, who was killed on Sept. 7, 1965.

• There are three sets of fathers and sons on the Wall.
• 39,996 on the Wall were just 22 or younger.
• 8,283 were just 19 years old.
• The largest age group, 33,103 were 18 years old.
• 12 soldiers on the Wall were 17 years old.
• 5 soldiers on the Wall were 16 years old.
• One soldier, PFC Dan Bullock was 15 years old.
• 997 soldiers were killed on their first day in Vietnam.
• 1,448 soldiers were killed on their last day in Vietnam.
• 31 sets of brothers are on the Wall.
• Thirty one sets of parents lost two of their sons.
• 54 soldiers on attended Thomas Edison High School in Philadelphia. I wonder why so many from one school.
• 8 Women are on the Wall. Nursing the wounded.
• 244 soldiers were awarded the Medal of Honor during the Vietnam War; 153 of them are on the Wall.
• Beallsville, Ohio with a population of 475 lost 6 of her sons.
• West Virginia had the highest casualty rate per capita in the nation. There are 711 West Virginians on the Wall.
• The Marines of Morenci – They led some of the scrappiest high school football and basketball teams that the little Arizona copper town of Morenci (pop. 5,058) had ever known and cheered. They enjoyed roaring beer busts. In quieter moments, they rode horses along the Coronado Trail, stalked deer in the Apache National Forest . And in the patriotic camaraderie typical of Morenci’s mining families, the nine graduates of Morenci High enlisted as a group in the Marine Corps. Their service began on Independence Day, 1966. Only 3 returned home.
• The Buddies of Midvale – LeRoy Tafoya, Jimmy Martinez, Tom Gonzales were all boyhood friends and lived on three consecutive streets in Midvale, Utah on Fifth, Sixth and Seventh avenues. They lived only a few yards apart. They played ball at the adjacent sandlot ball field. And they all went to Vietnam. In a span of 16 dark days in late 1967, all three would be killed. LeRoy was killed on Wednesday, Nov. 22, the fourth anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s assassination. Jimmy died less than 24 hours later on Thanksgiving Day. Tom was shot dead assaulting the enemy on Dec. 7, Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.
• The most casualty deaths for a single day was on January 31, 1968 ~ 245 deaths.
• The most casualty deaths for a single month was May 1968 – 2,415 casualties were incurred.

For most Americans who read this they will only see the numbers that the Vietnam War created. To those of us who survived the war, and to the families of those who did not, we see the faces, we feel the pain that these numbers created. We are, until we too pass away, haunted with these numbers, because they were our friends, fathers, husbands, wives, sons and daughters. There are no noble wars, just noble warriors.

Please pass this on to those who served during this time, and those who DO Care.

God bless us all!

Effective 1 January 2012 our official mailing address is:

The Blackhorse Association, Inc.

P.O. Box 223

Hemphill, Texas 75948-0223

Applications for 2012 Blackhorse Scholarships must reach Dir. of Scholarships, Colonel (Ret) Bob Hurt no later than 1 April 2012.

New applicants should follow the guidelines on our website found by clicking on this link.

For those previous recipients, your application process is somewhat streamlined. You must apply by letter with a letter of recommendation from a teacher/professor and a copy of your most recent transcript.

All requirements and appropriate mailing addresses and contact info is provided on our website here.

Once you apply, it is imperative that you maintain a serviceable email address throughout the application, award and payment process.

Steve Spriggs and the members of Post 291 have been faithful in providing scholarship donations to the association. Post 291 is one of our three leading annual donors. The 7th Annual Hoedown Fund-Raiser is scheduled for March 3, 2012 at their beautiful harbor facility in Newport Beach, California. See the flyer here and if you are in the area, please plan on supporting Post 291 in this most noble cause. Thanks Steve and all members of Post 291. Allons!

_____________________________________________________

2012 WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA REUNION

Glenn Snodgrass and his great crew have planned an interesting reunion during the period June 7 – 10, 2012. Please register early so the planners can insure our meetings and banquet halls are of adequate size to accommodate the various events. Our attendance numbers are growing each year and we need good estimates of attendance in order to insure we do not over commit for the various event venues. It is also recommended that you reserve your hotel room early. The hotel has a very satisfactory cancellation policy. More detailed reunion information is posted at www.blackhorse.com. Notice—- that is ".com". The same information may be found on our website at the Programs/Reunion Link at www.blackhorse.org.

_________________________________________________________

BLACKHORSE STORE

The Blackhorse Store is open 24/7 at www.blackhorsestore.org. Shop often.

The Blackhorse Association is proud to announce the soon to be released work of Phil Keith. "Blackhorse Riders" is due out this month with foreword by General George Casey, Jr. and available at Amazon.com in both hard back and Kindle. Sincere wishes for a huge success on the release date of 14 February 2012. Click here to order Blackhorse Riders at the Blackhorse Store.

"Camp Colt to Desert Storm" – GEN Donn A. Starry/George F. Hoffman. (Hardcover copy signed by Gen Starry) "Camp Colt to Desert Storm": The History of U.S. Armored Forces by George F. Hofmann (Editor), Donn A. Starry (Editor) The tank revolutionized the battlefield in World War II. In the years since, additional technological developments–including nuclear weapons, b allistic missiles, computer assisted firing, and satellite navigation–have continued to transform the face of combat. The only complete history of U.S. armed forces from the advent of the tank in battle during World War I to the campaign to drive Iraq out of Kuwait in 1991, "Camp Colt to Desert Storm" traces the development of doctrine for operations at the tactical and operational levels of war and translates this fighting doctrine into the development of equipment Click here to order at The Blackhorse Store.

"Through Mobility We Conquer" – G. Hoffman with Introductory Essay by GEN Starry (Hardcover). "Through Mobility We Conquer": The Mechanization of U.S. Cavalry (Hardcover copy signed by both) This book recounts the evolution and development of the U.S. Army’s modern mechanized cavalry and the doctrine necessary to use it effectively, and explores the debates over how best to use cavalry. Having reviewed thousands of official records and manuals, military journals, personal papers, memoirs, and oral histories–many of which were only recently declassified–George F. Hofmann now presents a detailed study of the doctrine, equipment, structure, organization, tactics, and strategy of U.S. mechanized cavalry during the first half of the twentieth century. Click here to order at The Blackhorse Store.

"Dearest Angel" – Elaine Cochrane Murphy (Paperback). "Dearest Angel" is the story of the life and death of Lieutenant John F. Cochrane who was killed in Vietnam on October 24, 1966. He was scheduled to meet his wife in Hawaii for R&R in six days, but his life was cut short by a sniper’s bullet. President Lyndon Johnson read portions of John’s last letter home to wounded Vietnam Veterans who were attending a Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony at the White House. President Johnson said of John: "I have known many brave men and wise men, but I wish I had known Lt John Cochrane. Then I would have known the best of men." "Dearest Angel" is a book you’ll want to read. Your life will be enriched and inspired as you share the deepest thoughts and feelings of one soldier taken from life too soon. Click here to order at The Blackhorse Store.

"Prepare for Desert War" – Dudley Harris (Hardcover). This is a hard back book with a dust jacket and printed on a four color offset press. The photographs were made by Dudley Harris when he was serving as an embedded photographer with an Army unit in Ft. Irwin, California. Click here to order at The Blackhorse Store.