One Mission Too Many

His name was Kelly--Major Charles Kelly, of Sylvania, Ga.--but in the manner of combat soldiers the world over, his men seldom called him by anything but his nicknames. One was "Little Napoleon," because he was only a shade over 5 ft. 6 in. tall, had intense blue eyes and a shock of unruly black hair. They also called him "Madman Kelly," for during his six months in the South Viet Nam war, he flew more helicopter missions than any of the men he led.

As commanding officer of the U.S. Army's 57th Medical Detachment, Kelly insisted on rotating his men on dangerous night rescue missions, but kept his own name at the top of every flight roster. Of the 1,600 casualties his five UH-1B choppers had lifted from the paddies of the Mekong Delta this year, more than 500 were carried by Kelly himself. "He worked day and night, seven days a week," said one of his lieutenants. "He wouldn't even take a beer in the evening for fear it might affect his flying. He had only one purpose: to get wounded men under medical care."

One day last week a familiar message came over the field radio in Kelly's headquarters; five Vietnamese and one American soldier had been shot in a fire fight near Cantho. As usual, Madman Kelly led the flight. As his "Huey" fluttered loudly into the paddyfield, the big red crosses on its side shone brightly in the high noon sun. Twenty feet away, the survivors and the wounded lay pinned down in their foxholes as Viet Cong ground fire crackled from a nearby wood line. So Kelly calmly lifted the Huey off the ground and began to "walk" it sideways toward the wounded men.

Now the Viet Cong shifted their sights, began socking bullets into the helicopter. A steel-jacketed slug snapped through the Plexiglas, and Kelly slumped over the controls. The Huey crashed and rolled over, injuring the rest of the crewmen. Somehow they managed to pull the major from the wreckage, and went to work on Kelly's wound. It was in vain, for he was shot through the heart--the 149th American to die in action.

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