If you have any questions, additional biographical information, personal remembrances, or photographs you would like to contribute, please contact the History Project Manager via this Email Link.

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They Say, our deaths are not ours, they are yours, they will mean what you make of them. They say, we leave you our deaths, give them some meaning. Archibald MacLeish poet and WWI veteran.

        On Thursday, 8 December 1966, PFC Charles DeWayne Damsgard, age 20, from St. Paul, Minnesota, 1st Platoon, C Company, became the 720th MP Battalion’s first casualty in Vietnam.

     PFC Damsgard was killed by small arms fire while performing night ambush duties outside the perimeter of the 3rd Ordnance Ammunition Supply Depot, Long Binh Post in Bien Hoa Province.

     PFC Damsgard responded to a radio inquiry from the Battalion Tactical Operations Command to determine the nature of the firing from another ambush site next to his teams.

     Unable to contact the other site by radio he proceeded to the neighboring teams location. In the darkness he accidentally wandered into their kill zone and was mistaken for the enemy. A burst of fire from the ambush site fatally wounded him.

Photographs courtesy of the Damsgard family.

--- General / Personal --- Last name: DAMSGARD First name: CHARLES DE WAYNE Home of Record (official): ST PAUL State (official): MN Date of Birth: Sunday, January 20, 1946 Sex: Male Race: Caucasian Marital Status: Single PFC Chuck Damsgard waiting by his armored gun jeep, Vietnam 1966. --- Military --- Branch: Army Rank: PFC Serial Number: 55848964 Component: Selective Service Pay grade: E3 MOS (Military Occupational Specialty code): 95B10 Chuck Damsgard pre military high school graduation photograph.

--- Action --- Start of Tour: Saturday, October 1, 1966 Date of Casualty: Thursday, December 8, 1966 Age at time of loss: 20 Casualty type: (A1) Hostile, died Reason: Misadventure (possibly friendly fire) (Ground casualty) Country: South VietNam Province: Bien Hoa The Wall: Panel 13E - Row 021

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