Memorial Day

Seen from here, they have no names. They could be any men, from any war.

Those men I remembered on Monday...

The three Badgers you already know about, if you’ve been reading here long. Good men, taken much too soon. We all know far too well that the bomb that took them could have claimed any three of us.

A sniper killed Major Olmstead while he tried to talk insurgents into surrendering, rather than running away and forcing his men to shoot. Captain Casey was killed when he went to aid Major Olmstead. Major Olmstead became the first milblogger that I know of to be killed in action in Iraq- his last post was published by a friend and spoke at length of his life’s philosophy and final regret at having died.

Taps

LTC Jack Friedrichsen was my grandfather, an Army Air Corps veteran of World War II. He died while I was in training to deploy to Iraq, just days after my 22^nd birthday. In the birthday card he sent to me that year, he told me how proud he was that I had chosen to serve my country and wished me safety in Iraq. I was reading it on my bunk when they came to tell me he was dead.

Pvt. James Kern

Another man I remembered Monday was one I had only just come to know, a little. Private James Kern was a veteran of the 1st Kentucky Cavalry in the Civil War. He died in 1928 and was buried in the Civil War-era "Silent Camp" in Boise. His grave formed an empty space between the weathered rows of marble- at some point since his burial, his headstone disappeared. Perhaps he never had one in the first place. Monday was Boise's day to give him the honor he deserved.

Civil War reenacters fire a salute to Pvt. Kern