View From the Editor’s Desk: Memorial Day 2023
Before this Memorial Day 2023 is over I want to remember the sacrifices of four Americans.
In Augusta County, three young Marines didn’t come home from Operation Iraqi Freedom: Jason Redifer, 19, USMC, Stuarts Draft, killed in Iraq January 31, 2005 … Daniel Bubb, 19, USMC, Grottoes, killed in Iraq October 17, 2005 … Daniel Morris, 19, USMC, Raphine, killed in Iraq February 14, 2007.
My mother’s older brother was killed in action six weeks before the end of World War II in Europe. His name was Clarence Osborne, he was in the Army, and he was 27 years old. I’ve published Mom’s research tracking the battles leading up to his death on a cold winter night by German soldiers along the Siegfried Line on the border of France and Germany. He was buried in the U.S. military cemetery in Saint Avold, France (pictured above) and later reinterred in Chester, Virginia.
The overcast and rainy weather matched the solemness of the day as we remembered the sacrifices of these young men and their families. Freedom is not free.
~Lynn