Vietnam vets pay final tribute to fallen Connemara comrade

Date Published: 17-Apr-2013

A group of Vietnam veterans clubbed together to pay lasting tribute to a fallen comrade, buried back home in Connemara – by paying for a new headstone on his overgrown grace.

It was a chance encounter that led one of the former US Marines to the grave of Peter Nee, a native of Bunahown in Cashel, who was killed in a landmine explosion in Vietnam in 1969.

But when Cottrel Fox saw the overgrown state of his fellow Marine’s grave, he contacted both his old colleagues and the Nee family to see if they could erect a new headstone.

All agreed – and the 21 year old Connemara man’s grave on the hillside in High Cashel cemetery now boasts a second, new headstone alongside the original.

It bears the inscription ‘Peter M. Nee, age 21, killed in action in Vietnam in 1969’ – a tribute from Marines to a comrade who fell in battle 44 years ago.

See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.