Category: We Remember

The Associated Press tells us that Robert Eugene Oxford is coming home after his plane, dubbed “Hot as Hell” went down during a resupply mission over India 74 years ago;

All signs of the mission were lost until 2006, when a hiker in northeast India spotted a wing and panel sign with the plane’s name inscribed — “Hot as Hell.” It wasn’t until 2015 that the U.S. Defense Department investigated the crash site and found the remains of 1st Lt. Robert Eugene Oxford.

On Thursday, Oxford will finally be returned home and then laid to rest this weekend with full military honors in his tiny hometown of Concord, Georgia. Photos of his seven fellow crewmen, none of whom was ever found, will lay beside the coffin and then be placed inside it for burial.

“We were ecstatic that Eugene was found, but we feel guilty there are seven other men on that mountain top,” said Merrill Roan, the wife of Oxford’s nephew. “So we are honoring the other seven. … We have to honor them as well, because they may never get any closure.”

Oxford’s plane departed Kumming, China, on Jan. 25, 1944, said Staff Sgt. Kristen Duus at the Defense Prisoners of War/Missing in Action Agency. Oxford was declared dead two years later.

He will return to his home in Georgia with a State Police escort and a memorial service is planned in the local school gymnasium. His final rest will be in the plot with his parents, Charles and Bessie.

Stars & Stripes tells the story of how the mates of Staff Sgt. Mark De Alencar kept his promise to his step-daughter, Octavia Osborne, to attend her graduation after he was killed in Afghanistan earlier this year.

Octavia had heard that some of her dad’s brothers-in-arms planned to attend her graduation ceremony May 25, but the reality of what that meant didn’t really sink in at first.

“It dawned on me here and there that they were going to be there, but it didn’t really hit me until I got to the graduation and saw all those men sitting there in the stands,” she said.

The contingent from the 7th Group included not only the Green Berets in their dress uniforms, but many of their spouses and children as well. When [De Alencar’s widow] Natasha and her mother, Yolanda Thornton, arrived at the stadium, Octavia’s special cheering section was already in place.

“They were saving seats for us!” Natasha said, her voice still filled with amazement at the memory. “I was overwhelmed. Everyone who was there had taken time out of their busy lives because they knew we had that void we were missing. They just wanted to let us know that they had our back.”

Thanks to Frankie for the tip.

Some of this is republished from last year;

The other day, my friend, Matt Burden, wrote on Facebook that this weekend should absolutely include barbeques and picnics because that’s how our fallen warriors would want us to spend a weekend remembering them – that we can push all of the worries in the world to the side because of their sacrifice. His point was that we don’t need to visit graves, plant flags and flowers in veterans’ cemeteries to honor their last full measure of devotion. All we need to do is live a life worthy of their sacrifice, and the sacrifice of their families.

Most of those warriors would be embarrassed by the attention, well, I know I would. But then, I’m embarrassed when someone thanks me for my service. It’s not that I’m not grateful for their verbal expression of gratitude, it’s just that I never know what to say. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think of every one of my friends and soldiers who have been lost because of their service to the American people. In my mind, what I’ve done doesn’t even approach that which they’ve done for this country and I honor their memory by living a life that they would consider worth what they gave to us.

In that regard, every day is Memorial Day for me. I don’t need to visit Arlington Cemetery and stand among the headstones. Everyday, I stand among the headstones in my mind.

Mostly, those warriors who went on before us, just want you to enjoy the life that they helped secure for you. Enjoying the time that you spend with your family and friends, doing the things with your life that make you smile is honoring the sacrifices that were made for you. I think “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” were all mentioned in the Declaration of Independence.

It’s not what you do one day out of the year that honors veterans, it’s what you do the other 364 days. It’s not the “thank you for your service” that matters, it’s what you say to me before you know that I’m a veteran.

So I hope you have an honorable Memorial Day weekend.

