• Born: 4 Jan 1947, Louisiana
• Died: 24 Jun 1968, S. Vietnam at age 21
• Buried: Centuries Memorial Park Cemetery, Shreveport, Caddo, Louisiana

   Find a Grave ID: 37232937.

  Noted events in his life were:

• News articles: Mark Cline, Gran Champion Steer, Shreveport, Caddo, Louisiana, USA.

• Military: GMG3 U.S. NAVY - VIETNAM. ² http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=pv&GRid=37232937&PIpi=30296003

• Military Casualties: ^{3 4} Name: Cline, Marcus Eugene
  Social Security or Service Number: 6975102
  Birth Date: 4 January 1947
  Service: Navy
  Component: Regular
  RAnk: Gunner's Mate G (Guns) Third Class (Navy)
  Grade: E4
  Service Occupation: Gunners Mate (NAVY)
  Actual Death Date: 24 June 1968
  Tour Date: 12 October 1967
  Casualty Type: Non-Hostile, Died While Missing
  Reason: Drowned, Suffocated
  Air/No Air: Ground Casualty
  Body Recovered: ---
  Country: South Vietnam
  Province: Dinh Tuong
  Major Command: USNAVFORV
  Task Force: TF-116
  Task Group: RIVDIV 53
  Ship: PBR-723
  Residence City: Caddo
  Residence State: Lousiana

• Military - Vietnam Casualties: 24 Jun 1968. ⁵ Name: Cline, Marcus Eugene
  Military Service: DN [Department of the Navy]
  Casualty County: Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam)
  Casualty Type: Non-Hostile - Died While Missing
  Reference Number: 498
  Processed Date: July 1968
  Social Security or Service Number: 6975102
  Military Grade: Gunners Mate (Navy)
  Pay Grade: Specialist Fourth Class (U.S. Army) or Corporal (U.S. Army, U.S. Marine Corps) or Sergeant (U.S. Air Force) or Grade/Rate Abbreviations with First Column: Any Entry; Second Column: N; Third Column: 3; Fourth Column: Blank (U.S. Navy, U.S. Coast Guard) or Grade/Rate Abbreviations with First Column: Any Entry; Second Column: Any Entry; Third Column: Any Entry; Fourth Column: 3 (U.S. Navy, U.S. Coast Guard)
  Death Date: 24 June 1968
  Residence City: CADDO
  Residence State: Louisiana
  Service Occupation: Gunners Mate (NAVY)
  Birth Date: 4 January1947
  Reason: Drowned/Suffocated
  Air or Not Air: Ground Casualty
  Race: Caucasian
  Religion: Protestant- No Denominational Preference
  Length of Service: 03
  Marital Status: Single (Spouse Not Listed)
  Gender: Male
  Citizenship: U.S.
  Poshumous Promotion: Not Posthumously Promoted
  Tour Date: 19
  Last Record Code: Final Record
  Body Recovered: Body Recovered
  Age: 21
  Component: Regular (RA, USN, USAF, USMC, USCG)
  Province: Military Region 4 - Dinh Tuong
  CorpCD: 04
  ProcCD: 1
  Flag: X
  Nearby Cemeteries:
  Oakland Cemetery, Caddo, Louisiana
  Star Cemetery, Caddo, Louisiana
  Light Hill Cemetery, Caddo, Louisiana
  Round Grove Memorial Gardens, Caddo, Louisiana
  Hebrew Rest Cemetery, Caddo, Louisiana
  
  

• Burial records-findagrave: Marcus Eugene Cline, 1947-1968, Centuries Memorial Park Cemetery, Shreveport, Caddo, Louisiana. ⁶ Record submitted by John Andrew Prime on May 18, 2009 "GM3C Cline was killed when his river patrol boat collided with another boat on patrol in South Vietnam. He was on his second volunteer tour in Vietnam."
  
  Tombstone photo added by: KBounds, Personal photo added by Tom Reece .Memorial# 37232937
  Parents:
  Willie Royle Cline (1923 - 1973)
  Jo Ella Levy Cline (1924 - 1949)
  
  Sibling:
  William F. Cline (1943 - 1957)*
  Marcus Eugene Cline (1947 - 1968)

• Memorial: Sailor's loss haunts family decades later, 25 May 2009, Shreveport Times, Shreveport, Caddo, Louisiana. ⁷ For Bobby Cline, living hundreds of miles from his native Louisiana and basking in the Florida sun does little to ward off an unseasonal chill every late May.
  He remembers his brother Marcus Eugene "Mark" Cline, who died in late June 1968 when his river patrol boat collided with another patrol boat on a dark South Vietnamese river. He drowned in the accident, and he was buried here in Centuries Memorial Park on Independence Day that year.
  Like the almost 250 military personnel buried in the Northwest Louisiana Veterans Cemetery near Keithville, and the hundreds of other men and women who died fighting for the nation's freedom, resting in plots from Oakland and Greenwood cemeteries to Star, Jewella, Lincoln Memorial, Hill Crest and Forest Park, he will be honored today as the nation observes Memorial Day, with 3 p.m. set aside as a moment of remembrance. Traditionalists will observe the day, noted since the closing years of the Civil War, on its historic date, May 30.
  "Mark was in his second tour of duty in Vietnam", said Bobby Cline, several years younger than his brother and now living in Destin, Fla. "He served on the USS McMorris off the coast of Vietnam on patrols to stop the flow of materials from North Vietnam. He re-enlisted with the Navy to serve his second tour from October '67 till his death in the 'Brown Water Navy'. I can't think about Mark today wiout shedding a few tears. He will always be young in my eyes."
  Mark Cline, a gunners mate 3rd class and only 21 years old when he died, had just signed up for a second four-year hitch in the Navy. He crewed on PBR-723, part of River Division 53, Task Force 116, and is memorialized on the Vietnam Wall on Panel 55W, line 28.
  Claudie Cline Thompson, of Lindale, Texas, remembers her favorite cousin well.
  "He was a sweetie," she said. "He had raised the grand champion steer his senior year in high school and his dad, Billy Cline, kept it in the backyard for him.
  She also remembers seeing him on the front page of The Times, when the steer he raised won grand champion at the 1961 Louisiana State Fair.
  That made the family proud, she said, and it was a tiny bright moment in what was a sad and painful series of tragedies for the family.
  "His brother William had been killed at the age of 14 in an auto accident, his mother had died having surgery when he was very young, and his dad died a few years after he was killed in Vietnam," she recalled.
  Thompson now works with the group Welcome Home Soldiers out of Tyler, Texas, and hoped to share something with them about her cousin, who now is buried in Centuries Memorial Park here in Shreveport, next to his mother, father and younger brother.
  "Mark was fabulous with his cattle," Claudie Thompson remember. "When he was in Vietnam, he had served his first tour of duty and signed up for a second tour without coming home. When he had candy or anything like that, he would give it to the Vietnamese children. The soldiers were warned not to trust those kids, but he couldn't help it. He shared his food."
  She has wondered what happened to the other men in the boat with Mark, whether they lived or died and whether anyone honors them today, as she still misses her cousin.
  "Those of us cousins who were around then, just couldn't get over it," she said. "The closer it comes to Memorial Day, the more I think about Mark and what he could have been. He was such a special young man."