DOB/DOD: July 7, 1943 (Zanesville, OH) – June 8, 1969; 25 years old
MARITAL STATUS: Unmarried
ENLISTMENT: April 18, 1968
SERVICE NUMBER: N2337550
MILITARY OCCUPATIONAL SPECIALTY: 3448 = Medical-Surgical Nurse
TOUR START DATE: April 24, 1968
UNIT: 312th Evacuation Hospital
CASUALTY LOCATION: Chu Lai, Quang Tin Province
DECORATIONS: Awarded the Purple Heart Medal, the Bronze Star Medal with “V” device for valor, the National Defense Service Medal, the Vietnam Service Medal, the National Order of Vietnam Medal, and the Vietnamese Gallantry Cross (with Palm).
THE WALL: Panel 23W, Line 112
FAMILY: Born to John E. (1918-1979) and Mary K. Buker Lane (1924-2015). One sister, Judith K. Lane Tritt (1943-), and one brother, Gary E. (1945-).
CIRCUMSTANCES: On the morning of June 8, 1969, the 312th Evacuation Hospital was struck by a salvo of 122mm rockets fired by the Viet Cong. One rocket struck between Wards 4A and 4B, killing two people and wounding another twenty-seven. Among the dead was 1LT Lane, who died instantly of fragmentation wounds to the chest. She was one month shy of her twenty-sixth birthday.
Canton (OH) High School South, Class of 1961 yearbook
She moved with her family to North Industry, in Stark County, Ohio, at the age of two, where she attended North Industry Grade School. She graduated from Canton South High School in June 1961 and entered Aultman Hospital School of Nursing in September 1961. After graduation on 25 April 1965, she went to work at the hospital until May 1967, when she left to join the business world. After three quarters at the Canton Business College, she left to join the United States Army Nurse Corps Reserve on 18 April 1968. She began basic training on 5 May 1968 at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, with the rank of Second Lieutenant, graduating on 14 June 1968. Three days later, she reported to Fitzsimons General Hospital in Denver, Colorado, where she began work in three outlying TB wards. While here, she is promoted to First Lieutenant and sent to work in the cardiac division’s intensive care unit and recovery room. On 24 April 1969, she reported to Travis Air Force Base, California, with orders to proceed to Vietnam. Arrived at the 312th Evacuation Hospital at Chu Lai on 29 April 1969, and went to work in the intensive care ward for a few days before being assigned to the Vietnamese ward. She then worked five days a week, with 12-hour days, in this ward, and on the sixth day, she worked in intensive care. “During the early morning hours of 8 June 1969, a Soviet-built 122mm rocket slammed into Ward 4 of the 312th Evacuation Hospital in Chu Lai, Vietnam. She died instantly. Though seven other American military women lost their lives serving in Vietnam, Lieutenant Lane becomes the only servicewoman killed as a direct result of enemy fire throughout the war.”
She was honored in many ways since her death. The Daughters of the American Revolution named her “Outstanding Nurse of the Year for 1969,” and she received the ‘Anita Newcomb McGee Medal’ at their annual Continental Congress in Washington, D.C. on 22 April 1970. On 11 November 1969, Veterans Day, the Fitzsimmons Hospital named its recovery room the ” Lane Recovery Suite ” in her memory, with a plaque and poem by a classmate in Morrow House (the Nursing School Residence Hall) in her honor. The 1970 class of Aultman dedicated their yearbook in her honor as well. On 18 October 1970, Faircrest Memorial Junior High School was dedicated to Sharon and four other servicemen from the area who lost their lives in Vietnam, with a plaque for each, placed at the entrance to the school. On Memorial Day, 29 May 1973, a statue was dedicated in front of Aultman Hospital by the William F. Cody Garrison # 30 of
The Army / Navy Union, with the statue being built with funds raised in the community, and was one of the first Vietnam memorials constructed in the United States. In March 1986, Aultman Hospital opened the Sharon Ann Lane Women’s Center in its main lobby. Two months later, on 26 May 1986, Canton Chapter # 199 of the Vietnam Veterans of America officially became the Sharon Lane Chapter # 199. There are two roads named for Sharon: one in Denver, Colorado, and the other at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. On 12 September 1995, Fort Hood, Texas, dedicated the Sharon Lane Volunteer Center. A permanent display in her honor can be viewed at the Ohio Society of Military History in Massillon, Ohio.
From the VVMF Wall of Faces
I met Lt Lane on two occasions. As a Navy Hospital Corpsman attached to the Marine Air Group – 13 Dispensary in Chu Lai, I, along with other MAG-13 corpsmen, would occasionally wander around ChuLai visiting various medical facilities looking for medical supplies we were short of. Sometimes these comshaw runs were productive, other times they were not.
On one such occasion, we stopped at the 312th to look up their supply sergeant. I ran across one of the 312th personnel whom I slightly knew. He was talking with this attractive young nurse, and he introduced Lt Lane to me. We all talked for a few minutes, and then I finished my business and left. A couple of weeks later, we were back to the 312th. I was just getting out of our vehicle when I heard this voice say, “Petty Officer Bruneel”. It was Lt Lane. Again, we talked for a few minutes, and I left on my business. Sometime during the next week or so, we heard that the 312th had been hit and that a nurse had been killed. I found out a few days later that it was Lt Lane.
I lost an acquaintance that day, but we in the world lost so much when this bright light was extinguished.
