It was early spring of 1967. U. S. military officials strongly suspected Quang Ngai Province of South Vietnam, as being a Viet Cong stronghold. Military officials declared the province a free-fire zone and subjected it to frequent, violent bombing missions and artillery attacks. By the end of 1967, most of the dwellings in the province had been destroyed and nearly 140,000 Vietnamese civilians were left without homes. "The war had taken on a hard-nosed character of its own. …showed first 75 words of 1031 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1031 total…the mourners were helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson and his gunner Lawrence Colburn who had rescued Vietnamese civilians involved in the massacre thirty years before. "Something terrible happened here 30 years ago today," Hugh Thompson told the crowd. "I cannot explain why it happened. I just wish our crew that day could have helped more people than we did." The legacy of that day still haunts the soldiers and the people of My Lai to this day.