Uncle Bill

My only Uncle on my mother's side was William Tully. He joined the Air Force after college to become a pilot. Actually he eventually wanted to try to get into the Astronaut program. So to enhance his career, he volunteered for the 1st Air Commando Wing, heading for Viet Nam in the fall of 1961.

He flew as navigator on a B-26. They flew actual combat missions when supposedly we were just in an "advisory" status over there.

Each aircrew was to fly100 missions before rotating back to the States. A good friend of my Uncle Bill was shot down with a few missions left before rotating. Due to only having a handful of aircrew over there, my Uncle volunteered to fly out the remaining missions after he had already completed his 100. 5 November 1962, on his 109th mission, their plane was shot down near Ca Mau and Uncle Bill and the entire crew were killed.

I was pretty young and never got to spend too much time around my Uncle Bill, but I was really drawn to his military life. He showed me around one of the planes he flew in. Let me wear his combat gear, gave me an ammo can to keep my treasures in. He will always be my hero.