William H. Tuttle

Chief Warrant Officer Three William H. “Bill” Tuttle was born in December 1950 in Nogales, Arizona, into a family of farmers and miners who settled in Yuma. He enlisted in the Army in August 1968 at seventeen and, passing up an invitation to the Golden Knights, was in Vietnam within a year as a signalman and search and rescue soldier. He was injured in January 1970. After recovering he returned to the 82nd Airborne Division and taught weaponry at West Point. Selected for Warrant Officer Candidate School in 1972, he finished flight school in 1973 and flew the UH-1 Huey at Fort Bragg. Tours followed in Korea, where he flew Senator John Glenn, and in Panama, where he flew border patrol missions for the Organization of American States and taught high altitude flying in Costa Rica. While flying for the 2nd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, CW3 Tuttle learned of the 160th Aviation Battalion and joined it in December 1982, flying the UH-60 Black Hawk; he counted this service his greatest accomplishment. He died on 4 October 1983 when the UH-60A he was piloting crashed into the sea off Panama, and his remains were never recovered. He held the Silver Star. He left a wife, a daughter and a son, and is memorialized at the National Memorial Cemetery of Arizona.