Richard Lee Borgman

On March 1, 1968, 1st Battalion, 502nd Airborne Infantry, 101st Airborne Division, began combat operations in Quang Tri district near the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), initiating patrols from Fire Support Base (FSB) Nora and An Lo Bridge while remaining elements of the battalion continued construction of FSB Sally. Alpha Company moved to the village of Ap Lai Xa where they had made heavy contact the day before. They found no enemy, but villagers stated that there had been approximately two hundred North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and Viet Cong (VC) fighters in the village and that they had been up most of the night dragging off their dead. Delta Company made light contact and the battalion commander's Command & Control (C&C) ship orbiting overhead used its guns to kill sixteen NVA. On March 2nd, the battalion continued search and destroy operations, making light contact throughout the day with booby-traps wounding three troopers. Search and destroy operations continued on March 3rd from An Lo Bridge to the village of Ap Duc Trong. Bravo and Charlie Companies made heavy contact from the village and called for all available fire support as they pulled back. After heavy fighting for over four hours, both companies were withdrawn by air. B Company lost one man, PFC Richard L. Borgman, and C Company suffered three killed: SP4 Ernest E. Fawks, PFC Henry Norfleet Jr., and PFC James E. Williams (both Norfleet and Williams were posthumously promoted to Corporal). During extraction, the Battalion commander's C&C aircraft received heavy fire, wounding the battalion commander, his radioman, the battalion S-2 intelligence officer, and aircraft commander. The battalion S-2, CPT Frank R. Dimmitt, from Headquarters & Headquarters Company (HHC), was dead on arrival at Camp Evans.