Hundreds visit Traveling Vietnam Wall in Myrtle Beach

About 1,000 people turned out in cold, blustery, rainy weather Friday afternoon for the opening ceremony of the Traveling Vietnam Memorial Wall on a soggy field at the Market Common in Myrtle Beach.

Many came in raincoats or ponchos and clutching umbrellas as they searched, in the dreary weather, for inscriptions—among the 58,307 names etched on the wall—of friends or loved ones killed in South Vietnam.

American flags were everywhere and the soft music of “Glory, Glory, Halleluia” played in the background as men and women, some fighting back tears, kneeled at the wall or otherwise paid homage to those lost in the war in Vietnam.

Some were too emotional to speak when approached by a reporter but others shared their thoughts.

“I was able to go a year ago up to Washington for the first time (to see the Vietnam Memorial Wall),” said 75-year-old Vietnam veteran Brian Smith of Myrtle Beach.

Smith served in the Army in Vietnam in 1968 and he was among those at the wall at the Market Common on Friday—which is a three-fifths scale model of the actual Vietnam Memorial Wall in D.C.

He said he did not get wounded in the Tet Offensive—a bloody conflict in Vietnam which took the lives of hundreds of American soldiers—but one of his friends made the ultimate sacrifice.

Pointing to the wall in the rain Friday afternoon, Smith said, “I should be there and he should be here.”

Denise Metten, 71, of Myrtle Beach, was at the wall with her husband, an Army veteran who served in Vietnam between 1968-69. Luckily, she said, he was not wounded and has not suffered from the effects of Agent Orange.

So her husband, who would go on to retire as a police lieutenant, came out of the Vietnam War “all good, but it’s a wonderful thing that they do here. I’ve seen the real one and I’m holding back tears again. . . That’s what happens to me.”

Likewise, Hector Mendoza, 70, of Myrtle Beach, had to collect himself for a few moments before he could speak about the wall.

“I don’t know the names of the guys I served with. I just know they were my brothers,” said the U.S. Navy veteran of Vietnam.

Mendoza said he has not been to the real actual wall in Washington, D.C., because he gets too emotional.

“My wife, she’s passed, but she told me, ‘I’ll go with you’ the last time the wall was here, and my daughter said, ‘Dad, I’ll go with you’ and I said, ‘No, I can’t do it.’

“Now I’m on my own and I had to do it. I had to come out here,” he said.

Richard Adams of Myrtle Beach is now 74 years old, but he was just 20 when he found himself as the point man in combat in Vietnam in 1969-70. Wounded twice, he remembers Brigadier General William Bond presenting him his Purple Heart.

Bond would be killed the very next day, Adams said.

“It was altogether different (in Vietnam) than what I was trained for,” Adams recalls. “When I got over there, I never knew what to expect. . . A lot of people don’t know what this (the Wall) is. That’s what’s sorry. . . I’m just sorry it’s such a miserable day.”

Dennis Thompkins, 64, of Myrtle Beach braved the awful weather Friday to find the etching on the wall of his cousin Marshall Mincey. He died at age 20 on November 21, 1969, when he stepped on a landmine in Vietnam. Another cousin, James Salley of Columbia, South Carolina, was listed as missing in action in 1968. He has yet to be found.

“I’m just amazed at the lives lost,” Thompkins said while standing near the wall.

At the opening ceremony for the replica wall at the Market Common, a spry 102-year-old World War II veteran sat in the first row. Originally from Delaware but now living in Myrtle Beach, Bob Jones described the Wall as a wonderful tribute to Vietnam veterans.

He said Vietnam veterans for too long didn’t get the recognition they deserved, but now, thankfully, that’s starting to change.

“They should do more of this kind of thing,” Jones said of the wreath laying, salutes and laudatory speeches for veterans at the ceremony. “They say, you know, ‘the war is over.’ Sure it is but we shouldn’t get over honoring the guys that died.”

A featured speaker at the wall ceremony Friday afternoon was severely wounded Vietnam Marine Corps veteran Clebe McClary of Pawleys Island.

McClary, today a motivational speaker, lost his left arm and left eye in combat in Vietnam in 1968.

The former platoon leader survived hand-to-hand fighting against the enemy, dozens of surgeries and more than two years in hospitals.

Awarded the Silver Star, the Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts for his bravery in Vietnam, the 82-year-old hero exhorted the audience at Market Common to never forget to honor America’s veterans.

That same message was driven home by Myrtle Beach Mayor Brenda Bethune who called the wall a “reminder of the great sacrifices made during the Vietnam War."

“Over 58,000 souls lost their lives, plus the lives of thousands of families were changed forever,” Bethune said. “So let us reflect on the importance of remembering and honoring our history… Thanks to all in our military. Our community honors you and respects you, and our community deeply loves you.”

Larry C. Timbs Jr., author of this story, is a Vietnam-era USAF veteran, who served in the Philippines in 1968-69. He volunteered at age 17 to go to Vietnam, but the Air Force, saying he was too young, wouldn’t send him there.