Navy Lt. Melvin Spence Dry dropped out of a helicopter into choppy waters off the coast of North Vietnam in June 1972. On a highly classified mission to rescue two escaped American prisoners of war, he died the moment he hit the water.
But because the mission was top-secret, Dry's valor went officially unrecognized. No medals, no commendations and no place of honor among the fallen at the U.S. Naval Academy, where he graduated in 1968.
Even his parents were told that he died in a training exercise.
But his father, also an academy graduate, never bought that explanation.
He spent the rest of his life seeking the truth and arguing that his son should be honored, a cause picked up by Dry's Annapolis classmates after his father died in 1997.
Yesterday, in a ceremony in the academy's hallowed Memorial Hall that was attended by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Dry was awarded the Bronze Star posthumously.
Navy officials at the event could not recall the last time that someone had received the award so long after death.
"This gathering here today fulfills my parents' greatest wish," Dry's brother, Robert Dry, told about 200 people gathered in Memorial Hall.
Dry, a 1968 graduate of the Naval Academy who died at age 26, was the last member of the elite Navy SEALs to die during the Vietnam War, officials said.
Because the operation involved saving two escaped prisoners, details surrounding the mission in which he died remained classified for years, Navy officials said.
Even when details emerged, the military declined to honor Dry or any other SEAL for their efforts during the rescue mission.
Story opened doors
It wasn't until July 2005, when the publication Proceedings printed an article by two of Dry's former Naval Academy classmates, that the full circumstances of his death were revealed.
After reading the article, a Navy officer who was part of the rescue operation submitted an application for Dry to be awarded the Bronze Star.
"It took a long time for this recognition to manifest itself," Rear Adm. Joseph Kernan said at yesterday's ceremony. "Today is ... the result of tireless efforts of many of you."
The story of Dry's death began in early 1972, when U.S. airmen being held as prisoners of war at the infamous prison known as the "Hanoi Hilton" began planning an escape, according to Proceedings. The prisoners planned to steal a boat and travel down the Red River to the Gulf of Tonkin.
