The Wall › Panel 44E › Missouri › Donald Wayne Bean
DONALD WAYNE BEAN
Sergeant Major · U.S. Marine Corps
January 16, 1926 – March 11, 1968
Service recordDonald Wayne Bean, of Holt, Missouri, served as a Sergeant Major in the U.S. Marine Corps. He died on March 11, 1968, in Quang Tri Province, South Vietnam, at age 42. His name is inscribed on Panel 44E, Line 13 of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
On the Wall
Panel 44E · Line 13
Names are inscribed in the order of loss, starting at Panel 1E at the apex and ending at Panel 1W. At the Memorial, find the panel number at the base and count down from the top line.
Remember
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Service
- Branch
- U.S. Marine Corps
- Rank
- Sergeant Major (SGTMAJ)
- Service
- Regular
- Born
- January 16, 1926
- Home of record
- Holt, Missouri (Clay County)
Casualty
- Date of death
- March 11, 1968
- Age
- 42
- Province
- Quang Tri
- Country
- South Vietnam
- Casualty type
- Hostile
- Category
- Killed in Action
- Circumstance
- Artillery/Mortar/Rocket
Context · from the records
What was happening
54 names on the Wall carry the date March 11, 1968; six of them were lost in Quảng Trị Province. In March 1968, 1,767 Americans whose names are on the Wall died in the war.
He died in Quảng Trị Province while the siege of Khe Sanh was under way. From 21 January 1968, North Vietnamese divisions besieged the Marine combat base at Khe Sanh and its hill outposts near the Laotian border for 77 days, while U.S. aircraft dropped some 100,000 tons of bombs around it. Operation Pegasus reached the base on 8 April. The casualty record gives the province and date, not the exact place, so it does not say whether he fell in the battle itself.
Read the history
Also on Panel 44E, Line 13
- JAMES WILBURN WOODSpecialist Four · March 10, 1968
- STEPHEN MICHAEL WORLEYCorporal · March 10, 1968
- WILLIAM ALBERT ANDREWSPrivate First Class · March 11, 1968
- CLARENCE FINLEY BLANTONLieutenant Colonel · March 11, 1968
Source. U.S. Department of Defense, Defense Casualty Analysis System, Vietnam Conflict Extract Data File (as of April 29, 2008), Records of the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Record Group 330, National Archives (NAID 2240992). Panel and line as recorded in that file. This page presents the official record and its historical context; no biography has been written for him yet. See something wrong? Report a correction.