Nurses Captured and Killed In Vietnam

Profile photo for Lostinspace1205 Lostinspace1205 · Follow Updated Sun Were women captured by North Vietnam? If so, were they mistreated as the men were? (Updated May 2025) Some were not ill-treated. Others, yes. February 1968. 28-year-old Marjorie Nelson was a doctor on the staff of AFSC's Quang Ngai Rehabilitation Center in Vietnam, and Sandra Johnson, a friend at a volunteer agency in Hué, were both captured by a cadre of VC in the same city. She recalls that the VC soldiers took great care to make sure she and Sandra were not harmed. When they arrived at a camp, they were well fed and cared for under the direction of the soldiers' commander. "It sort of occurred to them, I guess, that maybe we . . . shouldn't really be prisoners. We were really more like guests, and they sort of began to be a little embarrassed at this prisoner business.” Near March 20, the two women were instructed to write release statements. Marge wrote, in part, "Almost everyone I met has been both kind and friendly to me. I have been impressed with the courage, dedication, enthusiasm, and cheerfulness of the NLF Forces. There is no doubt in my mind that they represent a significant segment of the Vietnamese people and must be accepted as such." On March 31, 1968-nearly two months after their capture, they were both released north of Hué. (Source: American Friends Service Committee) Dr. Marjorie Nelson (Image of Sandra Johnson not found) Roughly 11,000 military women were stationed in Vietnam during the conflict. Nearly all were volunteers, and 90% served as military nurses, though women also worked as physicians, air traffic controllers, intelligence officers, clerks, and other positions in the U.S. Women’s Army Corps, U.S. Navy, Air Force, and Marines, and the Army Medical Specialist Corps. In addition to women in the armed forces, an unknown number of civilian women served in Vietnam on behalf of the Red Cross, United Service Organizations (USO), Catholic Relief Services, and other humanitarian organizations, or as foreign correspondents for various news organizations. 59 American women who served as civilians (including nurses) in Vietnam were also killed and died in that war. 4 were POWs. South Korea’s nurses in South Vietnam (below): Nurses from the Tiger Division Field Hospital stand in formation during ceremonies commemorating the third anniversary of the ROK Forces in Vietnam. Image Source: NARA photo 111-CCV-534-CC51541 by SP5 Dennis D. Connell At least 1.5 million women served in the North Vietnamese military during the War and comprised as much as 70% of youth volunteers. Women Viet Cong taken prisoner, January 1973. Image Source: NARA photo 111-CCV-430-CC86471 by SSG Richard Hiwa, Jr. A female and male VC taken prisoner on board a US helicopter. An injured NVA or VC nurse captured by an Anzac team. (Recently added): NEW INFORMATION American, Australian, New Zealand, and British Women who served or died in Vietnam: Charge Sister Pam Miley, a Royal New Zealand Nursing Corps Sister at an orphanage in Vung Tau, Headquarters of the 1st Australian Logistic Support Group, 1971. She survived the war. Lt. Drazba and Lt. Jones were assigned to the 3rd Field Hospital in Saigon. They died in a helicopter crash near Saigon, February 18, 1966. Drazba was from Dunmore, PA, and Jones from Allendale, SC. Both were 22 years old. Lt. Drazba and Lt. Jones Lt. Lane died from shrapnel wounds when the 312th Evac. Chu Lai was hit by rockets on June 8, 1969. From Canton, OH, she was a month short of her 26th birthday. She was posthumously awarded the Vietnamese Gallantry Cross with Palm and the Bronze Star for Heroism. Lt. Lane Capt. Alexander of Westwood, NJ, and Lt. Orlowski of Detroit, MI, died November 30, 1967. Alexander, stationed at the 85th Evac., and Orlowski, stationed at the 67th Evac. in Qui Nhon, had been sent to a hospital in Pleiku to help during a push. With them when their plane crashed on the return trip to Qui Nhon were two other nurses, Jerome E. Olmstead of Clintonville, WI, and Kenneth R. Shoemaker, Jr. of Owensboro, KY. Alexander was 27, Orlowski 23. Both were posthumously awarded Bronze Stars. Capt. Alexander and Lt. Orlowski Lt. Jerome Olmstead Lt. Shoemaker Jr. Lt. Shoemaker’s grave Lt. Col. Graham, Chief Nurse, 91st Evacuation