Davis first local to die in combat since Vietnam

Davis first local to die in combat since Vietnam

Robert Davis is the first serviceman or servicewoman from Southeast Missouri to die in a war since Vietnam.

Earl Tharp, the 20-year-old son of a Cape Girardeau minister, was killed in June 1970 when enemy mortal fire hit his base camp in Vietnam.

Two years earlier, Robert Taylor was killed in the same war two years earlier. He was an Eagle Scout and 1964 Central High School graduate.

Robert Gregory, a 1950 graduate of Central High School, was shot down during a reconnaissance flight in December 1966. He was declared dead in 1973. His remains were identified in Vietnam in 1988.

Richard Wilson of Cape Girardeau died in the Korean War during an ambush. He had made it to safety but returned unarmed to help a comrade who was trying to crawl to safety. He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Capt. Daniel McCollum, the husband of former Cape Girardeau resident Jennifer McCollum, died in a plane crash in Pakistan in 2002. The seven men on the plane were the first U.S. service personnel to die in the beginning of the conflict in Afghanistan.

-- Sam Blackwell