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FREEHOLD – The stone marker rests in entrance of American Legion Submit 54, proper alongside Essential Road in downtown Freehold.
In Reminiscence of Walter Francis Wrobleski
CWO (Chief Warrant Officer), U.S. Military
Vietnam
It’s not a grave. Walter has no identified gravesite. After his helicopter crashed in Vietnam in 1967, the opposite three troopers aboard scattered into the jungle. They ultimately had been rescued. No hint of Walter was discovered.
The Freehold Excessive College graduate was 21 years outdated was deemed lacking in motion. To today, the Division of Protection lists him as “unaccounted for.” He’s one in every of 40 New Jerseyans with that standing from the Vietnam Warfare.
Their stays haven’t been discovered. They by no means got here residence in any manner.
There was no funeral for Walter Wrobleski.
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“You held out hope, eternally, as a result of there was no definitive data,” Harry Wrobleski, Walter’s youthful brother, mentioned from his Arizona residence final week. “What would you do? You’re not going to surrender.”
On Memorial Day, as cemetery ceremonies happen throughout the nation, it’s additionally vital to recollect the lacking. They gave the last word sacrifice, too, with no closure for grieving family members.
So right now, we’re going to recollect Walt Wrobleski.
‘I at all times surprise’
Harry Wrobleski was 10 years outdated when Walt, then 19, enlisted within the Military.
“He was an impressive baseball participant,” Harry mentioned. “The older guys on the town would inform me they remembered him being actually good at it.”
Harry remembers Walt as “a great brother, an actual good one.”
Their father, Anthony, had served in World Warfare II. Walt was desperate to do his half. Skilled as a helicopter pilot, he was despatched to Vietnam in December 1966.
“He continuously wrote,” Harry mentioned. “He was superb about that, writing to my mother and me.”
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On Might 21, 1967, Walt’s UH-1C Iroquois was hit by machine gun hearth whereas on an extraction mission within the Ashau Valley of South Vietnam.
In keeping with the Division of Protection account, “It crashed, rolled down a small ravine and caught hearth.”
Fearing an explosion and attainable seize by enemy fighters, the opposite three occupants bolted from the wreck. Harry spoke with every of them in subsequent years.
“When it hit the bottom, they ran,” he mentioned. “I’d have executed the identical factor; you’d have executed the identical factor.”
As crewman Donald Corkran later wrote, upon influence, “the (helicopter’s) transmission got here down between Walter and myself and that was the final time that I bear in mind seeing him.”
Did the transmission lure Walt? Was he knocked unconscious? Did he wiggle out just like the others, solely to satisfy an unsure destiny within the jungle?
“In my very own head I at all times surprise,” Harry Wrobleski mentioned. “I’m wondering what occurred.”
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Within the ensuing days, aerial and floor searches for Walter got here up empty.
“I bear in mind any person telling me they at all times pictured him sitting beneath a palm tree in Thailand,” Harry mentioned. “On the time I believed, ‘Effectively, I don’t suppose he would shirk his duties. He was actually into being within the Military.’ I at all times thought when he got here residence from there he may get a great job as a result of he was a pilot.”
Harry was 13 when Military personnel got here to the household’s residence to inform Emma Wrobleski her eldest son was lacking. For 11 years, that’s all they knew.
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In 1990, a dedication
In 1978, in accordance with a later report within the Asbury Park Press, the Military declared Walt “presumed useless” though no new proof was discovered. They introduced the Wrobleskis with the memorial stone that is on Essential Road right now.
That was three years after the conflict ended and 5 years after the final American prisoners of conflict had been launched. Nonetheless, there can be years of ongoing inquiries — each official and unofficial — concerning the chance that servicemen bought left behind.
Harry Wrobleski moved to Vermont and took the stone with him. Finally, “I went again to Jersey and I knew some individuals on the Legion there, and I advised them I’ve bought this stone they usually mentioned, ‘Oh, we’ll take that,’” he mentioned. “I simply didn’t know what to do with it.”
On Nov. 11, 1990 — Veterans Day — 200 individuals attended the stone’s dedication in entrance of American Legion Submit 54.
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Emma Wrobleski was there and advised the Asbury Park Press the ceremony didn’t deliver her peace of thoughts.
“You continue to don’t know,” she mentioned. “You by no means know.”
Gary Wall, a Vietnam veteran from Brick who attended, was quoted as saying, “We’re bitter a few authorities that despatched us to conflict after which didn’t take the steps essential to deliver us all residence.”
The seek for stays
In keeping with the Division of Protection, 1,244 People who went lacking in the Vietnam Warfare stay unaccounted for. Of these, 470 are thought-about “nonrecoverable” — the federal government doesn’t imagine there are any stays to be discovered. That group consists of Walt Wrobleski.
Nevertheless, because the division notes, “on uncommon events, new leads can come up that deliver a case again to an energetic standing.”
Stays do get recovered from Vietnam yearly. Even from the Korean Warfare and World Warfare II, it nonetheless occurs. In 2017 a Korean farmer discovered the stays of Crimson Financial institution resident Dick Lucas, who disappeared as an Military non-public in 1950. They had been despatched residence to his descendants and buried with full navy honors.
“That may matter to me,” Harry Wrobleski mentioned. “My mother’s household had been in New Jersey pre-Revolutionary Warfare. All of our persons are (buried) there. In the event that they discovered any sort of stays, I’d need them introduced again and that might imply one thing to me. It will be a great factor.”
He actually doesn’t anticipate it to occur.
“Many occasions over time I’ve been contacted by individuals who say they’re going to do one thing, going over there to do that and that, go to the crash website, and nothing ever turns into of that,” he mentioned.
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Harry is 67 now. He’s advised his youngsters and grandkids about their uncle. He has little question they’d have preferred him.
“He was a reasonably cool dude,” Harry mentioned. “I consider him on a regular basis. Once I hear individuals discuss combating with their brother or one thing like that, I at all times suppose, ‘Rattling, I’d certain wish to have mine right here.’ It will have been fantastic.”
Harry has no particular plans for Memorial Day. He doesn’t want a delegated day to recollect Walt and what he sacrificed. That’s each day.
“I believe that it could simply be so cool to have him nonetheless right here, my solely brother,” he mentioned. “That may have been superior.”
Jerry Carino is neighborhood columnist for the Asbury Park Press, specializing in the Jersey Shore’s attention-grabbing individuals, inspiring tales and urgent points. Contact him at jcarino@gannettnj.com.
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