Rank: Specialist 4
Unit: K Troop, 3rd Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment
MOS: 11D – Armor Reconnaissance Specialist
Awards: Bronze Star Medal with Valor Device, Purple Heart Medal, Army Commendation Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal
Badges: Combat Infantryman Badge
Unit awards: Meritorious Unit Citation, Vietnamese Gallantry Cross with Palm device
Enlisted by: Selected Service
Date of birth: 13-Jun-1946
Hometown: Trinidad, Colorado
Marital status: Never Married
Campaign: Vietnam Conflict
Entered service: 8-Nov-1965
Start of tour: 23-Aug-1966
Incident date: 21-May-1967
Date of casualty: 21-May-1967
Age at death: 20
Cause of death: Hostile, died. Grenade. Multiple fragmentation wounds.
Anthony Wilfred Roybal was passenger in armored personnel carrier on convoy escort mission when the vehicle was hit by hostile recoilless rifle fire.
Seventeen Blackhorse troopers died in this incident:
SP5 William Phillip Centers Jr
SGT Eugene Harold Dickinson
PVT Jerry Lee Houser
SP4 Toler Lee Hutchins Jr
SP4 Phillip Earl Ireland
SSG James Albert Jackson
SGT Alfred Lee
PFC Patrick Michael Loisel
SP4 Henry David McInnis
SP4 James David McWhorter
SP4 Anthony Wilfred Roybal
PFC Rodolfo Andres Saenz
SSG Walter Stephen Simpson
PFC William Charles Stanley
SP4 James Thomas Steighner
SP4 Dwight Elmer Timberlake
SP4 Larry Allen Williamson
Location of fatality: Long Khanh, South Vietnam, YT 564 054
Place of interment: Catholic Cemetery, Trinidad, Colorado, USA
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BRONZE STAR MEDAL
WITH VALOR DEVICE
POSTHUMOUS
SPECIALIST FOUR ANTHONY WILFRED ROYBAL
21 MAY 1967
K TROOP, 3rd SQUADRON
11TH ARMORED CAVALRY REGIMENT
Specialist Roybal distinguished himself by valorous actions on 21 May 1967, while serving as machine gunner and observer on an Armored Cavalry Assault Vehicle during a fierce encounter with the enemy on Route 1 near Soui Cat, Vietnam. As the armored convoy moved down a road bordered on both sides with brush and slight vegetation, it suddenly came under a murderous volume of automatic and recoilless rifle fire from a numerically superior Viet Cong force. During the ensuing action, Specialist Roybal’s vehicle received a direct hit from a recoilless rifle round and immediately burst into flames causing him to receive serious burns on the left side of his body. Without hesitation, Specialist Roybal gallantly lead the crew from the burning vehicle to another personnel carrier. Although suffering great pain, Specialist Roybal bravely manned a machine gun and engaged the enemy. So effective was Specialist Roybal’s fire that he suppressed a sector of the hostile fire. Greatly handicapped by his burns, Specialist Roybal nevertheless managed to reload and fire until he was again struck by insurgent fire and mortally wounded. Specialist Four Roybal’s personal bravery and devotion to duty were in keeping with the highest tradition of the military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the United State Army.
Headquarters, 9th Infantry Division General Orders No. 1928 (27 June 1967)