D Company Bunker-Complex Contact — June 4, 1968 (YD324393)
June 4, 1968 — Bunker Complex, YD324393
Research stub. Built from a single secondary source (a veteran-transcribed company daily journal). The casualty tie to PFC Brian Winner below is a candidate identification, not a confirmed one — the journal never names individuals.
At 1345 hours on June 4, 1968, D Company, 2nd Battalion, 8th Cavalry engaged North Vietnamese Army forces in a bunker complex at grid YD324393, using automatic-weapons fire; supporting scout helicopters also took fire. Brigade intelligence had assessed a 10th Sapper Battalion command post essentially at the same location, YD323392. The company also took incoming 60mm mortar fire — 13 rounds — during the action. One NVA KIA (a rice carrier) was noted at 1000 hours, separate from the contact itself.
The company suffered one US KIA, whose body was not recovered that day — he was carried missing in action — and one US WIA from fragmentation.
Recovery, three days later
On June 7, the journal records that a US KIA was found at grid YD325391 (1105 hours) and identified by the platoon leader as the man missing since June 4; his remains were partially decomposed. Five additional NVA KIA from the intervening June 5-6 fighting, and a captured SKS rifle, were found in the same area.
The candidate match
PFC Brian Carl Winner's roster date of death is June 7, 1968 — matching this recovery/identification date rather than the June 4 date of the actual contact. That offset is the pattern this source repeats throughout: the journal was kept in the rear, and personnel status could lag well behind the tactical action itself. Virtual Wall independently records his cause of death as hostile fire, died outright, in Quang Tri Province — consistent with being killed in the contact itself rather than dying later of wounds, which fits the "carried MIA, recovered days later" account better than a delayed death would. He had arrived in-country May 13, 1968, about three weeks before this action. See Brian Winner for the full profile.
Next source needed
The 2/8 Cav daily staff journal (NARA RG 472, 4-7 June 1968) would confirm the casualty by name and resolve the exact circumstances of the recovery.
If you served with D Company, 2nd Battalion, 8th Cavalry in early June 1968, we'd like to hear from you. A bunker-complex action on June 4, 1968 near LZ Anne cost the company a man carried missing for three days before his body was recovered and identified. Any memory of this action, or of PFC Brian Winner, helps complete the record.
Share what you know →