 of Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund |
Remember...Clayton Andrew Craft
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Clayton Andrew Craft was born on May 30, 1949, in Elkview, West Virginia. He was the son of Raymond Wilson Craft and Fay Dolores Oxyer Craft Nunley. He had three older sisters: Julia Ann Craft Powers, Rosita Marie Craft Evans, and Dolores Yvette Craft Hayes. He also had a brother, Raymond H. Craft. His parents, Raymond Wilson Craft and Fay Dolores Oxyer Craft Nunley raised their children in Kanawha County, living primarily in the Elkview area. Clayton went into active duty shortly after graduating from Herbert Hoover High School, where he was a manager of the football team. He attended the Elkview Baptist Church weekly and worked as a newspaper delivery boy. He enlisted in August of 1967 in Ashland, Kentucky, and received his training in California at the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center. Shortly after his training, he would be sent to Vietnam.
The Vietnam War started in November of 1955 and ended in April of 1975. The U.S. involved itself in the early 1960s as the French army requested aid due to the heavy influence of communism spreading in the region. The first actual situation involving the two countries [the U.S. and Vietnam] occurred on August 2, 1964. U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin, Vietnam, had radioed that they had been fired on by North Vietnamese forces. Around January 30, 1968, the Tet Offensive was taking place. North Vietnamese and communist Viet Cong forces launched a coordinated attack against a number of targets in South Vietnam. This was the most intense time during the war. The U.S. and South Vietnamese militaries sustained heavy losses before finally repelling the communist assault. Support from U.S. citizens also started wavering, as it became clear we did not know who would win.
Clayton Andrew Craft started his tour in Vietnam on January 18, 1968, just before the start of the Tet Offensive. He was a private first class and assigned as a rifleman in the Marine Corps First Division, First Battalion, Fifth Marines, D Company. Shortly after his arrival in the theater of operations, Multi-Battalion Operation HOUSTON was launched in the Thua Thien Province. On April 8, Company D was in the vicinity of Thon Bao Vinh in the Phu Loc District. Pfc. Craft wandered off into a booby-trapped area and triggered an explosion. He was killed that day as a result of the fragmentation wounds his body sustained from the device.
During his service in the United States Marine Corps, Pfc. Clayton Andrew Craft received the Purple Heart with two Gold Stars, the National Defense Service Medal, the Vietnam Service Medal with three Bronze Stars, the Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal with 1960 device, the Republic of Vietnam Military Merit Medal, the Republic of Vietnam Gallantry Cross with Palm, and the Gold Star Lapel Button. His brother Raymond was also serving his country in the U.S. Army in Germany at the time of Clayton's death.
In Clayton's honor, I-79 Wills Creek Overpass 2674 Bridges Northbound and Southbound, carrying Interstate 79 over County Route 53 and Wills Creek in Kanawha County, were renamed as the "U.S. Marine Corps PFC Clayton Andrew Craft Memorial Bridge." He is also remembered at the Elk Hills Cemetery, where a monument stands that was previously located at the old Herbert Hoover High School location prior to the floods of 2016.
| He currently lies at Tyler Mountain Memory Gardens, in Cross Lanes, West Virginia. His name is inscribed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., at Panel 48e, Line 51.
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 Pfc. Clayton Andrew Craft's military headstone in Tyler Mountain Memory Gardens. Courtesy of Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund |
Article prepared by Daphne Tsekouras, George Washington High School JROTC
May 2025
West Virginia Archives and History welcomes any additional information that can be provided about these veterans, including photographs, family names, letters and other relevant personal history.
