thedrifter
11-09-08, 06:43 AM
Lasting tribute
Years after two servicemen from Lynn died in Vietnam, the city dedicates veterans squares in their honor at the housing project where they grew up
By Kathy McCabe, Globe Staff | November 9, 2008
On his second tour of duty in Vietnam, Marine Lance Corporal John D. Evans took a boat about a mile down the Cua Viet River to see Dick Donahue, a boyhood pal from Lynn who had enlisted with him on the buddy plan. It was Jan. 31, 1968.
"He asked for a pass to go see his 'foster brother' - that's how close we were," said Donahue, now 61. "I was on my first tour. Since he had already been there, I think he came to assure me that things were going to be all right."
When it came time to leave, the two Marines, wearing helmets, rifles, and flak jackets, hugged. Evans walked up a dusty red-dirt road.
"We waved to each other until we were out of sight," Donahue recalled. "It was not a see you later wave, it was a goodbye wave."
Evans was killed two days later, on Feb. 2, in an early-morning attack on his unit in Quang Tri Province. He was 22.
"The enemy hit with heavy artillery while they slept," Donahue said. "John was one of the first to die."
Forty years later, Evans, along with another fallen Vietnam veteran from Lynn, Army Corporal James J. Hazard, received a salute from their hometown. Veterans squares were dedicated to each at Curwin Circle, the public housing complex in West Lynn where they grew up.
Hazard was killed in ground warfare in Cambodia on May 20, 1970, just two months after he arrived in the war zone. He was 20.
"There was an enemy that remained in a bunker," recalled Mike Fillion, 58, who served in Hazard's platoon and lives in Ludlow. "We sent four people out to scout it out. And a grenade was thrown. . . . He was a heck of a soldier."
Hazard and Evans were honored in a humble ceremony in September marked by the playing of taps and prayers for US troops serving today.
"Hasten the day, O Lord, when we can enjoy the blessings of peace once more," said Ted Kurpiel, commander of the Franco-American War Veterans Post 12 in Lynn.
Vietnam claimed more than 1,300 servicemen from Massachusetts. Locally, about 160 casualties have been recorded from cities and towns north of Boston. In Lynn, 19 men, the most of any local community, died from 1964 to 1970, according to the US National Archives and Records Administration.
The names of Hazard and Evans are on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington that pays tribute to 58,195 US casualties. But there was no talk of a local tribute until a Curwin Circle reunion last spring. Almost 200 people, most of whom lived there in the 1950s and 1960s, reminisced about a childhood of basketball and baseball, the model car club, and Saturday night dances at the "mini," or the administration building. Most families were poor, often headed by a single mother.
"Everyone helped each other out," said Ken Donahue, 60, a Vietnam Army veteran and brother of Dick. "You could use your neighbors' toys. They could use yours. You weren't afraid that you weren't going to get them back. . . . We all dated each others brothers and sisters."
On Sunday, Jimmy Hazard ran a newspaper stand at the corner of Curwin Circle and Holyoke Street.
"Someone would pull up, they'd yell out what kind of paper they wanted and we'd bring it over to them," said Larry Donahue, 58, a brother of Ken and Dick who also served in Vietnam. "We'd close down the stand about 11:30 a.m. and walk up to Sacred Heart [church]. We'd get there just in time for 12 o'clock Mass. After, we'd go to Eddie's Drugstore for a soda."
But as in so many American neighborhoods, Vietnam interrupted life at Curwin Circle. Young men, such as the Donahue brothers, went off to war. Some, such as Evans, quit high school to enlist. Others, like Hazard, were drafted. Many of those who came home got jobs working for the city or at the local General Electric plant. Larry and Ken Donahue work at the city's public works department. Dick works at the water and sewer plant.
But Evans, Hazard, and others who died in the Vietnam War have a legacy of lost promise.
"They never had the opportunity to come home, and get married, and have their own family, with a kid on their knee," Ken Donahue said. "They missed all that. I always think about that. The poor kids never really had a chance to grow up."
At the reunion, Larry Donahue read a timeline of events, starting with the Korean War. He mentioned waiting out the floods of Hurricane Carol in 1954. When he began talking about the turbulent '60s and Vietnam, he remembered Evans's and Hazard's deaths just two years apart. The room fell silent.
"I think I got a lot of people thinking," he said. "I think we all knew there was some unfinished business."
John Hazard, Jim's younger brother, had long thought about asking the city to name a square for his brother. Lynn reserves the honor for servicemen and women killed while on active duty. Jim Hazard was the oldest son in a family of seven children. Their father was not living at home, and their mother, Mary, worked as a waitress at the nearby Crystal Cafe.
"You could not have asked for a better son or brother," said John Hazard, now 53 and a roofer. "One year, when my mother was particularly struggling, we weren't going to have much of a Christmas. [Jim] couldn't have been more than high school age, but he gave all of his earnings from his paper stand to my mother so the younger kids could have Christmas."
Jim Hazard, who graduated from Classical High School in 1967, was drafted into the Army a year later.