And there’s the Lee Brice song, “I Drive Your Truck”, that celebrates how Paul Monti remembers his son Jared Monti;

A few years ago, Tim Martin’s wife sent me this photo.

Another pal dropped by to see him for me on Memorial Day two years ago;

And one to add for this year is Sam Naomi, of the tall corn – he was TAH’s resident Korean War veteran who passed February 27th four days short of his 91st birthday.

AverageNCO sends this one that he visited yesterday;

Last year Hondo told us that DPAA had recovered the remains of Navy LCDR Frederick P. Crosby. Top Kone sends a link which reports that his daughter, Deborah Crosby, will finally lay him to rest in San Diego;

Crosby says she spent decades inquiring about the progress of her father’s case and providing anything to help in the search, including her aunt’s DNA.

Last year, military investigators found her father’s remains at the bottom of a fish pond in Vietnam.

From the San Diego Tribune;

Two U.S. Navy planes came in fast over a bridge in Dong Phong Thuong, North Vietnam. It was June 1965.

Cloud cover forced them to descend extremely low. The enemy was waiting.

Heavy ground fire erupted and the plane of Lt. Cmdr. Frederick Crosby of San Diego was on fire as it plummeted toward a fish pond.

The RF-8A reconnaissance aircraft rolled before it crashed, spraying up water and mud.

Crosby, a 31-year-old father of four, was listed as killed in action, though his body remained missing. It left his wife to grieve, pick up the pieces and provide a life for their children.

Deborah Crosby — 6 years old when her dad died, the family’s only daughter — always felt a void in her chest, especially on each Memorial Day, when people mourn at the graves of the fallen.

[…]

But today, May 26, Frederick Crosby’s remains will come home to San Diego — thanks to the tenacity of his daughter, the long memory of the U.S. Defense Department and the will of the taxpayers to keep searching for troops missing in action.

The flag-draped coffin should arrive at Lindbergh Field around noon.

The decorated pilot will be buried at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery on Sunday, virtually within eyeshot of the Point Loma house where his children grew up.

His headstone will read “He is home.”

An update:

Deborah Crosby, center right, hugs her brother John Crosby, right, in front of her father’s casket after its arrival to the airport Friday in San Diego. (Associated Press)

Late last week, Richard Collins III was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant from the Bowie State ROTC program. On Saturday, he was waiting with friends for an Uber when 22-year-old Sean Urbanski approached the group of friends according to Fox5;

“He said to the victim, ‘Step left, step left if you know what’s good for you,’” said University of Maryland Police Chief David Mitchell. “The victim looked at him puzzled with the other friends of his and said, ‘No.’ It was then that Sean Urbanski stabbed the victim in his chest.”

Investigators say Urbanski, who they believe had been drinking, never left the scene and was arrested without incident.

The police say that Urbanski belongs to a Facebook group called “Alt-Reich Nation”, a racist group of haters.

[Family pastor Darryl Godlock] said Collins’ father was in the Navy and Collins wanted to follow in his footsteps serving in the military. He was part of the Army’s Intelligence Division, according to Godlock.

“He loved his family, he loved people and he loved God,” he said. “We’re in shock at what has happened to him.”

According to his father, Freddie Jones lied about his age when he enlisted in the Navy in 1929, but he was thirty years old when he went down with the crew of the USS Oklahoma on December 7th, 1941 – that day that will live in infamy. When his earthly remains were recovered two years later, they were deposited in an unmarked grave in Hawaii, until they were identified. From the Detroit News;

Jones and the other unknown servicemen were reburied in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, nicknamed the Punchbowl because of its location in the crater of an extinct volcano in Honolulu.

After decades of lobbying by veterans groups, the Pentagon began another attempt to identify the remains in 2015. Among the 61 caskets it exhumed was one that held the remains of 100 servicemen.

Forensic anthropologist reassembled the skeletons and extracted DNA from the skulls and teeth. They used genealogical records to find descendants of the servicemen, and matched DNA samples from the relatives to the servicemen’s.

