DOUGLAS RAMSEY

RAMSEY DOUGLAS RAMSEY Foreign Service Officer Seven Years a Vietnam P.O.W. Douglas Ramsey, a retired Foreign Service Officer and Vietnam prisoner of war, died in Nevada February 23, 2018. He was 83. He attended high school at Wasatch Academy in Utah and Occidental College in Los Angeles. Following graduate work at Harvard, he served in the Air Force in Japan. He entered the Foreign Service in 1956. After initial assignments, he volunteered for service in Vietnam. In 1964 Ramsey and another Vietnamese speaker, USIA officer Frank Scotton, conducted unprecedented field surveys in bellwether Long An province. Doug later recounted: "One Sunday morning we went out, as usual alone, to call on a village chief. We noticed a group of armed men quietly squatting, peasant-style, nearby. "Oh, don't worry," the chief explained. "The VC come here Sunday mornings and we chat. You're safe as long as you're with me." In January 1966, while driving refugee supplies to a beleaguered hamlet, he was captured by VC guerrillas. He was put under armed guard and then moved frequently from one remote jungle location in Vietnam and Cambodia to another. He suffered frommalaria, beriberi, scurvy and occasional star- vation. "Seven years and several hundred attacks of malaria later," he wrote, "I was released." He was one of the last American prisoners to be freed. His friend and colleague, Frank Scotton, was first to greet him. He continued in the Foreign Service, serving in Taipei, Beijing, Kuala Lumpur and Manila. In 1988 he retired to Nevada, still suffering from malaria. Doug received two Superior Honor awards, the State Department's award for valor, and the Harriman award for "courage, creativity and disciplined dissent". Ramsey wrote he was "a life-long bachelor with no children (of whom I was aware)". Doug was a member of Diplomatic and Consular Officers Retired. In accordance with his longtime wish, his ashes will be intered in the DACOR section of Rock Creek Cemetery. A memorial service honoring Douglas Ramsey will be held at DACOR-Bacon House, 1801 F Street NW, on Friday, October 5, from 3 to 6 p.m. Attendees are asked to e-mail brucekinsey@hotmail.com to reserve a place.A memorial service honoring Douglas Ramsey will be held at DACOR-Bacon House, 1801 F Street NW, on Friday, October 5, from 3 to 6 p.m. Attendees are asked to e-mail brucekinsey@hotmail.com to reserve a place.