Pfc. John M. Hoar, a slender 20-year-old soldier who marched
off to the Vietnam war on Christmas Day
1965, returned home Sunday evening. He became the first (known) Belleville
serviceman to give his life in that far-away conflict which no one understands.
His gray, flag-draped coffin arrived at 9:30 p.m. Sunday
aboard a sleek military transport plane which landed at Newark Airport
accompanied by Sp. 5 Bob White, a military escort provided by the army for its
fallen warriors.
Pfc. Hoar died of a head wound inflicted by soldiers of the
Viet Cong during a savage firefight at Bongson, 265 miles northeast of Saigon
on the South China Sea.
His death, said an Army telegram from the Defense
Department, ''... was incurred by small arms fire while on a combat
operation.''
"When we came up here," he wrote before the fight,
"we had 15 guys in the squad. Now we have nine. One was taken sick,
another broke his leg, and three others were wounded."
Now Pfc. Hoar himself joins the list of America's honored dead
who were killed in action.
He is survived by his grieving parents, Mr. and Mrs. Robert
J. Hoar, 80 Cleveland Street, who sit quietly in their second-floor apartment
and remember the days when their son was a laughing young man who had the world
before him.
The Belleville Times Feb. 24, 1966
