Pvt. James Brown, USMC

Sep 21, 2012

Today is National POW/MIA Day. I never knew that since I used to wear a POW/MIA bracelet. That made every day POW/MIA Day.

I remember when the war came home to our neighborhood in Garden Grove, California. Buddy Miller, 18, was KIA. His family lived just a few houses down the street from us and this made the war more real than it had ever been, even though my father was in the Navy. I have no idea whether my father lost friends in Vietnam, he was very closed mouthed about work when he was home. I suspect that he did even though he never saw action out of country. I think what made it different with Buddy was that he was only four years older than I was and I was friends with both of his brothers.

As a result, my father took me to a large hanger at the Los Alamitos Naval Air Base where he was stationed at the time. I still remember walking into that big hanger and seeing rows of banquet tables full of boxes containing the bracelets with names of those soldiers who were POW/MIA. I could not even guess how many boxes there were but I am sure there were thousands and thousands of bracelets. My father told me I could choose one to wear.

The soldier I choose was Pvt. James W. Brown, USMC. He went MIA on April 5, 1966 at the age of 19. The Viet Cong shot down the helicopter he was riding in and he was the door gunner. I know this much as a result of a letter that I wrote to his mother in Texas. She wrote me a nice letter back describing her son to me and telling me what the government had told her. She sounded so very proud of her son and seemed to be particularly proud of the fact that he was a door gunner. The letter has since gone to pieces as a result of years of wear for I read it often.

When the war ended and the newspapers began publishing the POWs as they were released. Back then when you wore a bracelet you didn't know if the soldier had been captured or not. Everyday I checked the newspapers for Pvt. James Brown, USMC. Every day he was not there. Years passed and each time I would hear about prisoners being released or remains being found I would check the list of names. Pvt. James Brown, USMC, has never come home and is still listed as missing in action. Although the bracelet has broken, I still keep it in my jewelry box and I have never forgotten.

Today I found a site where you can order POW/MIA bracelets. I found Pvt. James Brown and have ordered a replacement for the broken bracelet. I don’t usually tout selling sites anywhere on the web but this seemed important enough or me to do that so here it is: http://www.memorialbracelets.com/powmia.php