SSG Earl Fredrick Brown
5th Special Forces
Army

The Wall
Panel 004E Line 106

Tribute

On 28 Jan 1966 Detachment A-107, 5th SF Group, at Tra Bong was asked by the Vietnamese District Chief to send a team to investigate an attack on the outpost at Long Phu.

Captain Fewell, the Det A-107 commander, his Vietnamese counterpart, and the District Chief jointly led a reaction force from the 144th CIDG Company to do the investigating – but the last word heard from the reaction force was a radio call saying “We’re going in to attack, request all the support you can give us”. All further efforts to contact the reaction force went unanswered.

That evening, the Danang headquarters sent a reaction force to Tra Bong, and on the 29th the reaction force located and recovered the bodies of 29 men from the original group. Eight others, including Captain Fewell, were not immediately recovered, although Fewell’s remains were later found. Four Americans died in the action:

CPT John P. Fewell, Kokomo, IN
SFC Elmer J. Reifschneider, St Louis, MO
SSG Earl F. Brown, Weston, WV
SSG Donald J. Jacobsen, Montevideo, MN