Description
USMC 1st Bn 9th Marines Walking Dead Patch — Embroidered Patch
The Walking Dead — 1st Battalion, 9th Marines
General Giap promised Ho Chi Minh he would wipe out 1/9 as a birthday present. He called them “Di Bo Chet” — The Walking Dead — already dead, just not buried yet. The Marines of 1/9 took that name, made it their own, and kept fighting for 47 months straight.
1st Battalion, 9th Marines was activated on 20 November 1917 at Quantico, Virginia. In World War II, 1/9 fought through Bougainville, Guam, and Iwo Jima with the 3rd Marine Division. But it was Vietnam that forged the Walking Dead legend. From June 1965 to July 1969, 1/9 endured the longest sustained combat and suffered the highest killed-in-action rate in Marine Corps history — 747 Marines killed out of 2,892 who passed through the battalion. The area just south of the DMZ became known as “Leatherneck Square” for the staggering Marine casualties, and 1/9 was at the center of it all. The battalion fought at Khe Sanh, participated in Operation Dewey Canyon, and earned a Presidential Unit Citation. After deactivation and reactivation cycles, 1/9 deployed to Ramadi, Iraq, and Helmand Province, Afghanistan, before being deactivated in August 2014. The Walking Dead may be cased, but they will never be forgotten.
Perfect For:
1/9 Marines past and present, 9th Marines regiment veterans, Vietnam War historians, Khe Sanh veterans, Walking Dead Association members, and anyone who respects the highest price paid in Marine Corps history.
The Walking Dead — still not buried.
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