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Where Mickey died 'Sad but peaceful': Vietnam crash site makes women think of all vets Photo by Paul Fattig Vietnamese interpreter Le Thi Tam, left, and Medford residents Nancy Ramey, Linda Moreau and Nick Moreau gather near the crash site along the Thach Han River while farmers take a break from their labors. By PAUL FATTIG EDITOR'S NOTE : Today is the last of a four-day series chronicling the Vietnam journey of a group of Rogue Valley residents earlier this month. Today's story describes Linda Moreau's visit to the site where her brother died. QUANG TRI, Vietnam -- The narrow trail from Highway 1 ends a quarter-mile away on the north bank of the Thach Han River. It was here, near the rich river loam sprouting lush crops of corn, peanuts and sweet potatoes, that a U.S. Army UH-1H Huey helicopter was hit by an SA-7 missile on Jan. 8, 1973. Among the six in the craft was Warrant Officer Mickey Allen Wilson, 24, the brother of Linda Moreau of Medford. And it was here that Linda and her husband, Nick, ended their third journey to Vietnam. "It's sad but it's peaceful," she said as they prepared to light incense in her brother's memory. "When I'm here at the crash site, I don't just think of my brother," she added. "I think of all of them, all the veterans." Yet it was the crash that listed her brother as missing in action that would eventually launch her search for answers and closure. Just before the crash, her brother had written home that he had gotten married on Dec. 7, 1972. He wrote that he would bring his bride to the United States in February. Little more than a month later, his helicopter was shot down. The Paris Accords ending American participation in the war were signed Jan. 31, just 23 days after the crash. Today would have been his 51st birthday. Linda Moreau would discover that the woman her brother married, "Mary" Hong Thi Chau from the village of Chu Lai, had borne his son. But his wife and child disappeared after the South Vietnamese government collapsed in 1975 and as the Communists swarmed into the region. In their search, the Moreaus traveled to Vietnam in 1996, and again the next year, the latter after organizing a group of medical professionals from the Rogue Valley to volunteer in the Da Nang area. This month's trip included bringing a volunteer nurse and dental team to help poor Vietnamese children. It was during the 1997 trip that they discovered that Chau and her son were living in Memphis, Tenn. After numerous applications to come to the United States under the Amerasian program, her application had been approved in 1990. However, she had been unable to contact any of her husband's relatives. Contact was made after the Moreaus had her photograph aired on Da Nang television in 1997, asking relatives to contact them. Regarding the crash, "We don't have all the answers, and we probably never will," Linda said. "The military doesn't know exactly where it crashed. But we know it crashed right around here. All the reports indicate the landmarks -- the bridge, the little airstrip across the river." The abandoned airstrip is on the southern bank, according to the military report. But it doesn't indicate whether the crash occurred in the river or along the bank. During the visit to the site, several farmers wearing conical hats stopped working to walk over, apparently out of curiosity. Interpreter Le Thi Tam asked one middle-aged woman whose family had long farmed in the area if she knew anything about the crash. "She tell me the helicopter right there in those bamboo trees," the interpreter said, pointing to a thicket about 200 yards away. "It was on the land. They go over there but no bodies in there." The villager reported that local residents later stripped and carted off the wreckage. That fact was confirmed by the crash report, which indicated that the only piece recovered was a planter found in a local farmer's home. The piece included the helicopter's serial number. It was apparently in 1975 that the farmers, returning to the fields after the war, discovered the downed helicopter. "They said there was a big fight here and they had to move to Da Nang," the interpreter said. "They said they came back after the war." But the villagers could shed no light on what happened to the helicopter crew. As the Moreaus walked along the river bank, their thoughts went back to the 1960s, when Mickey Wilson was still alive. One of his favorite songs was "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," Linda said. "For the longest time, I would break down when I heard that song," she said. "He wrote to me once and asked me to send him some Snickers candy bars. I was too busy so I never did it. It was years before I could look at a Snickers again." "He was an easy-going guy who loved children," added her husband, a Navy veteran stationed in the Philippines during the war in Vietnam. "One of the guys he was stationed with told us that everyone wanted to fly with him because he was a good pilot," he continued. Recalling that one of the political phrases of the war declared that Americans were fighting for peace, Linda noted that the Rogue Valley volunteers were helping to bring the peace that had proved elusive during the war. "Veterans were treated so badly when they returned, that they were just kids doing what they were expected to do," she added. "I hope that when we come over here and we are kind to the Vietnamese people and they are kind to us, that we have helped achieve that peace at last." Before heading back on the trail leading to Highway 1, she looked back at the serene river flowing slowly past the green fields and the bamboo thicket. "If Mickey is here, he is resting peacefully," she said. Central Point woman knows crash site well By PAUL FATTIG Central Point resident Mai Craft knows every little bend in the gentle footpath leading to the river at Quang Tri. As a little girl, Craft, now in her mid-40s, walked the path near where Mickey Allen Wilson's helicopter crashed. "We'd walk down that path to go to market," recalled the Quang Tri native. "My mom and grandma would take the path rather than the bridge. "I remember we paid about a nickel, maybe less, to be taken across the river on a canoe," she added. "We sold vegetables and chickens at the market." For her, Quang Tri was one of the few pleasant places in a world torn by war. She was born during what the Vietnamese called the French war, and spent her teenage years in what was known as the American war. In 1971, she married an American soldier named Charlie Craft. The couple -- he has since died -- moved to the Rogue Valley in 1982. They have a grown daughter. Although she is now an American citizen, she has never forgotten the farm country of Quang Tri. "We were very poor, but had very, very happy lives," she said. "I have so many good memories." One is of her uncle who still lives at Quang Tri near the path. "He's very funny, a real character," she said. "I really love him and my cousins who live there." When she was a baby, her father and his four brothers headed north while her mother stayed in Quang Tri. Her parents would not meet again until her father returned for a visit in 1975. Unfortunately, he had another wife and four children. Her mother, who died in 1977, never remarried. "When my father went to the north, my mother lived with my uncle," Craft said. "He built a little house beside his house. He gave my mom support." But her mother was put in jail for five years when what was then South Vietnam accused her of having ties to North Vietnam. "I lived with my uncle in Quang Tri," Craft said. "I remember after two years the government let me go see my mom. They handcuffed her on the bed. They had tortured her so bad she had become ill. It was a very sad time." Indeed, the war would explode around Quang Tri. "The marketplace used to have tall buildings -- they are all gone," she said. "The countryside used to be forest. That is all gone. My uncle said that is because they spray with Agent Orange (chemical defoliant). But it is slowly coming back." Craft, who has visited Vietnam several times in recent years, plans to travel to Quang Tri in June. In addition to visiting her relatives, she will pay her respects to her mother who is buried in a cemetery within half a mile of the crash site. She will also walk down the path to the river. "The Vietnam government didn't use to let you travel freely," she said. "It's much easier now." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA