The WallVietnam Veterans Memorial · The Lake Norman Brief
Bomb craters along the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos, August 1970.
Bomb craters along the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos, August 1970. Photo: U.S. Air Force, public domain. Shown for the time and place, not a photograph of Robert Edward Sheridan.

The Wall › Panel 28W › California › Robert Edward Sheridan

ROBERT EDWARD SHERIDAN

First Lieutenant · U.S. Army

August 8, 1948 – March 26, 1969

Service record

Robert Edward Sheridan, of Placentia, California, served as a First Lieutenant in the U.S. Army. He died on March 26, 1969, in Laos, at age 20. His name is inscribed on Panel 28W, Line 52 of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

On the Wall

Panel 28W · Line 52

Position of Panel 28W on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial

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.

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Service

Branch
U.S. Army
Rank
First Lieutenant (1LT)
Service
Reserve / National Guard
Occupation
Infantry Unit Commander (1542)
Unit (as recorded)
SPECIAL FORCES
Born
August 8, 1948
Home of record
Placentia, California (Orange County)

Casualty

Date of death
March 26, 1969
Age
20
Country
Laos
Casualty type
Hostile
Category
Killed in Action
Circumstance
Small Arms Fire

Context · from the records

What was happening

71 names on the Wall carry the date March 26, 1969. In March 1969, 1,553 Americans whose names are on the Wall died in the war.

Special Forces, his unit in the record, lost 20 of its members that month.

He died in Laos while the air war over Laos was under way. From 1964 to 1973, U.S. aircraft bombed the Ho Chi Minh Trail and supported the war in northern Laos; many of the Americans lost over Laos were never recovered.

Read the history

On the Wall

Elsewhere

Also on Panel 28W, Line 52

From Placentia

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.