Hospital, 43rd Medical Group, 44th Medical Brigade, Tuy Hoa, from Efland, NC, suffered a stroke and was evacuated to Japan, where she died four days later on August 14, 1968. A veteran of both World War II and Korea, she was 52. Lt. Graham Lt. Donovan, from Allston, MA, became seriously ill and died on July 8, 1968, in Gia Dinh Province, South Vietnam, at the age of 26. She was assigned to the 85th Evac. in Qui Nhon. Lt. Donovan Capt. Klinker, a flight nurse with the 10th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron, Travis Air Force Base, temporarily assigned to Clark Air Base in the Philippines, was on the C-5A Galaxy, which crashed on April 4, 1975, outside Saigon while evacuating Vietnamese orphans. This is known as the Operation Babylift crash. From Lafayette, IN, she was 27. She was posthumously awarded the Airman's Medal for Heroism and the Meritorious Service Medal. Capt. Klinker Australian Nurse Corps, Barbara Black died at age 25 at Vung Tau, Vietnam, in 1971. While in Vietnam, she was diagnosed with leukemia, which was untreatable at the time. She is counted as a casualty of the war. Barbara Black American Red Cross: Hannah E. Crews died in a jeep accident, Bien Hoa, October 2, 1969. Hannah Crews A U.S. soldier “sexually assaulted” (source: FOIA) and stabbed Virginia E. Kirsch to death in Cu Chi, August 16, 1970. Her assailant has never been identified. Virginia Kirsch Lucinda J. Richter died of Guillain-Barre Syndrome, Cam Ranh Bay, February 9, 1971. Linda Richter with a GI patient somewhere in South Vietnam. Date unknown. Army Special Services: Rosalyn Muskat died in a jeep accident, Long Binh, October 26, 1968. Rosalyn Muskat grave Dorothy Phillips died in a plane crash, Qui Nhon, 1967. Dorothy Phillips U.S. Department of the Navy OICC (Officer in Charge of Construction): Regina "Reggie" Williams died of a heart attack in Saigon, 1964. No image available Catholic Relief Services Gloria Redlin was shot to death in Pleiku, 1969. Redlin was a civilian nurse, volunteering for the Lutheran World Relief Organization in South Vietnam in 1970. Redlin. Little information is written about her death, and her companion, 1st Sergeant Louis Emil Janca, but what is known the pair were returning by moped to a hospital in Kontum City late at night on October 13, 1970. On the way, they tried to run an ARVN roadblock, not knowing if it was friendly. Sergeant Janca was killed, and Gloria Redlin was seriously wounded. She died of her wounds on October 21, 1970. No image available. CIA: Barbara Robbins died when a car bomb exploded outside the American Embassy, Saigon, on March 30, 1965. She was the first female employee to be killed in action in the CIA’s history, the first American woman killed in the Vietnam War, and, as of 2012, the youngest CIA employee to die in action. Undated photo of Barbara Robbins Scene of the 1965 bombing in which Robbins was killed Betty Gebhardt died in Saigon, 1971. Gephart was also killed by a car bomb. Image unavailable. U.S. Foreign Service: Jeanne Roge Skewes and Lydia Ruth James were shot and killed in a Viet Minh ambush on March 7, 1948, when their jeep was ambushed and set afire on the outskirts of Saigon. The Viet Minh later acknowledged the jeep was mistaken for a French patrol vehicle and was fired upon in error, describing the women's deaths as a regretful tragedy. James was a World War II WAC veteran in the South Pacific theater. Photo of Skewes and James USAID: Marilyn L. Allan was an adviser to a US civilian surgical team at a South Vietnamese hospital. August 16, 1967, she was murdered by her boyfriend, an Army Captain who then committed suicide in Nha Trang. Her body was cremated once in the US. No image available. Dr. Breen Ratterman (American Medical Association) died from her injuries suffered in a fall from her apartment balcony in Saigon, October 2, 1969. Doctor Breen Ratterman USAID worker Gail (Gayle) Thomashow Fairless died February 1, 1968, Vinh Long. The cause of death is unknown. The Thomashow family grave. Journalists: Georgette "Dickey" Chapelle killed by a mine on patrol with Marines outside Chu Lai, 1965. Chapelle at work. Image: Lew Lowery/ Wisconsin Historical Images, WHi Image ID 1942 Chaplain John McNamara of Boston makes the sign of the cross as he administers the last rites to photographer