Lieutenant William Calley found guilty of My Lai massacre

Historical Context Note

Lucas Paul Richert (University of Saskatchewan)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Domains

Massacres, purges

Dates

Date of occurrence 1971-03-29

Places

United States (Location)

On 29 March 1971, U.S. Army Lieutenant William Calley was found guilty by a military court for his role as leader of a platoon that carried out a devastating mass killing of some 500 person in a village called My Lai. The story, once revealed, contributed to American dissatisfaction and disillusionment back home. My Lai, located in the Quang Ngai province, was thought to be a Viet Cong stronghold. On 16 March 1968, a troop of U.S. soldiers raided My Lai after receiving intelligence that substantial Viet Cong personnel were in the area. However, no armed VC soldiers were discovered. Nevertheless, the U.S. platoon, led by Calley, killed nearly 500 women and children as well as elderly persons. Afterward, the incident was covered-up in a c…

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

202 words

Citation: Richert, Lucas Paul. "Lieutenant William Calley found guilty of My Lai massacre". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 01 October 2008 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=3529, accessed 26 November 2024.]

Save this article

If you need to create a new bookshelf to save this article in, please make sure that you are logged in, then go to your 'Account' here

Lieutenant William Calley found guilty of My Lai massacre

Domains

Dates

Places

Save this article

Leave Feedback