Rank/Branch: E3/US Army
Unit: Headquarters & Headquarters Co, 1st Battalion, 327th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Div.
Date of Birth: 18 October 1944
Home City of Record: La Planta MD
Date of Loss: 26 February 1966
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 130611N 1090601E (BQ941492)
Status (in 1973): Missing in Action
Category: 2
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: Ground
Other Personnel in Incident: Donald S. Newton (missing)
Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 15 June 1990 from one or more of the
following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with
POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews.
REMARKS:
SYNOPSIS: SGT Donald S. Newton and PFC Francis D. Wills were assigned to Headquarters & Headquarters Company, 1st Battalion, 327th Infantry, 1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Division. In early 1966, the company was operating in Phy Yen Province, Republic of Vietnam.

On February 26, 1966, Newton and Wills were members of a long range reconnaissance patrol (LRRP) and had orders to conduct a road reconnaissance about 250 meters from the patrol base a few miles west of the city of Tuy Hoa. Newton and Wills served as pointmen; the two left the base at 0745 and were never seen again.

Search teams searched for two days for Newton and Wills, but no trace of them was ever found. They were listed Missing in Action. The Defense Intelligence Agency further expanded Newton's and Wills' classification to include an enemy knowledge ranking of 2. Category 2 indicates "suspect knowledge" and includes personnel who may have been involved in loss incidents with individuals reported in Category 1 (confirmed knowledge), or who were lost in areas or under conditions that they may reasonably be expected to be known by the enemy; who were connected with an incident which was discussed but not identified by names in enemy news media; or identified (by elimination, but not 100% positively) through analysis of all-source intelligence.

In 1984, a private citizen obtained a lengthy document through the Freedom of Information Act that had been received by Da Nang Regional Intelligence in 1969. The report included a very detailed description of a POW camp near the city of Hue (specific enough that a rescue mission had been planned) and lists of names of POWs positively and possibly held at the facility.

When the citizen contacted the family of one of the men listed, he learned that this family had never been informed of this report. The report was shown to Larry Stark, a former civilian POW captured at Hue. Stark had not been shown the report during his debrief in 1973 for verification, and identified several on the lists as men he had been held with.

After this report gained media attention, the U.S. Government began contacting the families of the men listed, impugning the reliability of the informant and the information. Donald S. Newton's name was on the list of "possible" identifications.