Vietnam PoW for more than seven years

Among those freed in wake of Paris Accords

Jon A. Reynolds, a retired U.S. air force brigadier-general who spent more than seven years as a prisoner of war after his plane was shot down over North Vietnam in 1965, died April 16 at his home in Bethesda, Md. He was 84.

The cause was lung cancer. Reynolds was on his second tour of duty when his F-105 Thunderchief was struck on Nov. 28, 1965.

He was captured and taken to the “Hanoi Hilton,” the first of nine prison camps in which he was held. His injuries, which included a fractured jaw and two broken shoulders, were so severe that he could not feed or clean himself.

The prisoners could communicate by tapping on walls. One asked Reynolds why guards entered his cell several times a day. Only then did he explain the guards were feeding him.

Not long afterward, Reynolds's captors tried to get him to denounce the war in a letter. When he refused, he was denied food for eight days.

Through wall-tapping, he was told to wait in his cell until the guard fell asleep. A fellow PoW, Robert “Percy” Purcell, would arrange to get him some food.

“As the afternoon grew quiet, I heard scratching on the ceiling and dust and dirt were soon falling from around the single light bulb in the ceiling of my room,” Reynolds wrote in a 2013 remembrance of Purcell. “Soon the bulb and wire dropped down a couple of feet, which was then followed by a series of long slender pieces of stale bread. My first food in eight days! Through the hole ... I saw the smiling face of Percy.”

The signing of the Paris Peace Accords in January 1973 led to the release of almost 600 U.S. prisoners. Reynolds was among the first freed, on Feb. 12, 1973.

When he was shot down, Reynolds was engaged to Emilee McCarthy. During his imprisonment, she married another man.

After his release, she called his family and spoke to her one-time fiancé.

“He literally sounded like the same Jon I had known in 1965,” she said. “His voice hadn't changed at all.”

She obtained a divorce and married Reynolds in 1974. In addition to his wife, survivors include their two children, a brother and a granddaughter.

Jon A. Reynolds