Sixty-three of the unknown sailors and Marines have been identified, according to Pentagon records. The process is expected to take three years.

Jones came home Saturday to Port Huron, Michigan. From USAToday;

Helen Kellie Cosner is Jones’ granddaughter. She came from Seattle — where Jones’ descendants live — to be in Port Huron for the service.

“I’m so happy,” she said. “It’s overwhelming, the support and the fact that he’s home.

“I don’t have words to say.”

She received an American flag that had draped Jones’ simple coffin. The flag, she said, would go in a special place.

Sue Nichols of Burton also received a flag that she held clutched to her chest. Jones is her great-uncle.

“It’s overwhelming,” she said. “It’s amazing. I’m so blessed because all these people showed up.”

She said she felt sad at her great-uncle’s death, but also joyous that his body had been returned to Port Huron.

Thanks to Jill for the link.

Riflemusket reminds us that May 17th marks the 30th anniversary of the USS Stark incident.

An errant Iraqi pilot launched two Exocet anti-ship missiles at the USS Stark, both missiles struck their target, but only one exploded. The resulting damage killed 37 sailors and wounded 21 others, while the fires aboard the ship burned all night.

Captain Glenn R. Brindel saved his ship, but he was punished for not defending the ship against the attack and he was allowed to retire. At first, the Iraqis claimed that they had executed the pilot, but after the last was against Saddam Hussein, it was disclosed that the pilot was still alive.

In 2011, the US and Iraqi government signed an agreement which required the Iraqi government to establish a fund of $400 million to compensate prisoners of war and hostages in the first Gulf War, and those killed or injured in the 1987 attack on Stark.

But every year, members of the Stark’s crew gather on May 17th to remember the event so that we never forget;

SN Doran H. Bolduc, Lacey, WA

RMSA Dexter D. Grissett, Macon, GA

FCCS Robert L. Shippee, Adams Center, NY

BM1 Braddi O. Brown, Calera, AL

FC3 William R. Hansen, Reading, MA

SMSA Jeffrey C. Sibley, Metairie, LA

FC3 Jeffrey L. Calkins, Richfield Springs, NY

GMG3 Daniel Homicki, Elizabeth, NJ

OS3 Lee Stephens, Pemberton, OH

SN Mark R. Caouette, Fitchburg, MA

OSSN Kenneth D. Janusik, Jr., Clearwater, FL

TM2 James R. Stevens, Visalia, CA

SN John A. Ciletta, Jr., Brigantine, NJ

OS1 Steven E. Kendall, Honolulu, HI

ET3 Martin J. Supple, North Olmsted, OH

SR Brian M. Clinefelter, San Bernardino, CA

EMCS Stephen Kiser, Elkhart, IN

FC1 Gregory L. Tweady, Champaign, IL

OS3 Antonio A. Daniels, Greeleyville, SC

SM1 Ronnie G. Lockett, Bessemer, AL

ET3 Kelly R. Quick, Linden, MI

ET3 Christopher DeAngelis, Dumont, NJ

GMM1 Thomas J. MacMullen, Darby, PA

SN Vincent L. Ulmer, Bay Minette, AL

IC3 James S. Dunlap, Osceola Mills, PA

EW3 Charles T. Moller, Columbus, GA

EW3 Joseph P. Watson, Ferndale, MI

STGSN Steven T. Erwin, Troy, MI

DS1 Randy E. Pierce, Choctaw, OK

ET3 Wayne R. Weaver, II, New Bethlehem, PA

RM2 Jerry Boyd Farr, Charleston, SC

SA Jeffrei L. Phelps, Locust Grove, VA

OSSN Terrance Weldon, Coram, NY

QMCS Vernon T. Foster, Jacksonville, FL

GM3 James Plonsky, Van Nuys, CA

IC2 Lloyd A. Wilson, Summerville, SC

SMSN Earl P. Ryals, Boca Raton, FL