Rest in Peace Lt Lane
— John F. Bruneel
I was the Supply Sergeant at the 312th Evac when Sharon was killed. Because there were a couple of medical personnel in my hooch who worked on Ward 4, I had met Lt. Lane. The night before she died, I was sitting in front of my hooch when Sharon walked by on her way to work. We called to her and she came over. We were drinking beer. I asked if she wanted a beer. She said she would take half a glass. That was unusual, because mostly no one drank beer from a glass, and a “half” at that. I gave her the beer. I usually took some sort of food up to Ward 4 in the evening. That night, I had a very large can of raviolis and I cooked them up and took them to Ward 4. I don’t know if she ate any or not. When the rocket hit, we went to the bunker out back. Then someone said it hit Ward 4. We ran up there, but…… well, there was a gaping hole where the hallway was between Ward 4A and Ward 4B. I guess I also inventoried her belongings. I went to her services. We all cried. I cry every time I go to The Wall and see her name there. Not long known, but long remembered! God Bless You Missy!
— Gary Del Carlo
One sunny Sunday morning, while still half asleep, I wandered out of my hootch and I’m making a ‘beeline’ straight to the mess hall to get some coffee. On the way, I encounter a few guys coming in from perimeter guard duty. I ask, “Why are you coming in so late”? It is now sometime after 0700, and guard duty usually only lasts till daybreak. I’m told that they were told to stay on till further notice because they heard that MAG-13 had taken some incoming during the night. That seemed odd, because even though I was only in country a few months, that was the only time I had heard of incoming in or around Chu Lai. As a matter of fact, that was the only time while I was in Chu Lai. I was there from 04-69 to 03-70 with C Co 9th Engr Bn in a compound with the Army’s 26th Engineers. This is what we called a ‘secure’ area. We used to do night patrols around the perimeter, and sometimes I would look down on Chu Lai, with all its lights, and comment that it looked like ‘downtown LA’. This was my Vietnam, I had a 8 to 4 everyday job, 6 days a week, with Sundays off unless you pulled night guard duty. The war that was ‘hell’ was being there. I once heard that for every ‘grunt’ in the bush, there were 5 to 7 people in support of him.
So this Sunday was not any different from really any other Sunday except for the incoming incident. A few weeks go by, and I receive a letter from my mother. She starts the letter asking, “Were you near the nurse that was killed in Chu Lai”? I now have no idea what she is talking about. She goes on to tell me that she read it in the Philadelphia Bulletin, and to my Mom, if it was in the Bulletin, it was like it came straight out of the Bible. In her next couple of letters, she keeps mentioning the ‘nurse’, and my replies were that I did not know. It got to the point that I remember writing her and telling her that Chu Lai was so ‘dead’ it was like a ‘graveyard’. Not a very good analogy. You see, my Mom had two sons serve in Vietnam. My older brother had just returned from RVN in 09-68, while serving with the 1st Cav in and around Tam Ky, Hill 10, and 29. He also came home with 2 Purple Hearts and 2 Bronze Stars. So my Mom figured that if he got that kind of hardware with the Army, that things were not going to be very pretty for me. Oh, how wrong she was, and all that worrying for nothing. And I spent my whole tour trying to convince her of this.
Even after my return to the States, my Mom had mentioned that incident a few times, still not believing me, or that I was keeping something from her. My Mom passed away on 06-04-2002, and I’m still not sure if she believed me.
Since sometime in April of 2002, I have been logging on to the Vietnam Memorial Fund site and mainly going over profiles of men killed in action on that day. I have also been on the Virtual Wall site, where the name of a female Lieutenant caught my eye. I clicked on to her memorial because it was different to me to be looking up a female, the first that I had seen on either site. This was sometime in the middle of June, while I was off on bereavement leave from my job, for my Mom’s funeral. I read all the info from the site and could not believe that this must be the nurse that my Mom kept talking about. I double checked dates, to make sure, 06-08-69, I was there in Chu Lai at that time, and she has to be the one.
Now I am saying to myself, how did I miss her profile on June 8th? After going back in my mind to figure out why I would have missed it, it occurs to me that was the day that my Mom was buried. I did not get on the computer that day. Now I am beating myself in the head, figuratively speaking, about all this, and about June 8th in my life. To go back,
06-08-69—-The ‘incoming’ incident in Chu Lai, RVN.
06-08-70—-One year later, my oldest sister’s son, Kevin, is born. She had asked me to stand as Godfather for her child when she found out that she was pregnant, around 10-69.
06-08-79—-Ten years to the day my only daughter was born, LeeAnn.
06-08-02—-Thirty-three years to the day, my Mom is buried.
Coincidence, maybe, but still strange to me.
I do know who the ‘nurse’ is now, and hopefully my Mother believes me; it has only taken 33 years.
— Jim McIlhenney; USMC 68-70; Chu Lai, RVN 69-70
Honored on the Women’s Veterans Monument behind the Destin-Fort Walton Beach Convention Center, 1250 Miracle Strip Parkway SE, Fort Walton Beach, Florida
On November 11, 2021, Okaloosa County unveiled the Women Veterans Monuments, honoring women who have served and made significant contributions in the U.S. Military throughout history. Sharon Lane is one of the eight women honored.
Honored with a street naming, Sharon A. Lane Drive on Fort Belvoir, Virginia. Photos from the US Army Medical Department Center of History and Heritage on Facebook.
Buried in Sunset Hills Burial Park, 5001 Everhard Road NW, Canton, Ohio; Section 18, Row 6 from the east side, Plot 181. Photo from FindAGrave.com and contributor Rebecca Ellis.
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