Sometimes Marines go off to war and come home in a body bag; sometimes they never come home

Editor’s Note: Marine 2nd Lt. David W. Skibbe, a 1969 University of Illinois graduate still missing in action (MIA) in Vietnam, will be the first inductee to the Naval ROTC Hall of Fame on Oct. 18 when the university commemorates the 100th anniversary of its Memorial Stadium, initially dedicated in 1924 to honor 189 U.S. Armed Forces members from the U of I who died in World War I. Skibbe was posthumously awarded the Navy Cross for his action and leadership during a battle with the North Vietnamese Army in March 1970.

David W. Skibbe

After David W. Skibbe had finished NROTC training in 1969 and was commissioned a second lieutenant of Marines, he was graduated from the University of Illinois and then completed training at The Basic School in Quantico before being sent off to Vietnam.

His fiancée, Georgine Tortorella, also graduated from the university and started teaching high school English. They expected to be married when 2nd Lt. Skibbe served his time in the Marine Corps and came home to the Midwest to work at a career in forestry, his college major.

Those plans went awry soon after Skibbe spent six months in-country with the 2nd Battalion, 26th Marine Regiment of the 5th Marine Division, which had fought on Iwo Jima during World War II and was reactivated during Vietnam when both the 26th and 27th regiments fought there.

Skibbe became one of 67 University of Illinois graduates who fought in Vietnam and were killed in action. Not only was the lieutenant killed, but his body has yet to be recovered and brought home.

With 2/26 being rotated out of country, Skibbe opted to join the 1st Reconnaissance Battalion of the 1st Marine Division because of his relationship with the 2/26 commanding officer, Lt. Col. Bill Drumright. According to a fellow lieutenant and author, Dan Kellum, who spent years researching what happened to his friend for a book he was writing, “David and the colonel had a special bond as he had saved the colonel’s life when a flatbed rail car on which they were riding and a locomotive were blown off the railroad tracks above Da Nang. David pulled the colonel out from under the locomotive before it could crush him.”

The colonel reportedly wanted Skibbe to rotate because “he had seen enough of the war with 2/26.” But a push was made to send all of 1st Recon’s seven-man teams to the bush to flush out a big operation of the enemy. Skibbe managed to join the last team sent out to the Quế Sơn mountains south of Da Nang deep in an enemy-controlled area on March 2, 1970.

In a furious firefight in Quảng Nam Province about 10 miles northwest of the city of An Hòa, Skibbe took a round in the leg and ankle. Two helicopters had arrived and were able to hover above the treetops, 75-100 feet above the ground, to extract the wounded and the outmanned team. But Skibbe wouldn’t take the medevac initially because another man was wounded more severely, and the lieutenant insisted that Marine be evacuated first.

The corpsman described Skibbe’s wound as a “penetrating wound of the lower right leg, breaking the fibula 2 inches above the ankle leaving an open fracture. Hemorrhage was moderate and eased after a pressure battle dressing was applied.” The broken leg was immobilized by the application of “a splint constructed from a small tree limb.”

Skibbe continued directing his men and was later awarded the Navy Cross posthumously for his leadership. A hoist cable with a jungle penetrator to extract the more seriously wounded Marine was lowered. Then the cable was lowered again to retrieve Skibbe.

The Marines on the ground lost sight of him when he was 30-40 feet in the air and cleared the trees. But when he got about 20 feet from the door of the helicopter, 80-100 feet above the ground, the cable snapped and Skibbe fell to the ground.

This photo of 2nd Lt. David W. Skibbe, USMC, is featured on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund’s “Wall of Faces” website. The organization spearheaded the building of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.

Confusion followed. The pilot radioed to the Marines on the ground to see if Skibbe was OK. Apparently thinking Skibbe was in the chopper, the radioman replied, “Yes, he’s OK.” The pilot interpreted that to mean that they had located him and he was OK. Ladders were lowered for the rest of the team, and the choppers left for An Hòa.

It was there that both the helicopter crew and the team realized that Skibbe was not in the aircraft. Both helicopters went back to the area and an attempt was made to insert Capt. Lavoy D. McVey to search for Skibbe. Another cable snapped, and McVey also fell to the ground, presumably to his death.

Because of the enemy position, their numbers and dense jungle, it was decided not to attempt another insertion and risk more loss of life. And it was believed that both men sustained fatal injuries in the falls. No sign of either man was ever found in later searches.

Back home, about all his fiancée, Georgine, and his parents knew was that he was missing in action in South Vietnam, according to a letter dated March 27, 1970, from Lt. Col. Drumright.

A subsequent letter from the colonel described a later, unsuccessful attempt to find both Marines and that two men had originally witnessed Skibbe’s body hit the ground. A letter to Georgine from the assistant secretary of the Navy added little to what the colonel had written, repeating that the “fall and impact was observed by an experienced parachute jumper and a doctor. Both of these men stated that David did not move at all after impact with the ground, and from experience, both of them believe that an unobstructed fall from that height would render survival too improbable to be logically considered.”

“The story as to his demise never sounded right to me,” Georgine said, “even after several years of my trying to get answers from the White House. Years later, I received a letter from Dan Kellum, who had devoted himself to researching and commemorating the lives of Marines whose stories needed to be properly told. “So after almost 40 years, he contacted me and told me how a Vietnamese local had found David Skibbe, and on his person found a picture of David and me. That was so heart-wrenching. This prompted an even further probing by Dan and is included in the book that has that picture and David’s story in it.

“The stress of re-acquainting myself with this situation has taken a toll once again as I was in contact with Dan for some time as he wrote this book.”

“Book II American Heroes: Grunts, Pilots & ‘Docs’” by Dan Kellum, which includes 2nd Lt. David Skibbe’s story, can be ordered from www.michaeldankellum.com.