"He knew what was transpiring over there," said John Hazard, who was 15 when his brother left. "I think he knew he might not come back."
Larry Donahue, who was home on leave from the Army, remembers their last conversation. They had played in a softball game together, and rode home in a white Cadillac Donahue had borrowed from an uncle.
"I was leaving in a couple of days and Jim knew he was going to get drafted," Donahue said. "So we were talking about when we got back. We would get together, have a beer. . . . We would have been 21 when we came home."
But a telegram from the Army to Mary Hazard announced the news of her son's death just two months after his tour began. "I never expected not to see him ever again," John Hazard said.
As Evans was two years before, Hazard was buried with military honors at Pine Grove Cemetery in Lynn.
Evans was killed in Dong Ha soon after returning to Vietnam from an emergency leave to attend the funeral of his father, a World War I veteran.
"John idolized his father," Dick Donahue said. "I think John had the mindset, right from the beginning, that he was going to be a veteran, too."
Not everyone was happy with John Evans's dream. David Elwell, his nephew who was born nine months before Evans, already had served in Vietnam.
"I tried to talk him out of it," said Elwell, now 63, who lives in Peabody. "At the time, everybody had a different opinion about the thing. I thought he was too young to go. He went and did it anyway."
Now there are new memories of the slain Marine and the Army soldier at Curwin Circle. Yellow and black metal signs, with a star on top, are nailed to telephone poles at the main entrance. "John D. Evans Sq." is across from unit 307, where he grew up. "James J. Hazard Sq." is across from his old newspaper stand. The dedication drew about 100 people. The US Marine Junior ROTC unit from English High School stood at attention. Residents, many of them new immigrants, looked on from front stoops. A little boy in a Red Sox shirt waved to a burly Vietnam veteran standing with his Harley.
"John and Jimmy made the ultimate sacrifice. They gave their lives," Dick Donahue told the gathering, his voice breaking. "God bless America. God bless West Lynn."
Kathy McCabe can be reached at kmccabe@globe.com.
John D. Evans
Lance Corporal, Combat Engineer, Marines
Born: 12-5-1945
Military service: 8-26-1965 through 2-2-1968
Vietnam tour began: 5-11-1967
Died: 2-2-1968, age 22; ground casualty in Quang Tri Province, South Vietnam
James J. Hazard
Corporal, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile), Army
Born: 1-17-1950
Military service: 10-2-1969 through 5-20-1970
Vietnam tour began: 3-18-1970
Died: 5-20-1970, age 20, ground casualty in Cambodia
SOURCE: Mass. Military War Records Office
Ellie
RIP
Years after two servicemen from Lynn died in Vietnam, the city dedicates veterans squares in their honor at the housing project where they grew up
By Kathy McCabe, Globe Staff | November 9, 2008
On his second tour of duty in Vietnam, Marine Lance Corporal John D. Evans took a boat about a mile down the Cua Viet River to see Dick Donahue, a boyhood pal from Lynn who had enlisted with him on the buddy plan. It was Jan. 31, 1968.
"He asked for a pass to go see his 'foster brother' - that's how close we were," said Donahue, now 61. "I was on my first tour. Since he had already been there, I think he came to assure me that things were going to be all right."
When it came time to leave, the two Marines, wearing helmets, rifles, and flak jackets, hugged. Evans walked up a dusty red-dirt road.
"We waved to each other until we were out of sight," Donahue recalled. "It was not a see you later wave, it was a goodbye wave."
Evans was killed two days later, on Feb. 2, in an early-morning attack on his unit in Quang Tri Province. He was 22.
"The enemy hit with heavy artillery while they slept," Donahue said. "John was one of the first to die."
Forty years later, Evans, along with another fallen Vietnam veteran from Lynn, Army Corporal James J. Hazard, received a salute from their hometown. Veterans squares were dedicated to each at Curwin Circle, the public housing complex in West Lynn where they grew up.
Hazard was killed in ground warfare in Cambodia on May 20, 1970, just two months after he arrived in the war zone. He was 20.
"There was an enemy that remained in a bunker," recalled Mike Fillion, 58, who served in Hazard's platoon and lives in Ludlow. "We sent four people out to scout it out. And a grenade was thrown. . . . He was a heck of a soldier."
Hazard and Evans were honored in a humble ceremony in September marked by the playing of taps and prayers for US troops serving today.
"Hasten the day, O Lord, when we can enjoy the blessings of peace once more," said Ted Kurpiel, commander of the Franco-American War Veterans Post 12 in Lynn.
Vietnam claimed more than 1,300 servicemen from Massachusetts. Locally, about 160 casualties have been recorded from cities and towns north of Boston. In Lynn, 19 men, the most of any local community, died from 1964 to 1970, according to the US National Archives and Records Administration.
The names of Hazard and Evans are on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington that pays tribute to 58,195 US casualties. But there was no talk of a local tribute until a Curwin Circle reunion last spring. Almost 200 people, most of whom lived there in the 1950s and 1960s, reminisced about a childhood of basketball and baseball, the model car club, and Saturday night dances at the "mini," or the administration building. Most families were poor, often headed by a single mother.
