Harlan Chapman, the longest-lived Marine POW in the Vietnam War, has died at the age of 89

By the summer of 1965, just months after the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade landed in Da Nang, the intensity of the Vietnam War had increased dramatically. The rules of engagement had also increased.

It was reported that President Lyndon B. Johnson stated that U.S. pilots could not bomb annexes without his authorization. Frustrated pilots found themselves "flying into heavily defended areas on predictable trajectories at great risk and with often symbolic results", Stuart I. Rochester writes in the book Battle Behind Bars.

This was the environment in which Capt. Harlan Page Chapman and his comrades in Fighter Squadron 212 found themselves in the early months of the war. More than 30 American pilots had already been killed or reported missing in action, and more than a dozen were captured.

After six frustrating and difficult months, Chapman soon discovered that Johnson's joke about the outhouse was actually all too real.

Chapman was born in 1934 in Elyria, Ohio, and joined the U.S. Marine Corps in June 1956 as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Navy's ROTC program at the University of Miami, where he served for over a decade before finding himself in the dense jungles of North Vietnam from the cockpit of his Vought F8 Crusader aircraft.

During a sortie on Nov. 5, 1965, Chapman's strike group was tasked to strike a heavily defended railroad and highway bridge deep in enemy territory in Hai Duong. The target required a dangerous high-speed, low-altitude approach, according to Chapman's Distinguished Flying Cross award.

"As the pilot of the last aircraft of a large strike group of 32 strike planes targeting the target, he bravely and skillfully maneuvered his aircraft, despite intense and deadly anti-aircraft fire, dive-bombed the target and dropped bombs on the bridge", his award reads.

Hit by anti-aircraft fire, Chapman was forced to eject, dislocating his shoulder in the process.

Chapman thus became the first Marine pilot to be shot down in North Vietnam.

"There were Vietnamese all around me", Chapman recalled in a 2015 interview with The Chronicle. "I regained consciousness after a very soft landing, knee-deep in mud - I wasn't going anywhere. Local militia picked me up and walked me through the streets, and that night I ended up in [the Heartbreak section of] the Hanoi Hilton".

With his feet shackled and his hands tied tightly behind his back, Chapman began to endure the first of many interrogations.

"They pulled out a gun", he told The Stockdale Center. "They threatened to shoot me ... and after a while the pain got so bad that I realized I had to do something ... so I gave them names, like Clark Kent ... just all kinds of made-up names".

"It went on too long. I felt like hell for not sticking to my name, rank, and service number. You felt like you'd really failed if I was cool enough..".

Chapman was then placed next to several other airmen in a holding cell where communication between prisoners was strictly forbidden.

According to historian Jeffrey Norman, the men were thrown into solitary confinement, shackled, bound with ropes, and beaten when they were caught trying to socialize.

However, for many, it was worth the risk. Using a method known as the "tap code", prisoners were able to communicate and form organizations.

"They're in just as much shit as you are", he said in an interview with The Stockdale Center, recalling the budding camaraderie in the cells.

Still, he admitted, he had never felt so alone.

The Marine spent more than seven years in the infamous POW camp, 2,657 days in captivity, before becoming the first Marine Corps POW from the Vietnam War to be released during Operation Homecoming on February 12, 1973.

"In the space allotted, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to recount his treatment during his seven years of captivity", Chapman recalled in an interview with the Columbus Federal Voice. "However, I can summarize my opinion of the treatment by saying that it was basically brutal. I was tortured many times in captivity, using ropes, handcuffs, isolation and beatings".

According to his wife, Francis "Fran" Chapman, despite his suffering, held no animosity toward the Vietnamese people.

"He was not a public POW", she told The Chronicle publication. "Harlan was very quiet. He thought it was much more important that people knew who he was now and what his character was. ... He didn't advertise his time in captivity".

"He was very secretive about it", Darold Hessel, Chapman's stepson and a military veteran, told Military Times. "Except maybe when we were little, he would grumble and say, 'You know, at least in prison we had toothbrushes. Make sure you brush your teeth every day".

"He came into our family when I was nine years old and seemed like a superhero. He was physically tough, morally strong and just impressive to be around. ... He's an American hero".

Despite his quiet life away from the limelight, Chapman's story may have caught the attention of the closet department from the 2021 blockbuster "Top Gun: Maverick".

According to the U.S. Naval Institute, the vintage leather G-1 flight jacket worn by Tom Cruise's character in 1986 has been altered for the sequel to the movie "Top Gun".

"Presumably the jacket belonged to Maverick's father, who flew F-4 fighters in Vietnam", but sharp-eyed viewers noticed that the USS Oriskany and 3rd Marine Air Wing patches on the front of Maverick's jacket could have been a tribute to Chapman, who was shot down on the same day that Maverick's fictional father was said to have been shot down.

Upon his release, Chapman assumed command of the 314th Marine Fighter Attack Squadron at El Toro, California, where he served from July 1974 until his retirement two years later.

Chapman was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and early-stage dementia in 2017. He passed away on Monday, May 6, 2024, his family confirmed to Military Times.

Lt. Col. Harlan Page Chapman was 89 years old.