We Remember Thomas L. Corbett

Today we remember Thomas L. Corbett of Hampton, Virginia.

Thomas was born on November 24, 1945. In the fall of 1967, while most young men his age were beginning careers, building families, or simply figuring out what adulthood was going to look like, Thomas was serving as an infantryman with B Company, 4th Battalion, 503rd Infantry, 173rd Airborne Brigade in Vietnam.

He was 21 years old.

By November 1967, the 173rd Airborne Brigade had been pulled into a growing series of battles around Dak To in the Central Highlands. North Vietnamese forces had established heavily fortified positions throughout the surrounding mountains, and American troops were sent into brutally difficult terrain to find and dislodge them.

One of those places was Hill 875. The battle began on November 19 when men of the 2nd Battalion, 503rd Infantry attacked the hill and encountered a deeply prepared North Vietnamese defensive position. The fighting quickly became devastating. American troops were hit by machine-gun fire, grenades, mortars, and small arms from bunkers concealed in the jungle. By nightfall, many of the men on the hill were dead or wounded, and the survivors were desperately holding a perimeter.

The next morning, November 20, Thomas Corbett and the men of B Company, 4th Battalion, 503rd Infantry were among those moving toward Hill 875. They knew what waited ahead. Before moving out, B Company was warned that North Vietnamese troops were believed to be positioned along their route and that an ambush was possible. The company changed its approach and moved through thick bamboo, scrub, jungle, and broken terrain toward the surrounded men of the 2nd Battalion. What they encountered along the way offered a terrible preview of what had happened on the hill. They passed abandoned enemy camps and equipment. As they moved closer, they began encountering the aftermath of the previous day's battle. Ammunition lay scattered along the approaches. Dead American soldiers remained where they had fallen. Men of the 4th Battalion carried water and supplies forward for those who had been trapped through the night.

Somewhere in that terrible day, Thomas Corbett was killed.

The surviving records place him among B Company's dead on November 20, 1967. They give us his name, his unit, his hometown, and the date he died. They do not give us every detail of his final moments. Perhaps they do not need to.

Because one detail tells us something the casualty lists cannot.

Thomas Corbett was born November 24, 1945. He died November 20, 1967. Four days later, he would have turned 22. There should have been another birthday.

There should have been a 23rd and a 30th. There should have been years in which Vietnam became something that happened when he was young rather than the place where his life ended. There should have been ordinary days that never appeared in military records because nothing remarkable happened during them.

Instead, his life stopped on a hill in the Central Highlands of Vietnam.

His name became one among thousands recorded in casualty reports from a war that continued for years after his death. Today it can be found engraved on Panel 30E, Line 39 of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

But Thomas Corbett was never simply a name on a casualty list. He was a young man from Hampton. He was a paratrooper. He was a member of B Company, 4th Battalion, 503rd Infantry.

He was one of the men sent toward Hill 875 when other American soldiers desperately needed reinforcement.

And he was 21 years old.

History often remembers battles by their names: Dak To. Hill 875. The Central Highlands.

We choose to remember the people inside those battles. Today, we remember Thomas L. Corbett. A young man from Hampton, Virginia, who died four days before his 22nd birthday.

More than half a century has passed since November 20, 1967. His name is still here. His story is still here.

And we will make certain that he is remembered. 

See the artifacts that belonged to Thomas Corbett and help preserve the story of the man behind them.