Vietnam War Engineer/25th ID Grouping

[MinorInHistory]

Hey y’all,

 

I went back to a sale I’d been to a few weeks ago, and I was able to pick up a bunch of photos and paper items, so here’s the complete acquisition:

 

The veteran was the Assistant Division Engineer assigned to the 25th Infantry Division, and was involved in the Cambodian offensive in 1970. At the end I attached the first page of a document he wrote detailing his service in-country.

 

Included is a binder of about 150 color slides from Vietnam (many of which match the locations described in the memo), loose photos, negatives, various ephemera (including a plane ticket, duty rosters, etc.), theater made insignia, and various decorations. Some of the slides are pretty cool, including close-ups of Nancy Sinatra and Bob Hope, helicopters, aerial shots of destroyed bridges, etc. 

[ShibaLegend]

Love those slides. 

 

Any way you can post them on here?

[snake36bravo]

Super grouping! Packed with research items. The engraved letter opener(?) is top notch and the multiple bronze stars speaks to this veteran's heroism. 

 

"Ready to Strike!"

[MinorInHistory]

On 10/6/2023 at 2:28 PM, snake36bravo said:

Super grouping! Packed with research items. The engraved letter opener(?) is top notch and the multiple bronze stars speaks to this veteran's heroism. 

 

"Ready to Strike!"

Thanks! I’m pretty sure it is a letter opener, and I do hope I can find out what he got the stars for. 

[MinorInHistory]

On 10/6/2023 at 2:10 PM, ShibaLegend said:

Love those slides. 

 

Any way you can post them on here?

I can post a few of the ones I’ve scanned so far, what are you interested in seeing? 

[MinorInHistory]

Here's a couple of aerial pics from the 1970 Cambodian Offensive:

[snake36bravo]

Impressive slides. I collect those myself.

 

The gunships are Thunder Chickens from the 195th Assault Helicopter Company. The 195th AHC did a lot of cross border operations and were one of the few Army units that had camouflaged gunships and slicks. 

[MinorInHistory]

1 hour ago, snake36bravo said:

Impressive slides. I collect those myself.

 

The gunships are Thunder Chickens from the 195th Assault Helicopter Company. The 195th AHC did a lot of cross border operations and were one of the few Army units that had camouflaged gunships and slicks. 

That makes sense, I guess it's possible that the Major may have been flying with them over Cambodia. Looks like they did quite a bit of work with MAC V SOG as well, very interesting. Here are a few more aviation slides from the same 1970 timeframe:

[McDermut99]

That's a very cool and interesting grouping. The photos especially are very fascinating, I always get excited finding original slides and photos in groups.

 

Should you ever be interested, Texas Tech University has one of if not the best archive and research center for the Vietnam War, and I'm sure they'd be interested in digitizing and curating particularly the photographs and documents, especially as they seem to have pretty good provenance written on them by the Vet.

[MinorInHistory]

Here’s one of the pages of his log he filled out for Air Medal eligibility, looks like he flew quite a few visual reconnaissance missions! That makes sense with all the aerial shots.  
 

[MinorInHistory]

Here's another few slides taken on visual reconnaissance missions over Cambodia in 1970. 

[snake36bravo]

The temple in the 2nd image of your last post is Cao Dai Holy See Temple in Tay Ninh, Vietnam. 

[MinorInHistory]

10 minutes ago, snake36bravo said:

The temple in the 2nd image of your last post is Cao Dai Holy See Temple in Tay Ninh, Vietnam. 

Thanks for your correction, looking at the original caption on the slide it does says "Buddhist Temple at Tay Nihn Run, July 1970." It looks elements from the 25th ID were based at the Tay Nihn Air Base, so I wouldn't be surprised if that's where his recon missions started from.