Dickey Chapelle in South Vietnam, Nov. 4, 1965. Chapelle was covering a U.S. Marine unit on a combat operation near Chu Lai for the National Observer when she was seriously wounded, along with four Marines, by an exploding mine. She died in a helicopter en route to a hospital. (AP Photo/Henri Huet) Image: AP Photo/Henri Huet On 7 April 1971, journalist for UPI, Kate Webb made news herself when she, a Japanese photojournalist Toshiichi Suzuki and Cambodian journalists Tea Kim Heang, Chhim Sarath, Vorn and Charoon were captured by People's Army of Vietnam troops fighting Khmer National Armed Forces in an operation on Highway 4.On 20 April, official reports claimed that the body discovered was Webb's, and The NYT and other newspapers published obituaries for her. On 1 May, Webb and the others were released by the PAVN near where they had been captured, after having endured forced marches, interrogations, and malaria. Catherine Merrial Webb Catherine Leroy (August 27, 1944 - July 8, 2006) was a French-born photojournalist and war photographer. She became the first accredited journalist to participate in a combat parachute jump on 23 February 1967 in Vietnam, joining the 173rd Airborne Brigade in Operation Junction City. On 19 May 1967, while photographing a Marine unit near the Vietnamese DMZ, she was severely injured by People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) mortar fire. She was evacuated first to Con Thien, then to the USS Sanctuary. She was then transferred to a hospital in Danang and discharged in mid-June. In 1968, during the Tet Offensive, Leroy and Agence France-Presse journalist Francois Mazure were captured by PAVN soldiers during the Battle of Huế. She managed to talk her way out and emerged as the first newsperson to take photographs of PAVN soldiers behind their lines. Catherine Lovejoy preparing for a jump. Entertainer-journalist-missionary Philippa Schuyler died in a helicopter crash into the ocean near Da Nang, May 9, 1967. In 1966, Schuyler traveled to South Vietnam to perform for the troops and Vietnamese groups. She returned in April 1967 as a war correspondent for William Loeb's Manchester Union Leader and served as a lay missionary. In early May, Schuyler planned to leave Vietnam, but extended her stay to bring Catholic children from Hue. On May 9, 1967, she boarded a US Army helicopter on a mission to evacuate Vietnamese orphans from Da Nang. The helicopter crashed into Da Nang Bay. She survived the crash but could not swim and drowned. Entertainer Cathy Wayne, an Australian Singer, was Murdered during a performance in Danang, July 1969. She was killed by a US Marine Sergeant. Wayne had just finished a song at a Non-commissioned officer's club near Da Nang in South Vietnam when she was hit by a bullet fired from a .22 pistol, fitted with a silencer, which had been stolen at the base. Cathy Wayne Missionaries: Rev. Archie Mitchell, Dr. Eleanor Ardel Vietti, and Daniel Gerber were taken prisoner in 1962 at the leprosarium in Ban Me Thuot. on May 30, 1962. Dr. Vetti, who disappeared May 30, 1962, was an American physician and missionary. She worked at a leper colony, where she was taken as a POW. She was America’s first woman POW in Vietnam. She is currently the only American woman unaccounted for from the Vietnam War. Dr. Eleanor Ardel Vietti Carolyn Griswald, Ruth Thompson, and Ruth Wilting were killed in a raid on the leprosarium in Ban Me Thuot during Tet 1968. Ruth Thompson Reports of the killings and kidnappings came from U.S. Army Chaplain Richard Perkins at Ban Me Thuot and from Mrs. Marie Ziemer, whose husband, Robert, was one of those killed. Badly wounded, Mrs. Ziemer telephoned her report to Saigon from Nha Trang, where she was being treated at a U.S. military hospital. Janie A. Makil, 5 months old, was shot in an ambush while in the arms of her missionary father, who was also killed, at Dalat, March 4, 1963. Her twin sister, an older sister, an older brother (who was also wounded), and her mother survived the ambush. Photo of baby Makil with her family right after her birth. POWs: During the Tet Offensive, a bullet shattered the windshield of Betty Olsen’s jeep. Though uninjured, Olsen was seen taken captive by VC commandos. Olsen endured ten months in captivity, with forced day-long marches, beatings, inadequate