At the height of the war in Vietnam, the names of American soldiers held captive or missing in action were engraved on metal bracelets as a remembrance of their suffering.

Nearly 5 million of the bracelets, which bear a soldier's name, rank and date of loss, were sold in the early 1970s. Three decades later, many Americans still wonder about the servicemen named on the "POW-MIA" bracelets tucked away in dresser drawers or collecting dust in jewelry boxes.

"It's amazing after this many years how people will break up when talking about the bracelets," says Ann Mills Griffin, executive director of the National League of Families, who still wears one to honor her brother, Navy Cmdr. James Mills.

The POW Network recently published More Than a Band of Metal: Loveletters From Those Who Care, a compilation of letters from bracelet-wearers to the MIA soldiers they have been honoring. The network had to choose from thousands of letters, and spokesman Chuck Schantag explained the selection by saying, "If it made us cry, it went in."

Letter-writers expressed the bond they feel with the names on the bracelets. "Many feel they are a part of their family, setting a dinner space for them at Christmas and even wearing the bracelets during surgeries," Schantag says.

According to the Department of Defense, there are still 1,904 Americans missing from the Vietnam War. Some who still have the bracelets do not think the government has done enough to find the missing.

"It isn't a matter that should just be given up on," says Rose Clark of the U.S. Veterans Dispatch, a group whose main focus is the POW-MIA issue. "There is a strong possibility that some of them are still alive."

According to Griffin, Sept. 11 and the war on terrorism caused a surge in patriotism that raised awareness of the POW-MIA issue. So has this week's 20th anniversary of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington.

Duery Felton, curator of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Collection, says that more than 1,500 bracelets have been left at the Wall, some straightened, others attached to newspaper clippings, but all acting as "individual gestures."

The POW Network encourages holders of the bracelets to find out what became of the soldiers named on the bracelets and to consider giving the bracelets to former POWs who returned to America.

For donor and former POW alike, the bracelet exchange can be emotionally powerful, says Schantag. "The bond is incredible," he says, going on to describe a former Navy pilot who received a bracelet from a 13-year-old girl upon his return from Vietnam. "It was just amazing."

Many Vietnam veterans have been accumulating the bracelets, some making models of jets used in the war and some calling the collection their "bracelet family."

Owners of POW-MIA bracelets may learn the status of the named soldier through the POW Network at www.pownetwork .org or by sending a letter with the name, rank and loss date of the soldier to POW Network, Box 68, Skidmore, MO 64487. If the soldier is confirmed as alive, the POW Network can put supporters in contact with him. If the soldier did not return, those with bracelets should continue wearing them to honor him, the network says.