Forget Me Not: A Soldier's Story

Aug. 15, 2007 — -- Tuesday, at Arlington National Cemetery, there was a burial with full military honors for five fallen soldiers.

Remains and personal items from the soldiers were buried together, along with a memento from a person who never knew any of the soldiers or their families.

All of the soldiers were killed in a helicopter crash. But this wasn't a scene with casualties from the current conflicts in Iraq or Afghanistan. The men being remembered fought in a different war in Vietnam, nearly 40 years ago.

All of the men were listed as "missing in action and presumed dead," after their helicopter was shot down Jan. 5, 1968, over Laos.

For years, the missing crew was the focus of numerous MIA/POW investigations.

The crash site was excavated several times between 1995 and 2006. Personal effects of the soldiers were recovered and several partial remains. But none of the remains could be identified until this year when a single piece was ID'd: a tooth.

It belonged to Staff Sgt. John T. Gallagher of Hamden, Conn.

For Gallagher's family the news was bittersweet, mostly because Gallagher's mother, Helen Gallagher Yunek, died in 2000, never knowing what had happened to her son.

"One of the last things my mother said was, 'I'm not afraid of death … because I'll finally find out what really happened to my son,'" said Gordon Gallagher, John Gallagher's brother.

At least the Gallaghers had some remains, even if it was only a tooth. There were no remains for the families of Dennis Hamilton of Iowa; Sheldon Shultz of Pennsylvania; Ernest Briggs Jr. of Texas; and James Williamson of Washington.

At Tuesday's ceremony, Gallagher's tooth, along with the unidentified remains and some personal effects from his crew members, were buried together. And one more thing was buried that did not belong to any of the dead soldiers: a bracelet.

For years, a complete stranger Barbara Anzellotti wondered about Gallagher's fate too. She never knew Gallagher personally, only by name. It was etched on a MIA/POW bracelet she got by chance at a Forget Me Not dinner in Connecticut sponsored by a POW/MIA organization. Anzellotti says she then proceeded to wear the bracelet on her wrist for the next 20 years.