Father and son remembered for their sacrifice in Vietnam

Ask the average American adult what war the country was fighting 50 years ago today, and most would remember without difficulty: Vietnam.

But ask who was that war’s first casualty and most people would draw a blank on Richard B. Fitzgibbon Jr., of Weymouth, who was killed on June 8, 1956, the first acknowledged American service death in the conflict. And even fewer people would know that Fitzgibbon’s son, Richard III, incredibly also lost his life in Vietnam, nine years after his father.

As the United States begins to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War with events and ceremonies honoring those who served, the Fitzgibbons are in a rare place in the long history of the conflict. One of only two confirmed father-son tandems to die in the war, their names are etched on the wall of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., as well as on a more modest stone in the Vietnam Memorial Park in Weymouth.

But it took some effort — over 15 years, in fact, by his sister and others — to get the elder Fitzgibbon’s death officially recognized as a war casualty.