As Nellie Elliot Price of Unionville started to sit down at the small table for four in the kitchen, she said "honey, I know I am going to cry because even though it happened a long time ago, I still cry my eyes out. I remember him telling me in a letter that he had not had taken his combat boots off nor had a bath in two weeks. He said that his feet were aching." She said that she felt so bad that her child's feet were hurting because of his athlete's foot and there was absolutely nothing she could do to help. She said that his feet really hurt him a lot.
Even though twenty three years had passed since the Army told her that her son, Staff Sergeant Charles Mitchell Price, had died in Vietnam, the emotions are as fresh for her as they were the day she learned that her son had been killed.
Staff Sergeant Price was born in Monroe, North Carolina even though his father Staff Sergeant Louie Price was a career soldier in the military and they did not live in Monroe. Nellie stated that she had each one of her three children in Monroe because she had heard that they were mean in the military hospitals so she came home to have her three children. She later learned that the rumor she heard about military hospitals was untrue.
Nellie fondly remembers when Charles would put his father's army boots and hat on and running around the house playing soldier. She said that he loved to play army and he wanted to be a soldier when he grew up.
Staff Sergeant Price attended Benton Heights Elementary School and Monroe High School. He did not like school and wanted to join the Army.
She had to sign for him to go into the Army because he was only seventeen but she knew that was what he wanted to do. He entered the military in 1964 and completed his basic training at Ft Gordon in Georgia. The Army assigned him to Germany, then to Korea, and finally to Vietnam. He served his tour in Vietnam of four years, then left the military, and went home.
He worked for two years as fireman for the Monroe Fire Department however he became unhappy when his marriage broke up. He told his mother one day that he was going to see a military friend in Florida. She pleaded with him not to go because she knew that his friend would convince him to re-enlist in the military and she would never see him again. She said that she cried and cried and no one in her family really understood because she knew deep down in her heart that she would never see him again. She was right.
He re-enlisted in Florida and the Army assigned him to Korea and after six months he was sent to Vietnam for a second tour of duty. Staff Sergeant Price died six months after returning to Vietnam.
Nellie received a letter from her son just before he died on January 7, 1971, giving her a list of what he wanted her to cook for the coming Christmas "because there was no doubt in his military mind that he would be home for Christmas". His list included turkey, dressing, sweet potato pie, and chocolate pie.
Staff Sergeant Price also told her in the last letter she received from him, that his platoon was going to the Cambodian border.
The Army told the family that "he died leading the men of his squad on a protective reaction mission during which they made contact with a hostile force of an unknown size. When his unit engaged the enemy, with complete disregard for his own safety, he exposed himself to the intense hostile fire as he moved forward to the point of heaviest contact and began placing a heavy volume of suppressive fire upon the insurgent forces. During the firefight that followed, Charles was mortally wounded by enemy small arms fire. It may afford you some comfort to know that death came quickly and he was not subject to any suffering. He was truly a soldier's soldier, greatly respected and admired by all who knew and worked with him."
The Republic of South Vietnam also sent his mother a letter stating that her son was a "serviceman of courage and rare self-sacrifice, who displayed at all times the most tactful cooperation while aiding the Armed Forces of the Republic of Vietnam."
He received the Purple Heart medal, the Good Conduct Medal, the National Defense Service Ribbon, the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal for service in Korea, the Vietnam Service Medal, and the Bronze Star with Oak Leaf.
Nellie said that his sister wrote him a letter while he was in Vietnam, complaining that her boy friend was being sent to Vietnam for that "useless war" and he sent her a letter back, telling her that it was not a useless war because they were over there fighting for freedom because if they did not, they would be fighting for freedom at home.
Staff Sergeant Price was twenty-three when he was killed and he is buried in Lakeland Cemetery in Monroe.
Nellie stated that she did not visit the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial in Washington, DC with her other son because she knew that it would really upset her. She is really glad that the Moving Wall is coming to Indian Trail so she can finally see her son's name on the Wall.