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From the 1/14th
Daily Journal for 20 NOVEMBER 1966.
20 NOVEMBER 1966 After the action of the day before, the battalion
spent a restless night, to say the least. With Three companies remaining not
more than 500 meters from the contact area, the enire battalion, as well as
the brigade, was geared to react to anything the enemy might try during the
night or early morning. Everything proved quiet, however, except for a jumpy
NVA OP who fired off and on until Arty was adjusted in on his general
vicinity. The first job this morning was to police the battle area. Three
men from Co C (McGowan, Machado and Belcher), were still out in the battle
area. They were known KIA's, but their bodies were not brought in the night
before due to intense enemy fire brought upon the recovery party. Co C,
under their acting company commander, Capt Beal, was moved out on a sweep of
the area. Their three bodies were recovered as well as a large quantity of
US equipment from the wounded and dead. A great number of enemy dead were
also found. This sweep of only about one fourth of the area resulted in a
NVA body count of 166.
During the sweep, the wounded and dead at "Dragon's Crater" were evacuated
and the companies prepared to move back to LZ "Lane". A B-52 strike covering
the battle area had been laid on and the time on target was 1500 hrs. This
meant that the companies had to be back at LZ "Lane" prior to the strike.
This move was made with no problems.
Co B, 1/35th which had been dropped in the previous day as a reaction force, linked up along the route. This put a total of five companies at the fire support base, a formidable force if "Charlie" wanted to try anything tonight.
A few personnel changes, due to casualties suffered yesterday, were also put into effect today. Lt. Terry Scott, who had been scheduled to take over Company B, became Co B's commander today and Captain Childers, coming from the Bde "3" shop, took over Co C.
21 NOVEMBER 1966 Following yesterday's B-52 strike, the order for the
day was to send three companies, A, B, and C 2/35 back down into the area to
make an assessment and recover any additional equipment they could find.
This was done with the companies mentioned above. Co A and Co B, 2/35 moved down on two axes to "Dragon Crater". They remained there until Co C could come up to within 400 meters and act as a reaction force and Lt. Col. Procter with his forward Cmd CP closed into "Dragon Crater".
Just prior to moving out, Co A's OP's saw and received fire from an estimated five to six NVA. Fire was returned with 2 NVA KIA as a result. This action seemed to clear out the area and Co B 2/35 under Capt McQuillan moved out to the west to come up on the line with Co A. With both companies on line, the sweep moved out.
About 200 meters south of "Dragon Crater" (YA602500) the right flank platoon from Co B 2/35 came under fire. This platoon was pinned down for a short while until Arty and air coupled with covering fire from the other platoons allowed them to pull back a little ways. With approximately a 50 - 100 meter buffer zone between the enemy and Captain McQuillan's men Arty, and air support was brought in on the enemy position. Following the strike, we again moved forward and again received fire. Co B 2/35 finally did reach one bunker and found a still smoking RPD MG and one dead NVA hastily buried, at this point, Col Procter decided to pull back and let the air and arty pound the area. This was done.
During this period of Co B's contact, Co A remained on line. No fire was directed toward them and they simply held their position. The engineers worked on destroying all the bunkers covered by the sweep.
The two companies pulled back into "Dragon Crater" for the night. Co C remained in a company perimeter 400 meters north of the crater. With a total of 7 NVA KIA for the day and no friendly casualties at all, the "Golden Dragons" had a "good" day.
