An Army veteran shared his experience of reuniting with a Marine he helped save in Vietnam and then located through TogetherWeServed.
On Dec. 19, 1972, an OV-10 Bronco observation plane flew through the scattered clouds over South Vietnam’s northern region west of the South China Sea. At the controls was Air Force pilot Capt. Frank Egan. His aerial observer, a Marine officer known by the call sign “Wolfman 44,” carefully searched for enemy activity in the rain-soaked jungle and mountains below.
Suddenly, the twin-engine Bronco was hit by an enemy heat-seeking missile. The damage was extensive. Not wanting to crash in the thick jungle, Egan turned his crippled aircraft toward the coast in an attempt to ditch it over water.
As luck would have it, an Army U-21 Ute conducting electronic battlefield surveillance witnessed the incident and descended toward Egan’s damaged plane. The pilot, Army Capt. Warren Fuller, contacted Egan on the aircraft emergency frequency and was told by Egan that he planned on punching out when he got to 800 feet.
As Egan’s crippled Bronco approached the coast, both he and “Wolfman 44” ejected at the planned altitude, but Fuller saw only one parachute open.
“Wolfman 44 contacted me when he hit the ground and told me Frank’s parachute never deployed,” Fuller said.
“Wolfman 44” and Egan’s lifeless body were picked up by a Huey and taken to a Navy warship, where Egan was officially pronounced dead.
A few days later, the Marine aerial observer came over to Fuller’s outfit hoping to meet him and thank him for his help.
“But I was out on another mission, and missed him,” recalled Fuller.
For 30 years, Fuller hoped to find “Wolfman 44,” but the only information he had was the aviator’s call sign and a tip that he was a Marine attached to the 1st ANGLICO. He turned to the internet, posting on various military bulletin boards, but all was in vain until one of Fuller’s posts caught the attention of several Marine members of TogetherWeServed.com.
Those Marines began searching all possible candidates on TWS using TWS’s Buddy Finder system and posting on its various forums.
On New Year’s Day 2010, TWS Member and Army veteran Mark Stovall reached out to the TWS Administrators. Stovall said he had first-hand knowledge of the events of Dec. 19, 1972: He was the one who pulled Egan from his downed aircraft. Egan didn’t eject, recalled Stovall.
“I found him still strapped in his seat,” he said.
The search for “Wolfman 44” continued as Fuller and Stovall, along with other TWS members, pursued every lead. Then on Jan. 5, 2011, a big break came from TWS member, retired Marine Sgt. Major James Butler.
“There was an aerial observer in our unit, a 1st Lt. J.F. Patterson,” said Butler. “He was recommended for the Purple Heart in December 1972.”
With that vital piece of information, TWS members called upon George Reilly, a Marine veteran and NYPD detective who headed up TWS’s Person Locator Service , who quickly got to work.
It didn’t take but a few days when Reilly made an announcement on the TWS People Finder Forum:
“After 38 years of searching, Warren Fuller is on the phone with “Wolfman 44” right now! 1st Lt. Jon Patterson was indeed the man he was looking for!”
Patterson is now a member of TogethterWeServed.com, the website whose members worked every lead and were finally successful in achieving the almost seemingly impossible.
For your own journey to find and reconnect with military service buddies, check out Together We Served’s Buddy Finder.