In 2003, I was the managing editor of The People-Sentinel in Barnwell. When the war broke out, the publisher said we had to do something for the troops. that's it. Something. No explanation or ideas.
i brainstormed with my lone reporter, and we came up with an idea.
Just days into the war in Iraq, a story was foisted on the American public about a little girl from West Virginia in a military convoy gone astray who bravely fought off swarming Iraqis until she ran out of ammo. She was later rescued by a special ops team.
Turned out it wasn't quite true. She was captured, but never fired a shot. She had broken legs It was a cynical attempt to manufacture a heroic symbol. The worst part of it was others were killed in that convoy, but they were ignored, and are, in many ways, still forgotten.
George Edward Buggs was in that same convoy with Jessica Lynch. He might have been in the same vehicle. We'll never know for sure what really happened. But while Jessica Lynch survived and was rescued, George Buggs was one of eight soldiers killed in that action, the first soldier from South Carolina to be killed in either of these latest wars.
Because of what we had done in our paper, we should have been prepared. But Buggs' family had not filled out a little slip of paper nor given us his photo. We had to go find them to get their story.
Over the course of two weeks and three papers, we covered the story of his life and death as well as any paper.
Like a good community paper, we not only wrote stories, but we helped the funeral home with some of the things they needed. We enlarged the few, poor Polaroids the family had, for one thing.
Because he was the first Palmetto State casualty, S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford attended his funeral and spoke at it, hopping down from a stage to give a Palmetto State flag to George Buggs' son.
It was a big event. The death scarred the community a little.
When the war is over, they are supposed to do something special for him and all the men who served.
When the war is over. Some now might call that a cruel joke.
George Buggs was career military. He left behind a wife and a son.
When I heard how Buggs used to love to take his son to the movies, I was tempted, so tempted, to fill that void. I love movies, after all.
I wasn't to stay much longer in Barnwell, it turned out. But my heart went out to the son, the wife, Buggs' parents, and the community.
At that time, I didn't understand why a boy was left without a father, a mother without a son, a wife without a husband. A few months later, another young man died, an Allendale County native.
Orenthal Smith was his name. He was the fourth South Carolinian killed in the war. I sat down in my office and talked for a while with his mother and sister. We got the reaction of friends, family,
I remember having again the thoughts. Why?
It is more than three years later. I'm in another community, and I have to retrace some of my old steps to tell a story that I've told in some ways before.
Spc. D. Logan Tinsley is apparently the 41st person from South Carolina to die in this war. But he is the first from Chester County.
He is the first war zone casualty involving a Chester County man since the Vietnam War, his ROTC instructor said. So the county might not fully be prepared for this. We don't know what will happen to the community. His mother doesn't even know for sure when his body will be brought home.
I talked to my mother the other day. It was Christmas after all. I don't know in what context it came up, but at one point, she said she believes in miracles. Her faith is a tower. Mine isn't even the straw hut blown down by the big bad wolf.
But I flash back, sitting in a crowded school gym and at the graveside with the family of the first man from our state killed in this war, I remember sitting there with the family of the fourth, in my office, talking about a lost loved one. And here I am again, sitting in the home of the 41st young man killed in this war.
I don't know why and can't fathom why this happens.
But I hope my mother is right, that there are miracles. I pray Logan Tinsley will be the last from South Carolina to die in this war.
But it will take a miracle.
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