Omission from Vietnam memorial compounds pain of naval calamity

On the signal bridge of the USS Frank E. Evans, Steve Kraus was scanning the ocean about 3 a.m. as the destroyer made a long, sweeping starboard turn through the darkness.

The watch was uneventful until - seemingly out of nowhere - the Australian aircraft carrier Melbourne came barreling toward the Evans at 22 knots.

Kraus hurried into the ship's signal shack and got on the intercom to warn the pilot house below: "We're going to get hit!"

Then came a mighty crash, and the screeching and shrieking of metal. The carrier ripped into the Evans "like a knife through butter," as an Australian later said.

Seventy-four U.S. sailors were killed, most in the front half of the destroyer, which sank in minutes, dropping 1,100 fathoms into the South China Sea. The stern section bobbed in the water. Only one body was recovered.

Forty-five years later, the horrific accident, during a break from operations off Vietnam, still haunts surviving Evans crewmen - and the families of the lost - some from Pennsylvania and New Jersey, who remember a dreaded knock on the door by uniformed Navy officers bearing yellow telegrams with news that recovery operations had ceased.

But that loss was made all the more painful by the Defense Department's judgment that the deaths had occurred outside the Vietnam combat zone and that the names of the 74 therefore would not be etched into the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington.

The omission was unacceptable to Kraus, other Evans veterans, and the families of the 74, who have been fighting for decades to have the sailors honored on the polished black granite walls.

On Thursday, Philadelphia City Council is set to vote on a resolution by Councilman Dennis O'Brien calling on the Defense Department to include those names, including sailors Patrick Corcoran of Philadelphia's Torresdale section and Earl Preston of Gladstone, N.J.

The memorial "is a sacred historical remembrance of the ultimate sacrifice given to our country," said O'Brien. "It's the nation's memorial of record from that war.

"The omission of these 74 sailors serves as a double tragedy to the surviving family members," he said. "The validation of their service is long overdue."

The effort follows similar urging - in an amendment to the Defense Authorization Act - passed in May by the House of Representatives. Resolutions also have been passed by the legislature of California, Veterans of Foreign Wars, and AMVETS.

Adding interest to the cause this month is a new book - American Boys: The True Story of the Lost 74 of the Vietnam War - detailing the disaster.

"They were serving their country and deserve the honor of being on the wall," said Carol Preston Coulter, twin sister of Yeoman Second Class Preston. "They put their lives on the line."

The Evans was shelling the North Vietnamese in May 1969 during Operation Daring Rebel, south of Da Nang. It was later sent about 200 miles away to the South China Sea for an antisubmarine warfare exercise with other ships, including the Melbourne.

"They were in combat just before the collision," said Coulter, a second-grade teacher who now lives in Burke, Va. "And they were going back" to Vietnam.

Earl Preston's comrade Patrick Corcoran was honored in 1988 with the placement of his name on the polished gray granite wall of the Philadelphia Vietnam Veterans Memorial near Penn's Landing.

His father, Tom Corcoran Sr., who died in 2006, worked for years to have him recognized there. But he still wanted to see that name in Washington.

"On his deathbed, my father told me there wasn't a day that went by that he didn't think about Patrick and the other 73 men," said Tom Corcoran Jr., a Langhorne resident who was 9 when 19-year-old Patrick died. "My family, my brother, and the other 73 have waited a long time."

On June 3, 1969, the Evans crew wasn't expecting danger. Most sailors were asleep in the front compartments of the ship at the time of the collision.

Marcus Rodriquez - who was on watch with Kraus - was catapulted from the top of the signal shack and landed on the flight deck of the Melbourne with many broken bones. He now lives in Fresno, Calif., said Kraus, vice president of the USS Frank E. Evans Association and second-class signalman on the destroyer.

"I was slammed on my back in the shack," Kraus said. "I kicked the door open, slipped into the water, and swam away."

The front half of the ship tried to right itself but quickly filled with water and began to sink. Steam hissed and water rushed through open hatches into the forward compartments where Corcoran, Preston, and other sailors had been sleeping moments earlier.

Of the Evans crew, 199 survived; there were no deaths aboard the Melbourne. A joint inquiry would apportion most of the blame to the Evans.

In Philadelphia, Tom Corcoran Sr. was driving home from one of his three jobs when he heard on the radio of a collision in the South China Sea, said his son.

About 2 a.m. the next day, there was a knock at the door. Two Navy officers handed him a yellow telegram with word of the collision and cessation of recovery operations.

In Gladstone, a Navy representative delivered the news about Earl Preston to Carol Preston Coulter's father. He drove to her office in Somerville, N.J., to tell her in person.

"My heart just sank," said Coulter, who was 22 then. "I went home and all the neighbors were there; it was totally unbelievable.

"It's been in my mind every day since then," she said. "We don't have the body, so I put flowers on a plaque at a cemetery on his birthday, and flags on Memorial Day and the Fourth of July."

Among the dead were three brothers from Nebraska: Boatswains Mate Second Class Gary Sage, Radarman Third Class Greg Sage, and Seaman Apprentice Kelly Jo Sage.

On the day of the collision, the Navy awarded the Evans a Vietnam Service Medal, given to ships in operations directly related to the Vietnam War, said Louise Esola, author of the new book on the Evans disaster.

"This was an accident of epic proportions, a tragedy," said Esola. "But the second tragedy is the government forgetting about the [sailors'] loved ones.

"Having the names on the wall is their closure," she said.

Esola will be aboard the USS New Jersey on the Camden waterfront from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, giving a talk on the Evans and signing her book.