Name: William Ellis Jr.
Rank/Branch: E3/US Army
Unit: Company A, 1st Battalion, 35th Infantry, 3rd Brigade, 25th Infantry
Division
Date of Birth: 28 January 1947
Home City of Record: Summerville SC
Date of Loss: 24 June 1966
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 133913N 1073622E
Status (in 1973): Missing In Action
Category: 2
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: Ground
Other Personnel In Incident:
(none missing)
Source:
Compiled by Homecoming II Project 15 October 1990 from one or more of
the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with
POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews.
REMARKS:
SYNOPSIS:
PFC William Ellis, Jr. was a rifleman in Alpha Company which was on a
support operation in Pleiku Province to assist in the withdrawal of a
reconnaissance platoon on June 24, 1966. The Recon platoon had been engaged with
the enemy.
As Alpha Company moved from their landing zone to the vicinity of the recon platoon, Ellis saw a wounded soldier and returned to the LZ to get help. As Ellis moved toward the LZ, he was seen removing his field gear so he could move faster. Shortly after Ellis was seen headed toward the LZ, friendly forces evacuated the area, and Ellis was not seen again. The man Ellis was trying to help was removed with the group during withdrawal.
Searches were conducted for three or four days and into July with no trace of Ellis. He was classified as Missing In Action. No one saw him die, no one saw him wounded. The 19-year-old black youth who left his home in South Carolina to serve his country disappeared without trace.
When prisoners were released at the end of the was, Ellis was not one of them. Although there is a high probability that the Vietnamese know his fate, they deny any knowledge of him. Even though over 10,000 reports relating to Americans lost in Southeast Asia have been received, and many authorities believe there are still hundreds alive today, the U.S. maintains no actionable evidence is in hand.
