SEXTON, JOHN CALVIN, Jr.

Name: John C. Sexton Jr.
Rank/Branch: E4/United States Army
Unit:
Date of Birth:
Home City of Record: Detroit, MI
Date of Loss: 12 August 1969
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates:163635 North 1064125 East
Status (in 1973): Returnee
Category:
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: APC
Missions:
Other Personnel in Incident:
Refno 1480

Source: Compiled by P.O.W. NETWORK from one or more of the
following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources,
correspondence with POW/MIA families, published sources,
interviews, "SPITE HOUSE, the Last Secret of the War in Vietnam",
by Monika Jensen-Stevenson, published 1997, Norton Publishing.

REMARKS: 711008 RELEASED

QUOTED from SPITE HOUSE, page 161

"Unreceptive certainly describes the attitude encountered by recently
upgraded* Army Staff Sergeant John Sexton, who in 1971 was suddenly and
without warning released from a VC prison camp near the Cambodian border.
The possibility existed that the camp was actually inside a part of
Cambodia controlled by communist guerrillas. It was difficult for POWs to
decipher their precise location. At first Sexton was accompanied by NVA
soldiers who made him walk point, as the Air Force man ldlled by First
Force Recon had been made to do, but he was then abandoned near the small
town of Snoul in Cambodia to make his own way back. Sexton, who was
dressed in black pyjamas and carried a message from the communists asldng
for reciprocity for his release, said that once he reached American lines
no one on his own side was interested, other than to impress upon him that
be was to keep his mouth shut. For a long time he felt that it might have
been more convenient for his own side if he had died in prison camp. For
years after his return, he could not speak at meetings held by the families
of other prisoners without an ever-present government representative to
insure his silence. He still feels that his own government had somehow
become persuaded that he bad been turned by the communists and that was why
he had been chosen to be released. His only crime was to have fallen into
the hands of the enemy after being severely wounded. He was shot in the
head, blinded in one eye, and incapacitated in one arm. His medical care
was minimal but be is still grateful that the enemy applied the primitive
medicine of setting maggots to clean out his wounds. He suffered torture
and interrogation for two years. There was never any proof that he had in
any way collaborated with the enemy.





*Sexton was a corporal when he was captured. Under U.S. law American
POWs were automatically upgraded in rank at certain intervals."

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