Lynn MA dedicates city squares to two who fell in Vietnam

Lynn dedicates city squares to two who fell in Vietnam
Lasting tribute
Years after two servicemen from Lynn died in Vietnam, the city dedicates veterans squares in their honor at the housing project where they grew up


By Kathy McCabe
Globe Staff / November 9, 2008

On his second tour of duty in Vietnam, Marine Lance Corporal John D. Evans took a boat about a mile down the Cua Viet River to see Dick Donahue, a boyhood pal from Lynn who had enlisted with him on the buddy plan. It was Jan. 31, 1968.

"He asked for a pass to go see his 'foster brother' - that's how close we were," said Donahue, now 61. "I was on my first tour. Since he had already been there, I think he came to assure me that things were going to be all right."

When it came time to leave, the two Marines, wearing helmets, rifles, and flak jackets, hugged. Evans walked up a dusty red-dirt road.

"We waved to each other until we were out of sight," Donahue recalled. "It was not a see you later wave, it was a goodbye wave."

Evans was killed two days later, on Feb. 2, in an early-morning attack on his unit in Quang Tri Province. He was 22.

"The enemy hit with heavy artillery while they slept," Donahue said. "John was one of the first to die."

Forty years later, Evans, along with another fallen Vietnam veteran from Lynn, Army Corporal James J. Hazard, received a salute from their hometown. Veterans squares were dedicated to each at Curwin Circle, the public housing complex in West Lynn where they grew up.

Hazard was killed in ground warfare in Cambodia on May 20, 1970, just two months after he arrived in the war zone. He was 20.
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