MILLARD, CHARLES WORTH
Remains Returned, buried 09/15/2002
Name: Charles Worth Millard
Rank/Branch: W3/US Army
Unit: 478th Aviation Company (Heavy Helicopter), 11th Aviation Group, 1st
Cavalry Division
Date of Birth: 08 June 1933
Home City of Record: Wilson NC
Date of Loss: 19 April 1968
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 162127N 1070642E (YD255095)
Status (in 1973): Missing In Action
Category: 4
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: CH54
Refno: 1132
Source: Compiled from one or more of the following: raw data from U.S.
Government agency sources, correspondence with POW/MIA families,
published sources, interviews. Updated by the P.O.W. NETWORK in 2002.
Other Personnel In Incident: Arthur J. Lord; Philip R. Shafer; Michael R.
Werdehoff (missing on CH54, coordinates YD255095-LZ Tiger); Jesus A.
Gonzales, Douglas R. Blodgett, William R. Dennis; (missing from CH47A,
coordinates YD290105, pilot and co-pilot survived); Michael J. Wallace,
Anthony F. Housh; (missing from CH47, coordinates YD291087-LZ Tiger; pilot,
co-pilot and gunner survived)
REMARKS: CHOPPER CAUGHT FIRE; CRASHED
SYNOPSIS: On April 19, 1968 three Army helicopters were shot down in the A
Shau Valley of South Vietnam. All three were making supply runs to Landing
Zone Tiger in Quang Tri Province. Five men survived the three crashes, and
nine men remain missing.
The CH47A on which Douglas Blodgett was a crewman, William Dennis was flight
engineer, and Jesus Gonzales was crewchief was resupplying ammunition at the
LZ when it received small arms fire from the ground and crashed. The pilot
and co-pilot were able to crawl away, but the rest of the crew was never
found. They were declared Missing In Action.
The CH47 on which Anthony Housh was flight engineer and Michael Wallace was
crewchief was hit by 50 calibre and 37 mm ground fire on its approach to the
LZ. Housh and Wallace jumped from the aircraft from an altitude of 50-100
feet above the jungle canopy. The others were rescued. No trace of Housh and
Wallace was ever found. They were declared Missing In Action.
The CH54 "Flying Crane" on which Arthur Lord was aircraft commander, Charles
Millard pilot, Arthur J. Lord co-pilot, Michael Werdehoff flight engineer,
and Philip Shafer crewchief was carrying a bulldozer into the recently
resecured LZ Tiger when the aircraft was hit and crashed. All the crew were
classified Missing In Action.
Thorough searches for the 3 helicopters were not immediately possible
because of the enemy situation. A refugee later reported that he had found
the wreckage of two U.S. helicopters, one with 3 sets of skeletal remains,
in Quang Tri Province. The U.S. Army believes this could correlate with any
of the three helicopters lost on April 19, 1968, but no firm evidence has
been secured that would reveal the fate of the nine missing servicemen.
Some 250,000 interviews and "millions of documents" have been analyzed
relating to Americans who may still be alive, captive, in Southeast Asia.
Many experts believe there are hundreds of men still alive, waiting for
their country to rescue them. Whether any of the nine missing from near LZ
Tiger is among them is unknown, but it is clearly past time for us to bring
our men home.
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http://newsobserver.com/front/News/story/1736422p-1749448c.html
Monday, September 16, 2002 3:23AM EDT
After 34 years, pilot comes home
Shot down in Vietnam, Charles W. Millard is laid to rest in Wilson
By CINDY GEORGE, Staff Writer
WILSON - After 34 years of uncertainty, Chief Warrant Officer Charles Worth
Millard made his way home Sunday.
On April 19, 1968, Millard was flying a mission in Quang Tri, South Vietnam,
when his Army helicopter was shot down by enemy fire. He and four others in
the chopper were declared among the Vietnam War's missing in action.
The tragedy left his wife, Trudy, and his brothers and sisters grieving.
They faced years of reminders and reopened wounds, but few answers.
In 1978, the military changed Millard's status to killed in action.
"We never knew if he was killed or captured," said Nannie M. Moore, his
oldest sister. "Every time we thought we could put it away, we would hear
from the government again, and it was just like it was happening again.
"We've waited all these years. We waited until all the prisoners were
released, and he wasn't among them. We wanted him to come home somehow."
In 1999, military officials discovered remains during their second search of
the 30-year-old crash site. They asked for blood samples from family
members. In May, tests confirmed that the remains were Millard's.
"Even though there were mere bone fragments and teeth, to us that's him,"
Moore said. "It was him."
The family passed up an offer to have Millard buried in Arlington National
Cemetery outside Washington.
"We wanted him home," said Moore, 71, of Bailey.His wife, who now lives in
Tampa, Fla., never remarried. The couple had no children. She joined her
in-laws at Maplewood Cemetery in Wilson on Sunday to bury the man she called
Charlie, family and childhood friends called Worth, and all who knew him
considered a hero.
Millard, who was 34 when he died, was laid to rest beside his parents.
He graduated in 1951 from the former Charles L. Coon High School in Wilson,
where he received a most valuable player trophy for his skills on the
football team. He won a football scholarship to East Carolina University but
wanted to go into the military instead.
He left just after he graduated from high school and went on two tours of
duty in Vietnam: in 1965 for a year and again in 1968.
Moore recalled one visit during her brother's early years as a pilot, when
he surprised his parents by arriving at their home in a borrowed helicopter
from Fort Bragg.
"He landed right behind my mother and daddy's house, stayed the night and
visited," she said. "My son, James, was quite young, but to him, my brother
was a hero. My brother let him sit in the seat, and he's never forgotten
it."
Millard was a flight instructor who had been back in Vietnam for only three
months when his chopper was shot down. At the time of his death, Millard had
served 17 years.
Staff Sgt. Leroy Clark of Lexington, who was in same unit with Millard,
attended Sunday's graveside service. Clark, himself a helicopter pilot, had
been scheduled to fly with his buddy that day.
"Charlie went in to drop a [bull]dozer off. He was under hostile fire. He
missed the first pass and turned around to come back for the second pass to
drop it. As he was flaring up for the drop, a round hit the cockpit. And
that was it. All of them. I knew he was dead."
Clark, 69, said he is glad for the family's final resolution, since hundreds
who fought in Vietnam remain unaccounted for.
Millard was officially removed Sunday from a list of North Carolinians
missing in action from Vietnam. The names of the others were read at the
service. Members of the North Carolina chapter of the Vietnam Helicopter
Pilots Association towed in a 1964 Huey, the type Millard flew on his first
tour in Vietnam. Members of the American Legion attended, along with the
Fort Bragg and Raleigh chapters of Rolling Thunder, Vietnam veterans who
rode in on their motorcycles.
The service conveyed full military honors. The family was presented U.S. and
POW-MIA flags.
Maj. Valerie St. John, chaplain for an Apache attack helicopter unit at Fort
Bragg, led a private prayer with the family before the service. During her
tribute to Millard, she offered his loved ones words of comfort.
"Perhaps Charlie died to save another," she said. "God sees us through, even
if it's through the valley of the shadow of death."
The Rev. Jimmy Jarrell, chaplain of the N.C. Department of the American
Legion, heralded Millard as a hero.
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his
friends," said Jarrell, himself a Vietnam veteran. "If I may take a liberty,
I'd change it to 'that a man lay down his life for his country.' "
Staff writer Cindy George can be reached at 829-4656 or
cgeorge@newsobserver.com.