Rebecca Droke, Post-Gazette Retired U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Parker Johnston greets fellow Vietnam veteran Del Ayers, of Phoenix, Ariz., at a talk about Johnston's service during the war at Victory Family Church in Cranberry yesterday. Mr. Ayers and three other veterans who served under Mr. Johnston's command in the Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol during the war surprised Mr. Johnston by attending the presentation. Click photo for larger image.

The last time Oscar Carroway saw Parker Johnston was in 1968, when both men were in intensive care in a military hospital in Pleiku, Vietnam.

Last night, they looked in much better shape, despite the passage of 39 years.

Mr. Carroway and five other former soldiers from Mr. Johnston's unit had driven to Cranberry from as far away as Arizona to take part in an American Conflicts Roundtable. The talks by U.S. veterans are put together by Jim Lucot, who teaches history at Seneca Valley Senior High School.

More than 200 people attended the two-hour session at the Victory Family Church Youth Center on Route 19 in Cranberry.

Mr. Johnston, a Crafton native who now lives in Pittsburgh, was the featured speaker. What he didn't know was that members of his former unit, including four from his patrol, would be joining him on stage.

He appeared momentarily stunned when his comrades entered the hall. The veterans were greeted by a standing ovation.

Mr. Johnston, who won the Silver Star for gallantry in action, has been inducted into the Hall of Valor at Soldiers & Sailors National Military Museum & Memorial in Oakland. He is a retired U.S. marshal.

Mr. Johnston and his buddies all served on long-range reconnaissance patrol teams, called "LRRPs." They were ferried by helicopter in units of five or six men into the Vietnamese countryside to carry out intelligence, ambush or prisoner-capture missions against the North Vietnamese Army and their guerilla allies, known as the Vietcong.

Mr. Johnston said he was on his third tour of duty and had taken part in between 30 and 35 reconnaissance assignments by May 28, 1968, when his team was dropped close to what turned out to be a large enemy base camp near Vietnam's border with Cambodia.

"We saw what looked like the entire North Vietnamese Army," he recalled. "Then everybody started shooting."

Several members of the patrol were wounded, including Mr. Johnston, who was hit in the leg, arm and chest. His Hall of Valor plaque notes that despite his multiple wounds, he maintained leadership, directing both return fire and radio requests for air support and withdrawal.

He pointed to both training -- "Every man did the job he was supposed to do," he said -- and luck in accounting for the survival of his patrol.

"We went through so much together," he said. "We sweated, we bled, we killed people."

He also had high praise for the helicopter pilots who risked their lives to bring reconnaissance patrols to and from battlefields.

"This has been really emotional for me," Mr. Carroway, of Stillvale, Ill., said of meeting up with the former Sgt. Johnston and the other members of his unit. "I'm looking forward to spending the next two days catching up."

The goal of the American Conflicts Roundtable is to get local people to talk about their experiences during World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War, Mr. Lucot said.

The evening series at Victory Family Church grew out of programs he arranged for his Seneca Valley students, in which military veterans would come to class and talk about their service experiences.

"I don't think there is another high school class in the country that has had so much interaction with veterans," he said.

"I tell them every family has its heroes."

Ashley Watkins, 17, a Seneca Valley junior, said she had known little about history before taking Mr. Lucot's course.

Her family heroes include her big brother, Josh, 27, a former member of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division who served in both Kosovo and Iraq. He now works as a police officer in West Deer.