A moving story about an Australian veteran who spent 20 years searching for the remains of Vietnamese martyrs

Recognize the martyr’s pen

There are many people over 80 years old who, upon hearing the news that their relatives were found, traveled far from Pacific to Binh Duong to attend the memorial service.

Among them, Ms. Nguyen Thi An (84 years old) and Ms. Nguyen Thi Khang are sisters of martyr Nguyen Van Ha (born in 1946, from Thai Binh).

Ms. An recounted that her younger brother, Nguyen Van Ha, had been in the army since 1964. In 1966, he went to the southern battlefield and died in 1968. The family had many times searched for the martyr’s grave but did not know where it was. More than 10 years ago, her family heard that Australian veterans were looking for Vietnamese martyrs’ graves in Tan Uyen (Binh Duong), so they came to coordinate the search but could not find it.

“Recently, the family suddenly received news that the remains of martyr Nguyen Van Ha had been found in Tan Uyen. We were very moved. We recognized the martyr because the relic was a pen with the word Ha engraved on it. Gia The family took a report at Division 7 and identified it as martyr Ha,” Ms. An shared.

“Today, I love and miss my brother very much. My brother has a diary and a pen. He likes to write poems and rhymes and send them to me. I keep reading them and crying.

At that time, I was very thin and weak, he wrote a poem about me like this: I love you, you are weak and skinny. Every day without passing through the fields. Herding buffalo is my duty to look after. If the buffalo is fat and healthy, it’s my job. Things I miss about my father. It’s right to love your mother very much…”, Mrs. Nguyen Thi Khang emotionally read the poems that martyr Nguyen Van Ha sent back from the battlefield in the past.

After 20 years of searching, relatives of martyrs hugged Australian veterans and cried

According to information from the People’s Committee of Binh Duong province, this memorial service has 20 martyrs’ remains just found in a rubber garden in Choi Dung hamlet, Binh My commune, Bac Tan Uyen district, Binh Duong province. The search and unloading took place thoughtfully.

The martyrs found this time are officers and soldiers of the 7th Division of the South Vietnamese Liberation Army who died in a battle with the Royal Australian Army fighting in Vietnam in May 1968.

For two decades, many Australian veterans and relatives of Vietnamese martyrs have actively supported this search. They went directly to the rubber forest, determined the coordinates and dug up the ground to search for Vietnamese martyrs.

Mr. Luke Johnston Luc – The son of an Australian veteran also participated in this 20-year historical search. While in Vietnam, Mr. Luke Johnston Luc found his happiness – getting married with a Vietnamese girl, and living in Binh Phuoc.

“This is a very long story. After my father returned home from the war, he was haunted by the war in Vietnam. As a son, I wanted to do something for my father. I went to Vietnam. Nam and Mr. John Bryant (an Australian veteran who fought in the battles at Tan Uyen in the past) to find the remains of Vietnamese martyrs, we found the burial place of the paralyzed remains “Today, we are very moved,” Mr. Luke Johnston Luc shared.

At the memorial service, Mr. John Bryant – Australian veteran hugged the relatives of the Vietnamese martyrs and cried as he brought the remains of the martyrs to their final resting place in the Martyrs’ Cemetery of Binh Duong province.