food, and no medical attention. She died in captivity as a POW of the North Vietnamese Army. Eleanor Ardel Vietti was an American physician and missionary. She worked at the Ban Me Thuot leper colony, where she was taken as a prisoner of war on May 30, 1962. She was America’s first woman POW in Vietnam. She is currently the only American woman unaccounted for from the Vietnam War. She died in 1968 while being held as a prisoner and was buried somewhere along the Ho Chi Minh Trail by fellow POW, Michael Benge. Remains have not been recovered. No images available. Evelyn Anderson and Beatrice Kosin, both missionary nurses, were captured by Pathet Lao or North Vietnamese communists and burned to death in Bang Kengkok, Laos, in 1972. Their remains were recovered and returned to the U.S. Evelyn Anderson (top) and Beatrice Kosin In the late hours of. Saturday, October 27, 1972, a small group of North Vietnamese soldiers invaded the southern Laotian town of Beng Kengkok. They took prisoners, including Evelyn Anderson, Beatrice Kosin, Lloyd Oppel, and Samuel Mattix. Several other Americans there managed to escape and radioed for help. At 9:04 on Sunday morning, following the capture, an American helicopter arrived and evacuated nine Filipinos, five Lao, and the Americans who had radioed for help. Less than an hour later, Sgt. Gerry Wilson returned by helicopter to try and locate the two American women. Lt. Colonel Norman Vaughn immediately set rescue plans into motion. The American Embassy in Vientiane [Laos] heard of the rescue plan and ordered from the highest level that no attempt be made to rescue the women. The peace negotiations were ongoing, and it was feared that a rescue attempt would compromise the sustained level of progress in the talks. On November 2, 1972, a radio message was intercepted from Hanoi that ordered that the two women be executed. A captured North Vietnamese soldier later told U.S. military intelligence that the women were captured, tied back-to-back, and their wrists wired around a house pillar. The women remained in this position for five days. After receiving orders to execute the two, the Communists simply set fire to the house where they were being held and burned them alive. A later search of the smoldering ruins revealed the corpse of Miss Anderson. Her wrist was severed, indicating the struggle she made to free herself. The two men, Oppel and Mattix, who were captured with Anderson and Kosin, were released. It is speculated that the women would have been too much trouble to care for on the long trip to Hanoi, and were killed instead. Beatrice Kosin’s grave Evelyn Anderson’s grave German aid workers: Although not associated with US forces, these names should also be remembered: Monika Schwinn (b.1942) was a West German nurse who worked in South Vietnam together with four other German aid workers as part of a humanitarian aid operation by the Malteser Relief Service and was kidnapped by VC guerrillas. She followed a call from the West German Maltese Relief Service to help the civilian population in South Vietnam and began working as a nurse in a children’s ward in Da Nang in 1968/1969. On April 27, 1969, a Sunday, she was kidnapped by the VC along with Doctor Bernhard Diehl, nurses Marie-Luise Kerber (or Kerben) and Hindrika Kortmann, and paramedic Georg Bartsch on a country trip. Monika Schwinn and Bernhard Diehl – the other prisoners did not survive the hardships – were eventually taken as hostages to the infamous Hanoi Hilton, where they were tortured as political prisoners. On March 7, 1973, following the signing of the Paris Peace Accord, Monika Schwinn and Bernhard Diehl returned to their homeland scarred by their captivity. Monika Schwinn and Doctor Bernhard Diehl, following their release in 1973 Rika Kortmann Kerben(r) was 19 years old when kidnapped. (I couldn't find any specific images of Marie-Luise Kerber, the German nurse captured.) Marie-Luise Kerber, Hindrika Kortmann, and Georg Bartsch died during their captivity. (Similar to Kerben, I couldn’t find any specific images of Georg Bartsch.) REMEMBER THESE VALIANT MEN AND WOMEN ON MEMORIAL DAY EACH YEAR Nurses Memorial at the Vietnam War Memorial Wall, Washington, D.C. 175.9K views View 867 upvotes View 13 shares 1 of 2 answers 55 comments from Richard Ellenberger and more