Soldier's Name Misspelled on Vietnam Wall

By Myles Collier, Christian Post Contributor Wednesday, January 04, 2012

A Vietnam veteran who served his country bravely had his name misspelled on a war memorial honoring fallen service members.

Sgt. Stephen Hiett Phillips of Springfield, Mo., was 23 and an expectant father when he was killed in combat two days after arriving in Vietnam in July 1965.

His name, like thousands of others, is etched in stone on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C. The only discrepancy was his first name being misspelled. On the wall, it is spelled "SHEPHEN."

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The error was probably made in one of the Combat Area Casualties current files that is computerized and maintained by the National Archives, it appears to stem from a list of Vietnam War dead dating to January 1967, according to USA Today.

Phillips’ name is correct on the Springfield National Cemetery headstone that marks where he rests.

Larry Thompson and Pete Neumann, who served in the same regiment, were outraged to learn of the mishap.

"One doesn't honor a person by misspelling their name," Pete Neumann told the News-Leader. He had notified several federal agencies and nonprofits in an attempt to have the error corrected.

The News-Leader reported Staff from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund notified those involved that the misspelling of Stephen H. Phillips' name had been corrected in the group's online database.

"We have made the change on our website, so 'Shephen' is now 'Stephen,'" Lee Allen, VVMF's director of communications said, according to the News-Leader.

Steve has tried to get his father's misspelled name corrected for years with no results. Knowing that others have been making a similar effort meant a great deal to him.

But Steve explains that it meant even more to learn their efforts may cause the correction of the memorial in Washington, D.C., since the change to the memorial's website has already been made.

"It makes me feel proud that the guys thought that much of my dad," he said.