Alexandria to Hold 13th Annual Veterans Day Ceremony

City of Alexandria officials and others will mark Veterans Day Tuesday when they gather with “Friends of Rocky Versace” in Del Ray.

They will be honoring Captain Rocky Versace, and the other Alexandrians who died during the Vietnam War and all veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces in attendance. The ceremony takes place from 1 to 2 p.m. Tuesday at the statue of Versace, located at the Mount Vernon Recreation Center, 2701 Commonwealth Ave. in Alexandria.

The ceremony will be held near where Versace grew up on Forest Street in Alexandria. He attended Gonzaga College High School his freshman and sophomore years, but the family moved to Germany when his father, an Army official, was reassigned in 1953. He graduated from high school in Norfolk and then went on to graduate from West Point.

While serving in the Vietnam War, Versace died two years after his capture by the enemy. Two weeks before he was due to return home, Versace, 27, was captured on Oct. 29, 1963, by Viet Cong guerrillas who spent the next two years torturing and trying to brainwash him, according to the Defense Department. In return, he mounted four escape attempts, ridiculed his interrogators, swore at them in three languages and confounded them as best he could, according to two U.S. soldiers captured with him.

The witnesses said the unbroken Versace sang “God Bless America” at the top of his lungs the night before he was executed on Sept. 26, 1965. His remains have never been recovered.

On July 8, 2002, President George W. Bush presented his siblings with a Medal of Honor which was posthumously awarded to Versace.

Bush said the Army captain was “a soldier’s soldier, a West Point graduate, a Green Beret who lived and breathed the code of duty, and honor and country.

“Last Tuesday would have been Rocky’s 65th birthday,” the president said in 2002. “So today, we award Rocky the first Medal of Honor given to an Army POW for actions taken during captivity in Southeast Asia.

“In his defiance and later his death,” Bush said, “he set an example of extraordinary dedication that changed the lives of his fellow soldiers who saw it firsthand. His story echoes across the years, reminding us of liberty’s high price and of the noble passion that caused one good man to pay that price in full.”

Rocky Versace was a posthumous Medal of Honor recipient, Ranger Hall of Fame inductee, Distinguished Member of the Special Forces Regiment and Distinguished Member of The Old Guard Regiment.

The Friends of Rocky Versace raised money to erect the Captain Rocky Versace Plaza and Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial in 2002 in honor of the 67 Alexandrians killed in Vietnam.

PHOTO courtesy of City of Alexandria