Gravesite Visit – Bibbville Baptist Church Cemetery
On July 10th, 2024, my family (me, my wife Garnett and three of our children) left our hotel in Gadsden, Alabama and headed south on Interstate 59, continuing a journey from our home in Morgantown, West Virginia to Lafayette, Louisiana that we had started the day prior. Just a couple hours into our drive, we pulled off the interstate and passed through the small town of Woodstock Junction. A massive Mercedes Benz automobile plant, located just south of Woodstock Junction, occupied acres and acres of land. The signs of industrial investment were everywhere. This small town, a dozen or so miles south of Birmingham, was surely benefiting from this massive corporation, whose factories seemed very out of place amongst the rolling hills and lush green forests of rural Alabama. Just past the last huge building, we turned on to Bibbville Road. The first 500 feet or so had been widened to accommodate the large trucks that accessed the Mercedes plant daily, but after that, it narrowed into a well-maintained country road. We glimpsed a small pond through the trees on the south side of the road. Maybe Garry Lawrence had fished in that very pond. PFC Garry Frank Lawrence, from Woodstock, just a few miles north, likely attended church with his family at the Bibbville Baptist Church, just down the road from that small pond.
On February 4th, 1968, just 26 days after arriving in Vietnam, he was shot and killed by a sniper outside of Fire Support Base (FSB) 25, west of Dak To. He was interred in a gravesite in the family plot in the Bibbville Baptist Church Cemetery, and today, we would be making a visit to pay our respects.
We pulled into the empty gravel parking lot in front of the church. It was a beautiful summer day in Alabama, and the large shade trees surrounding the church gave us a welcome respite from the hot sun. The small cemetery, located to one side of the church, was incredibly well maintained. We made our way up a small rise and into the mix of upright headstones and flat grave markers. It only took a minute to locate Garry’s headstone amongst the roughly 200 markers. Near the back of the cemetery, I could see the name Lawrence prominently displayed on a large upright granite marker. I made my way to it and saw the names Vester Lee and Edna Earle imprinted on the reverse side. These were Garry’s parents. Vester and Edna had been married in 1946, at the young ages of 18 and 17 years respectively. Vester had passed away in 2017, and Edna in 2005. Just a few feet away from their headstone was the military marker of their son Garry. A black lichen darkened the face of the rectangular granite marker. If I had more time, a few treatments of headstone cleaner would bring it back to its original gray color. Although darkened by the elements, the inscription was still easy to read.
GARRY F LAWRENCE
ALABAMA
PFC CO C 12 INF 4 INF DIV
VIETNAM BSM – PH
DEC 21 1947 FEB 4 1968
A bare flagpole stood next to the marker, likely used for special events. About five feet in front of the military marker stood a large vertical monument for Garry. Adorned with an inscription of a cross sitting on top of a scroll, this marker was also weathered by time and the elements, although not as severely. Within the scroll was the inscription
P.F.C. GARRY FRANK
LAWRENCE
DECEMBER 21, 1947
FEBRUARY 4, 1968
“GOING HOME”
February 4th, 1968 – Dak To District, Kontum Province, Republic of South Vietnam
Charlie Company, 3rd Battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division was given the task of maintaining security over the battalion firebase located at Fire Support Base 25, on Hill 849 west of Dak To. The battalion had occupied this firebase since mid-January, and a string of bloody firefights had caused dozens of casualties. When the Tet Offensive had officially begun on January 30th, the fighting in and around FSB 25 had actually diminished…. slightly. Each of the four line companies of the 3-12 (Alpha, Bravo, Charlie & Delta) had taken turns launching attacks against heavily entrenched NVA elements west of the firebase. By February 1st, Alpha, Bravo and Delta Company had moved off of the firebase and into other parts of the battalion AO. Charlie Company, composed of approximately 100 men, remained in defensive positions around the perimeter of the firebase. Each day, small groups of 10-25 men would leave that perimeter and patrol the surrounding area, looking for indications of an NVA presence.
On the morning of February 4th, a Charlie Company ambush patrol moving across a low point between the firebase and an 800 meter hill nearby was themselves ambushed by a large NVA force. Four Americans were seriously wounded, but the Charlie Company element was able to withdraw to the relative safety of the firebase, and the casualties evacuated. American artillery and mortar fire were called in on the suspected NVA locations.
PFC Lawrence, who had likely been manning a perimeter bunker during the morning events, unknowingly penned his last letter home. In it, he attempted to encourage and comfort his wife Darlene. “Don’t worry. God is on my side and will take care of me” he wrote. He also included a few details about the heavy fighting Charlie Company had recently experienced and expressed a desire to return home once this war was over, and never leave it again. That letter, as well as another sent in lieu of an anniversary card, was added to the large red bag containing all of the outgoing mail prepared by the men of the battalion. February 5th was to be his first wedding anniversary, and he complained that “he wasn’t in a place to obtain a proper card”, so a second letter would have to suffice.
At some point after noon on the 4th, PFC Lawrence’s squad was tasked with running a patrol along a ridgeline, or finger, that ran to the northwest of the firebase and eventually descended into a river valley below. The NVA had used that finger to move men and materials into position for a failed assault on the firebase several days before. It had been blasted apart by artillery and airstrikes, but the battalion commander wanted to make sure it was still clear of enemy troops.
At 1530 hours, as the Charlie Company patrol moved away from the firebase and across the finger, an NVA sniper zeroed in on the American troops. No one will ever know why, but the sniper selected the thin frame of PFC Garry Lawrence as his target. A shot rang out, and Lawrence, likely the most inexperienced soldier on the patrol crumpled to the ground. He had been in Vietnam for just under a month, and with Charlie Company in the field for roughly two weeks. He had seen and survived heavy combat, including mortar and rocket barrages, but now, as the sniper that fired the shot melted away into the jungle, his short war was over. PFC Garry Lawrence would return home to rural Alabama as he desired, never to leave again.
Besides his parents, Garry also left behind several brothers (Charles, Johnny and Roger) and of course his widow Darlene, who cruelly learned of her husband’s death on February 5th, their first wedding anniversary.
If visiting the Bibbville Baptist Church and its adjoining cemetery is a bit far out of your way, you can also pay a visit to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on the national mall in Washington D.C. There, on Panel 37 East, Line 24, his name is inscribed. One of over 55,000 men and women who died while serving their country in Vietnam.