Name: Manuel Reyes Denton
Rank/Branch: E4/US Navy
Unit: First Marine Air Wing, Fleet Marine Force Pacific
Date of Birth: 18 June 1941 (Sam Antonio TX)
Home City of Record: Kerrville TX
Date of Loss: 08 October 1963
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 160207N 1073440E (YC758744)
Status (in 1973): Killed/Body Not Recovered
Category: 3 -- Doubtful knowledge. This category contains individuals whose loss incident such that it is doubtful that the enemy would have knowledge of the specific individuals. (e.g., aircrews lost over water or remote areas.)
Aircraft/Vehicle/Ground: UH34D
Refno: 0019
Other Personnel In Incident: Luther E. Ritchey (missing)
Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 01 April 1990 from one or more of the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, correspondence with POW/MIA families, published sources, interviews. Updated by the 
P.O.W.NETWORK 1998.
REMARKS: ACFT CRASH AFT AIR COLLISION - J

SYNOPSIS 

In 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated and Lyndon Johnson took the office of the President of the United States. Few Americans had more than a passing knowledge of Vietnam, yet in February, a U.S. Senate panel reported that annual American aid to South Vietnam totaled $400 million. By the end of the year 16,300 Americans were on station there 
"on dangerous assignment." During this year, the war in Vietnam captured U.S.media attention when Buddhists staged demonstrations, revolts and self-immolations during that summer.

Lance Corporal Luther E. Ritchey, Jr. was attached to HMM 361, Marine Air Group 16. Hospital Corpsman Third Class Manuel Reyes Denton was a crewman assigned to the First Marine Air Wing, Fleet Marine Force Pacific. On October 8, 1963, the two were crewmen aboard a Marine UH34D helicopter conducting a search mission for a downed friendly aircraft.

Denton and Ritchey's aircraft crashed some 43 miles west of Da Nang, SouthVietnam in a mountainous jungle terrain, in what was then hostile territory. The exact cause of the accident is unknown (according to the Navy), although Joint Casualty Resolution Center had some evidence that an air collision occurred prior to the aircraft crashing.

Denton and Ritchey were initially placed in a casualty status of Missing and later changed to Reported Dead. Since their remains were never recovered,they are listed among the unaccounted for servicemen from the Vietnam war.

Denton and Ritchey are among nearly 2500 Americans still missing from the Vietnam war. Nearly 10,000 reports have been received regarding these men since war's end which have convinced many authorities that hundreds are still alive. Whether Denton and Ritchey are among them is unknown, but as long as even one man remains alive in enemy hands, we have failed as a nation.

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