VIETNAM

Photos: U.S. Coast Guard

Chief Boatswain's Mate C. C. Gardner of U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Point Mast gives a package of pencils, paper, candy and plastic toys to a Vietnamese girl during the cutter's civic action visit to Hon Nam Du on Oct. 18, 1966.


FM COMDT COGARD WASHINGTON DC//CG-092//
TO ALCOAST
UNCLAS//N05700//
ALCOAST 202/18
COMDTNOTE 5700
SUBJ:  REMEMBERING THOSE WHO GAVE THEIR ALL: 50 YEARS AGO IN VIETNAM

1. Memorial Day is a solemn day when we honor the memory of those who fell in
action during our nation's wars. This Memorial Day, over 50 years after the 
Coast Guard began combat operations in Vietnam, we pay tribute to the eight 
Coast Guardsmen who made the ultimate sacrifice so far from home. 

2. On April 29, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson committed the Coast Guard to 
combat operations in Vietnam for the next decade, carrying on the Coast Guard's 
tradition of serving our nation during all of its conflicts.

3. During the war, over eight thousand Coast Guardsmen served in theater, many
aboard fifty-six cutters that served on the maritime front lines, interdicting
enemy supplies and providing gunfire support to U.S. troops in combat 
operations. Coast Guard aviators volunteered to fly combat search and rescue and
support missions while buoy tenders marked South Vietnamese waterways for safe
navigation. Merchant Marine Detail personnel provided their vital expertise to
keep merchant vessels and their sailors afloat and underway. The Service also
built and manned Long Range Aids to Navigation (LORAN) stations throughout
Southeast Asia, operating that state-of-the-art navigation system in support of
Allied combat and logistical operations.

4. That service came at a high cost. A tragic friendly fire incident early in
the war took the Coast Guards first lives: LTJG David Charles Brostrom, 
commanding CGC POINT WELCOME, and his shipmate, EN2 Jerry Phillips, on August
11, 1966. LTJG Brostrom was from Los Altos, California and was 25 years of age. 
EN2 Phillips was from Corpus Christi, Texas and was 27 years of age.  

5. Two fell in combat 50 years ago this year: LT Jack Columbus Rittichier and FN
Heriberto Segovia Hernandez. LT Rittichier flew as a volunteer exchange pilot 
with the Air Force 37th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron. He was killed
in action on June 9, 1968 along with his Air Force crew while attempting to
rescue a downed Marine Corps aviator. FN Hernandez was killed in action during
small boat operations while serving as a crewman aboard CGC POINT CYPRESS on
December 5, 1968. LT Rittichier was from Barberton, Ohio and was 34 years of
age. FN Hernandez was from San Antonio, Texas and was 20 years of age.

6. Three Coast Guardsmen were killed in action in 1969. ENC Morris Sampson
Beeson, Chief Engineman aboard CGC POINT ORIENT, fell in combat operations
during a boarding mission on March 22, 1969. ENC Beeson was from Pitkins, 
Louisiana and was 37 years of age. On August 9, 1969 a mortar exploded aboard
CGC POINT ARDEN, killing both the cutter's Executive Officer, LTJG Michael Ward
Kirkpatrick and his shipmate EN1 Michael Harris Painter. LTJG Kirkpatrick was
from Gainesville, Florida and was 25 years of age. EN1 Painter hailed from
Moscow, Idaho and was 26 years of age. 

7. ENC Leonard Earl Outlaw served as the Chief Engineman aboard CGC BASSWOOD.
On March 24, 1972, he collapsed from a heart attack as his tender returned to 
port at Cam Rahn Bay, Republic of South Vietnam. ENC Outlaw was from Grandy, 
North Carolina and was 35 years of age.

8. All eight names are inscribed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in 
Washington, D.C., with ENC Outlaw's name added in 2016.

9. Today we honor their memory and their loss while in service to our country.  
Inscribed on the Coast Guard Vietnam Veterans Memorial at the Coast Guard 
Academy are the words: "They Died That Others Might Live in Peace,'' a fitting 
epitaph to their selfless sacrifice in service to our nation. I encourage you
to spend a few moments this Memorial Day to reflect on these Coast Guardsmen and
what they gave up to keep us and our way of life secure.

10. For more information, check the Coast Guard Vietnam Commemorative web page
at: https://www.history.uscg.mil/Commemorations/Vietnam/.

11. RADM Peter Gautier, Director of Governmental and Public Affairs, sends.

12. Internet release authorized.

SS MORRO CASTLE

Cutter Tampa alongside Morro Castle

By Vinny Del Giudice

It burned from bow to stern and ignited pubic outrage. The SS Morro Castle inferno of the 1930s led to the creation of Public Law 622, a federal mandate setting standards for fire safety at sea and requiring government approval of ship construction design.

Today, such rules are enforced by the U.S Coast Guard, while inland the Coast Guard Auxiliary provides vessel examinations for recreational boaters.

Though the cause of the Morro Castle fire was never determined - some suspected electrical, others suspected arson - the Ward Line ship's design and flammable art deco interior allowed for rapid spread. The disaster just off the coast of southern New Jersey on Sept. 8, 1934 claimed 135 of 549 passengers and crew on a prohibition-era "booze cruise" returning to New York from Cuba.

Aggravating matters, Morro Castle's officers and crew proved ill-prepared and ill-trained for firefighting and life saving. There had been no boat drills. Negligence and insubordination reigned, with crew members abandoning ship prematurely, and officers failing to issue orders. Only half the lifeboats were lowered while the others burned and buckled. The SOS radio call was delayed. The officer on the bridge set course into the wind. 

A newsreel narrator correctly called it a "hell ship." A bizarre twist, the sudden death of the ship's master hours earlier in the voyage, contributed to the seagoing anarchy.

"I shouted orders to get the passengers in the life boats," William Warms, chief officer, told a board of inquiry, "but the passengers were shouting and there was great confusion. Many of them wouldn't get in the lifeboats." His testimony was reported by the Associated Press. 

A brief radio call for help, sightings at sea and telephone calls from the Jersey shore triggered a response from a commercial flotilla, including the fishing boat Paramount, the liner Monarch of Bermuda and the cargo ship Andrea F. Luckenbach.

The Coast Guard sent patrol boats, the Cutter Tampa (WPG-48) and the Cutter Cahoone (WSC-131). Craft from Coast Guard stations Shark River, Squan Beach and Sandy Hook were among the first to arrive, according to the National Coast Guard Museum Association.

Aircraft from the Coast Guard Station at Cape May circled, searching for survivors adrift, the heat and flames having forced passengers and crew to leap overboard. Coast Guard beach patrols helped pull survivors from the Atlantic surf. Local first aid squads cared of the casualties. The dead bobbed in rough seas.

Some people criticized the pace of the response to the disaster but individual Coast Guardsmen performed valiantly. The smoldering, blistered hull eventually beached at the resort of Asbury Park after a towline from cutter Tampa snapped - a ghastly scene that drew thousands of spectators to the boardwalk.

The Morro Castle disaster led to a public backlash and a criminal trial. In 1936, Chief Officer Warms was sentenced to prison for his role in the fire but the conviction was overturned on appeal. The ship's chief engineer and a Ward Line official were also convicted.

The chief radio officer, George Rogers, was suspected of arson but there was no solid evidence to charge him. It could have been him. Rogers amassed a violent criminal record in the years following the disaster, culminating in a 1954 double-murder conviction. "Sparks," as he was once called, died in prison of a heart attack.