Memorial Day Weekend

This weekend, as you are grilling and drinking beer, please pause for a moment and remember all our brothers and sisters in green who have paid the ultimate sacrifice
A letter i feel speaks for all of us to those left behind:

Washington, Nov. 21, 1864.

Dear Madam,--

I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.

I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save.

I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,

A. Lincoln

In memorium:

Phillip J Jones, Atlanta Ga.
I Btry 3rd Bn 10th Marines 2nd Mar Div
Killed February 24th 1991, approx. 0600 when we had a hang fire on our 155mm Howitzer and he stepped in to remedy it and the gun fired and he was caught by the recoil, crushing his skull, killing him instantly.

Semper Fi PJ.

UPDATED by Jar(egg)head:

Captain John W. Maloney, USMC. Killed 16 JUN 2005 by an IED.

Leaders of his quality are quite rare, which makes their loss all the more painful. The Corps lost one of its best in John Maloney.

Semper Fi, John