Four names to be added to Vietnam Veterans Memorial

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Four American servicemen will finally join their comrades on the national memorial to their war, nearly four decades after fighting for their country in Vietnam.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund will commemorate the inscription of their names onto the black granite memorial unofficially known as “the Wall.” Thursday’s ceremony in Washington, D.C., is set to start at 11: 30 a.m.

The additions of a soldier and three Marines bring the number of names on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial to 58,253.

The new names are:

• Army Spc. 4 Bobby Gene Barbre of Carmi, Ill.

• Marine Lance Cpl. George Bryant Givens Jr. of Robards, Ken.

• Marine Pfc. Hans Jorg Rudolph Lorenz of Midland, Ontario, Canada.

• Marine Capt. Patrick Rumley Jr. of Medford, Mass.

Lorenz died in 1966, Rumley died in 1968, Barbre died in 1971 and Givens died in 1994. Memorial fund officials could not say why the names of the four men are being added now.

“We get the names from [the Department of Defense] and we put them on the Wall,” said memorial fund spokeswoman Lisa Gough.

“We will add the names as close as possible to their dates of casualty, so these servicemen can remain in the company of those they served with,” said Jan Scruggs, founder and president of the memorial fund.

Welcome Home Brothers, you are not along anymore