Specialist 4, John Patrick Lee - Medic

2nd Platoon, A Company, 4th Battalion, 47th Infantry, 2nd Brigade

Gia Dinh Province - June 19, 1967

Alpha Company

Vincent D. Polisano and John Lee relaxing between patrols.

Memorial by Mike Lee - June 5, 2004

My brother John was the third of seven children. He was born in New York and was raised there until 1956 when my parents, with five children, drove across country and set up shop in Southern California.  My Dad was a machinist and Mom was a registered nurse. My little sister and I were the only part of the family to be born in California. John went to Saint Bernard's High School in Marina Del Rey. He rapidly became known as a class clown where he viewed a classroom as 35 captives who needed to be entertained.

In 1963 the family moved to La Crescenta.  John attended CV high school with several other 9th Infantry Division soldiers.  As the war in Viet Nam escalated John entered Glendale College, but like most young men he had not chosen a direction, which resulted that spring of '66 receipt of the famous "Greeting" letter from Uncle Sam.  Dad encouraged John to join the Navy but John wanted nothing to do with a 4 year hitch so he accepted the draft.  Several of the soldiers I have met have little recollection of the faces but I met a soldier named Monte Euler, also an Alpha Company trooper, who had a copy of the orders with John's name on them from Los Angeles to Fort Hood and then to Fort Riley.

John took a page from his mother's book and chose to be a medic. I have read letters he wrote where he spoke about being grilled by other soldiers to make sure his knowledge base was sharp. John came home for leave just before his deployment overseas.  He had just received his tropical weight dress "greens" and he took them to the dry cleaners to make sure they were pressed and ready to ship out, regretfully the cleaners caught fire and his dress uniform went up in smoke.

As John approached his 21st birthday, we gathered around an ancient reel-to-reel tape recorder and sent the tapes and a cake packed in popcorn to Viet Nam.  We were never sure if the cake made it there.

The week after John's birthday, my brother Dennis, a soldier himself at the Language Institute at Monterey Ca., a chaplain and the military escort came to our house. My Mom was concerned when they said John

"My Brother John"
By Dennis Lee - U.S. Army Security Agency - 1965

The World has never known your name
And fame has known you not
You left no words in history books
Great wealth was not your lot

Your travels never took you to
Those far, enchanting places
You never saw the happy smiles
On foreign, friendly faces

You were much for reading books
For gentle words and phrases
Your interests lay in other things
Like what the baseball score was

No John, you weren't big and rich
You never did mighty things
The things you did were just enough
To make our sad hearts sing

You walked the simple road of life
Your beaming, happy eyes
Your chubby face and beaming smile
I'm sure made blue the skies

You grew up with us all, and yet
It's funny but it's true
You're just a boy in short blue pants  That's how I think of you

You went away to do a job
Only big, strong men could do
And thinking that the only one
That could do it right was you

And because you loved us here at home
And loved the joy of giving
You offerred up your precious life
So we could go on living

Our lives will never be the same
Our hearts will forever hold
The ache and void that is your loss
That never can be told

I pray the place where you are now
Is a happier place to be
I pray your bed is safe and warm
And that you are looking down on me

I also pray that some day soon
All men will see the dawn
And try to save other precious life
 Like yours, My Brother John

Here's John at Camp Bearcat in February '67, shortly after we arrived in South Viet Nam.