Rank: Staff Sergeant
Unit: E Troop, 2nd Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment
MOS: 11D – Armor Reconnaissance Specialist
Awards: Bronze Star Medal, Purple Heart Medal, Army Commendation Medal with Valor Device, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal
Badges: Combat Infantryman Badge
Unit awards: Valorous Unit Award, Vietnamese Gallantry Cross with Palm device
Enlisted by: Regular
Date of birth: 6-Oct-1944
Hometown: Worth, Illinois
Marital status: Never Married
Campaign: Vietnam Conflict
Start of tour: 29-Jul-1967
Incident date: 10-May-1968
Date of casualty: 10-May-1968
Age at death: 23
Cause of death: Hostile, died. Explosive Device. Other explosive device.
James Leonard Matthews died from injury received while passenger on military vehicle on combat operation when vehicle hit hostile mine. / (Individual transported to 7th Surgical Hospital, Blackhorse base camp, Long Giao.)
Location of fatality: Long Khanh, South Vietnam, YS 429 938*
Place of interment: Chapel Hill Gardens South, Oak Lawn, Illinois, USA
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ARMY COMMENDATION MEDAL
WITH VALOR DEVICE
SERGEANT JAMES LEONARD MATTHEWS
6 JANUARY 1968
E TROOP, 2nd SQUADRON
11TH ARMORED CAVALRY REGIMENT
Sergeant Matthews distinguished himself on 6 January 1968, while serving as Point Man with Troop E, 2d Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment. Seeing a group of North Vietnamese soldiers trying to overrun a disabled tank, Sergeant Matthews alerted his fellow patrol members and immediately took the enemy under fire, thus providing the rest of his patrol time to secure defensive positions. Sergeant Matthews’ heroic actions are in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit the United States Army.
Headquarters, 9th Infantry Division General Orders No. 2538 (18 April 1968)