Boston, Leo Sydney
Air Force Colonel

Leo Sydney Boston, age 31, from Fremont County Canon City, Colorado .

Service era: Vietnam

Date of death: Friday, April 29, 1966
Death details: On April 25, 2011, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC, now DPAA) identified the remains of Colonel Leo Sydney Boston, missing from the Vietnam War. Colonel Boston joined the U.S. Air Force from Colorado and was a member of the 602nd Tactical Fighter Squadron. On April 29, 1966, he was the pilot of an A-1E Skyraider participating in a search and rescue mission over North Vietnam. Colonel Boston’s aircraft went down over Son La Province, North Vietnam, at some point during the mission, and he was killed in the incident. Immediate search efforts could not be conducted due to heavy enemy presence in the area. Between 1996 and 2005, U.S. and Vietnamese search teams conducted joint investigations in Son La Province that recovered aircraft wreckage, human remains, and crew-related equipment. In 2011, modern advances in forensic techniques allowed for the identification of Col Boston from among the remains recovered there. Colonel Boston is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. His name is also inscribed along with all his fallen comrades on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, DC.

Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Pueblo Chieftain (2011)