"Everyone helped each other out," said Ken Donahue, 60, a Vietnam Army veteran and brother of Dick. "You could use your neighbors' toys. They could use yours. You weren't afraid that you weren't going to get them back. . . . We all dated each others brothers and sisters."
On Sunday, Jimmy Hazard ran a newspaper stand at the corner of Curwin Circle and Holyoke Street.
"Someone would pull up, they'd yell out what kind of paper they wanted and we'd bring it over to them," said Larry Donahue, 58, a brother of Ken and Dick who also served in Vietnam. "We'd close down the stand about 11:30 a.m. and walk up to Sacred Heart [church]. We'd get there just in time for 12 o'clock Mass. After, we'd go to Eddie's Drugstore for a soda."
But as in so many American neighborhoods, Vietnam interrupted life at Curwin Circle. Young men, such as the Donahue brothers, went off to war. Some, such as Evans, quit high school to enlist. Others, like Hazard, were drafted. Many of those who came home got jobs working for the city or at the local General Electric plant. Larry and Ken Donahue work at the city's public works department. Dick works at the water and sewer plant.
But Evans, Hazard, and others who died in the Vietnam War have a legacy of lost promise.
"They never had the opportunity to come home, and get married, and have their own family, with a kid on their knee," Ken Donahue said. "They missed all that. I always think about that. The poor kids never really had a chance to grow up."
At the reunion, Larry Donahue read a timeline of events, starting with the Korean War. He mentioned waiting out the floods of Hurricane Carol in 1954. When he began talking about the turbulent '60s and Vietnam, he remembered Evans's and Hazard's deaths just two years apart. The room fell silent.
"I think I got a lot of people thinking," he said. "I think we all knew there was some unfinished business."
John Hazard, Jim's younger brother, had long thought about asking the city to name a square for his brother. Lynn reserves the honor for servicemen and women killed while on active duty. Jim Hazard was the oldest son in a family of seven children. Their father was not living at home, and their mother, Mary, worked as a waitress at the nearby Crystal Cafe.
"You could not have asked for a better son or brother," said John Hazard, now 53 and a roofer. "One year, when my mother was particularly struggling, we weren't going to have much of a Christmas. [Jim] couldn't have been more than high school age, but he gave all of his earnings from his paper stand to my mother so the younger kids could have Christmas."
Jim Hazard, who graduated from Classical High School in 1967, was drafted into the Army a year later.
"He knew what was transpiring over there," said John Hazard, who was 15 when his brother left. "I think he knew he might not come back."
Larry Donahue, who was home on leave from the Army, remembers their last conversation. They had played in a softball game together, and rode home in a white Cadillac Donahue had borrowed from an uncle.
"I was leaving in a couple of days and Jim knew he was going to get drafted," Donahue said. "So we were talking about when we got back. We would get together, have a beer. . . . We would have been 21 when we came home."
But a telegram from the Army to Mary Hazard announced the news of her son's death just two months after his tour began. "I never expected not to see him ever again," John Hazard said.
As Evans was two years before, Hazard was buried with military honors at Pine Grove Cemetery in Lynn.
Evans was killed in Dong Ha soon after returning to Vietnam from an emergency leave to attend the funeral of his father, a World War I veteran.
"John idolized his father," Dick Donahue said. "I think John had the mindset, right from the beginning, that he was going to be a veteran, too."
Not everyone was happy with John Evans's dream. David Elwell, his nephew who was born nine months before Evans, already had served in Vietnam.
"I tried to talk him out of it," said Elwell, now 63, who lives in Peabody. "At the time, everybody had a different opinion about the thing. I thought he was too young to go. He went and did it anyway."
Now there are new memories of the slain Marine and the Army soldier at Curwin Circle. Yellow and black metal signs, with a star on top, are nailed to telephone poles at the main entrance. "John D. Evans Sq." is across from unit 307, where he grew up. "James J. Hazard Sq." is across from his old newspaper stand. The dedication drew about 100 people. The US Marine Junior ROTC unit from English High School stood at attention. Residents, many of them new immigrants, looked on from front stoops. A little boy in a Red Sox shirt waved to a burly Vietnam veteran standing with his Harley.
"John and Jimmy made the ultimate sacrifice. They gave their lives," Dick Donahue told the gathering, his voice breaking. "God bless America. God bless West Lynn."
Kathy McCabe can be reached at kmccabe@globe.com.
John D. Evans
Lance Corporal, Combat Engineer, Marines
Born: 12-5-1945
Military service: 8-26-1965 through 2-2-1968
Vietnam tour began: 5-11-1967
Died: 2-2-1968, age 22; ground casualty in Quang Tri Province, South Vietnam
James J. Hazard
Corporal, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile), Army
Born: 1-17-1950
Military service: 10-2-1969 through 5-20-1970
Vietnam tour began: 3-18-1970
Died: 5-20-1970, age 20, ground casualty in Cambodia
SOURCE: Mass. Military War Records Office
Ellie
RIP