Vietnam Veteran Presents Dog Tag Of Fallen Marine To Magnolia Family

MAGNOLIA, TX — A journey back in time became a journey of a lifetime for retired Marine Sgt. Maj. Eddie Neas, when he discovered the dog tag of a Marine killed at the battle of Khe Sanh nearly a half century earlier.

Neas, who lives in Rahway, New Jersey, met the family of Marine LCpl David Freed in front of a packed out at Magnolia City Hall on Tuesday, to present the family with that dog tag.

“Unfortunately when we go to war, America sends off their best kids,” said Magnolia City Manager Paul Mendes, himself an Army veteran. “They were the ones who will stand up and fight for their country, and go out and do what nobody else wants to do.”

The journey for Neas — one he took himself in 1967 as a fresh faced Marine — was supposed to be one of healing, as well as a way to share the real Vietnam story.

The journey, however took on a different meaning when he and the 11 other veterans returned to the battlefields of their youth.

In March 2016, Neas arrived in Vietnam, and was paired up with College of the Ozarks student Grant Talburt, along with 11 other Veterans and 11 students.

“I wanted to go back,” Neas said. “It was so good hooking up with 11 other veterans...It was amazing. The college treated me, the veterans and the students like we were royalty.”

The students and their respective veterans traveled to cities like Can Tho, Saigon, Cu Chi, Da Nang, Hue City, Dong Ha, and Hanoi.

They visited the infamous Hanoi Hilton, the POW camp where Sen. John McCain and the late Vice Admiral James Stockdale — bothe Navy combat pilots — were held captive during the war.

While visiting Khe Sanh, where one of the war’s most infamous battles took place, Neas saw a Vietnamese peddler carrying a tray that held relics collected from the battlefield.

Neas called the man over and looked through the tray that held saw bullet casings, cartridges, a communist red star emblem that had once been attached to the front of North Vietnamese soldier’s helmet, and pieces of shrapnel from grenades and mortar fire.

It was then that Neas spied the unmistakable shape of a dog tag among the battlefield relics in the peddler’s tray.

Neas gingerly picked up the dog tag and read the name and saw the letters USMC after the name.

It was the first time, Neas met LCpl David Bruce Freed.

“I knew I had to bring it back home,” he said.

He bartered with the peddler, finally purchasing the dogtag for $25 U.S dollars.

Neas began researching and learned that Freed, who’d been killed in action in September 1968, was also from New Jersey.

But that was merely the start of a journey that would take 17 months of digging.

Neas shared the story of the dogtag at various veterans events, but during one particular Marine Corps League event in Connecticut, when Ray Baldwin, a Marine who sat next to him, said he would share his story with someone who was an experienced researcher.

Two days later, Neas received the names of family members of Freed in Magnolia, Texas.

Brian Freed, the younger brother of LCpl Freed, received an email from Neas about the dog tag.

Although he desperately wanted to believe it was true, Freed said he also didn’t want to be taken advantage of by a stranger.

“I’m a cynical old fart,” Freed said.

Then one day, Magnolia Police Chief Terry Enloe showed up at Freed’s front door, and told him that Neas was trying to bring the dog tag to Freed’s family.

“At times, I feel that it is my job to be a voice for those men who no longer have a voice,” Neas said as choked back tears. “I hope I have done well.”

On Tuesday, Freed stood next to Neas in front of a packed house at Magnolia City Hall, and unclipped the dog tag of LCpl David Freed from the chain that accompanies his own dog tags, and handed it to Freed.

The two embraced and Freed began to speak, and then he began to weep.

“It may have been 50 years ago, but I was only 10 years old and I didn’t get to know my older brother and I miss him still,” Freed said. “And this means more than Eddie will ever know.”

Freed, who also received a photo album from Neas, leans to preserve the history for his family.

Image: Natalie Rasnick, College of the Ozarks

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