On the morning of October 8th, 2020, my then nine-year old son Micah and I met Frank Morrison and his wife Tracy at a small diner in Corpus Christi, Texas. Micah and I were on day four of a ten-day trip, having spent the previous day playing tourist at the USS Lexington Museum ship. He was getting quite the adventure, on this, his first trip outside of Alaska. After a fun and relaxing day, we settled back into the task at hand. Visiting the gravesites of men from the 3rd Battalion, 12th Infantry who had died in Vietnam.
Which brings us to our breakfast with Frank and Tracy. In November of 2017, Frank had posted a remembrance on the Wall of Faces memorial page for PFC Sanders Key Stroud II, who had served in Bravo Company, 3-12 Infantry. “Sandy” as he was called, was killed in action on the slopes of Hill 1338 south of Dak To on November 4th, 1968.
“Sandy was a good friend of my older sister. Although he was almost 4 years older than me, I remember him well before he left for Vietnam. He was a very kind and gentle young man. He had a red and white little car. I think it was a ’63 or ’64 Dodge Dart. Although it has been over 50 years, you have not been forgotten for the ultimate sacrifice you made for your country. Thank You and God Bless You!”
Frank Morrison
Frank had left his email address on his post, so I sent an email asking if he would be willing to share anything more about Sandy Stroud. In his response, he stated that he didn’t have much else to add but would be more than happy to meet us when we arrived in Corpus Christi and show where Sandy was buried. I gladly took him up on the offer.
Frank, Tracy, Micah and I enjoyed a wonderful breakfast together, filled with conversation not just about Sandy and Vietnam, but about life in Corpus Christi, and our lives in Alaska. After we finished our meal, Frank and Tracy led us to the Seaside Memorial Park, a picturesque cemetery located just a block away from the southern shore of Corpus Christi Bay. Frank and Tracy pointed out the location of the headstone, said their goodbyes, and left us to pay our respects.
Sandy
On November 4th, 1967, while serving as an infantryman in Bravo Company, 3-12 Infantry, PFC Sanders Key Stroud II of Corpus Christi, Texas was killed in action in Vietnam. PFC Stroud had started his tour in Vietnam on August 15th, 1967. He had been in Vietnam for 81 days.
Operation MacArthur – Battle of Dak To
On November 3rd, 1967, Bravo and Alpha Companies of the 3-12 Infantry were inserted by helicopter onto a landing zone near Hill 978 in the Ngok Tang Mountains, approximately six kilometers south of Dak To. The two companies were immediately engaged by elements of the North Vietnamese Army, fighting from a series of heavily fortified and camouflage bunkers. The Americans called in artillery and airstrikes as they established a night defensive perimeter in an old American perimeter just below the NVA bunker system. The Battle for Dak To had begun.
On the morning of November 4th, Bravo Company left their perimeter and moved west towards the bunkers, but were pushed back after receiving heavy automatic weapons fire, sniper fire and mortars. More airstrikes were called in, and at just before noon, Bravo once again moved against the bunker complex. The two lead platoons were soon cut off from the rest of the unit. In the face of a tremendous volume of automatic weapons fire and mortars, they eventually fought their way back to the main body.
As they regrouped and took accountability of men and equipment, they realized two men were missing. These two men, PFC Sanders Stroud and SP4 William Schmees (Cincinnati, Ohio) had last been seen on the flank of the isolated platoons. Platoon Medic Thomas Cooper, who was busy moving some of the 24 wounded men back to the friendly perimeter, had seen the two men advancing towards the enemy on his right.
Back in the combined Bravo and Alpha perimeter, Alpha Company medic John Benitez helped treat the wounded. He watched a group of Bravo Company men gathered together and set out in the last known location of Stroud and Schmees. He felt the pull to go with them, but also listened to the little voice inside his head, urging him to stay put and tend to his own men. The Bravo men headed out, but returned soon after empty handed.
On the 5th of November, Alpha Company headed out towards the bunker complex that had been so stoutly defended for the past two days. Encountering only sporadic sniper fire, they scoured the ridgeline for the missing Americans and any remaining North Vietnamese. In the ensuing search, the bodies of at least 27 NVA soldiers were discovered in bunkers and trenches, along with numerous drag marks and blood trails, indicating a much higher body count. For medic John Benitez, the memory of finding the two Bravo Company soldiers remains burned into his mind, a burn which is still unhealed after over 50 years.
“When we located both guys, we tried to handle the bodies cautiously in case they had been booby trapped (they had not been). One of the dead, I remember had not laced his boots. The laces were wrapped around his boots, like he had been in a hurry. He was lying on his back. He had been hit in the chest. The other one had a wound in the back of the head.”
PFC Sanders “Sandy” Key Stroud grew up in Corpus Christi, Texas. The son of a prominent eye doctor, he was known as a kind and gentle young man. He had lost his mother Joyce when he was just two-years old, and had been raised by his father, with the support of many friends in the Corpus Christi community.
Felicia Clemens, a childhood friend, remembers the first time she met him, and the grief she felt when she learned he had been killed in Vietnam.
“When he was 12, Sandy and my brother met on a playground. I was two with severely crossed eyes. Sandy said his dad was an eye doctor and maybe he could fix them. They carried me to his house – on foot no less – and Dr. Stroud operated on my eyes the next morning. He didn’t charge us. That’s a pretty kind 12 year old. I remember when we found out he was killed in Vietnam. I was eight. I cried in my room. I still cry for you, Sandy. We wish you were still here.”
Felicia Clemens
PFC Sanders Key Stroud II, the namesake of his beloved father, was 19 years old when he was killed. At the Seaside Memorial Park in his hometown of Corpus Christi, in the Stroud family estate in Section M II, you will find his grave, marked by a standard flat granite military marker. Next to it, another flat granite marker displays the names of his mother Joyce and his father Dr. Sanders Stroud, who passed away in 1986, still grieving the son he had lost in Vietnam.