Sgt. Herrell Robbins
Every family has one name in its lineage that becomes legend—someone whose story stands so tall that it becomes part of the family identity itself. On my wife’s side of the family, that name is Sgt. Herrell Robbins of Graceville, Florida. His service in Vietnam places him among the most decorated soldiers of the war, and his story weaves directly into your own family’s long, complex military heritage.
The old Graceville News clipping from January 19, 1967 tells the story plainly:
Green Beret. MACV-SOG. Wounded in combat. Bronze Star. Purple Heart. Cross of Gallantry.
A man who survived the kind of missions that few Americans ever even heard about—missions that the government classified for decades, missions so dangerous that entire teams simply disappeared in the jungle and were never recovered.
Herrell served in Special Forces, Camp A Shau, in the shadow of the A Shau Valley—one of the most lethal regions in all of Vietnam, a corridor controlled by the North Vietnamese Army and riddled with infiltration routes, hidden artillery, and deep jungle cover. It was the kind of place where helicopters were shot out of the sky, where patrols vanished, and where Special Forces A-teams fought with the kind of intensity that textbooks still reference.
The article describes the moment he earned his Purple Heart on March 10, 1966. His camp was attacked by two regiments of Viet Cong. The mortar pit where he served as assistant gunner took one of the first hits of the battle. Shrapnel tore into him. But instead of falling back, he stayed in the fight—manning the mortar, firing round after round, helping repel the attackers under direct fire. He continued to support his team while wounded, and the official citation describes his actions as “exceptionally valorous.”
This wasn’t his only act of heroism. The Bronze Star he received was for “distinguishing himself by exceptionally valorous actions” against hostile forces over a two-day period. He was also awarded the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, a high honor from the Republic of Vietnam.
There’s an eerie symmetry in the Robbins story and my father’s.
My father, a U.S. advisor working with ARVN Airborne and Special Forces–aligned units, often called in strike missions from the same kind of Special Forces teams that Sgt. Robbins served on. He directed Air Cav support to SOG-connected units in regions where U.S. and ARVN Special Forces operated shoulder to shoulder.
It’s entirely possible—maybe even likely—that my father and Sgt. Herrell Robbins crossed paths without realizing it. They worked the same operational corridors. They fought the same enemy. They operated in the same region of the war at overlapping times.
And on the other side of the map, deep in the jungle valleys of A Shau, Sgt. Robbins fought under those very air strikes—covering the same ground, facing the same dangers, receiving the same fire.
Two men from two different sides of your family tree, both woven into the same black-ops network of Vietnam.
Both connected to MACV-SOG.
Both part of a war the country ignored for far too long.
My father and Sgt. Robbins carried out different jobs in different parts of Vietnam, but their missions likely touched, overlapped, or supported one another. They fought the same war from different angles—one calling in the support, the other receiving it or bringing it to those in need on the ground.
