Posted on 04/10/2004 8:38:19 AM PDT by Uncle Miltie
A 20-year-old from the northeastern Minnesota town of Cloquet has become the third Minnesota Marine to die in Iraq this week and the seventh Minnesotan to die there since the war began.
Lance Cpl. Levi Angell was killed Thursday in Abu Ghurayb, on the western outskirts of Baghdad and on the road to Fallujah when his Humvee was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, his family said Friday.
Angell was also the third Marine from Carlton County to die in the Persian Gulf region in the past two months.
He was the son of Loretta and Gordon angell, Jr. He was the second-oldest of their five children together and one of eight children in the family.
"It's not easy," Loretta Angell said.
She said her son was on his second tour of duty in the Gulf region. He had been in Kuwait before and had just volunteered to go to Iraq, where he drove military tranports.
His grandmother, Lila Angell, also of Cloquet, said her grandson joined the Marines shortly after graduating from Cloquet High School in 2002.
The grandmother said he cam home for Christmas and "just smiled from ear to ear."
"He was so proud of what he was doing," she said.
Also in Today's Forum:
Beulah soldier injured in grenade attack
Beuhlah, ND
The father of a Marine injured in a grenade attack in Iraq says his son wants to complete his mission there.
Cal Wagner said his son, Lance Cpl. Robbie Wagner, 22, suffered shrapnel wounds to the right side of his face, shoulder and forearm, and right hip areas when enemy grenades were thrown at him and three other Marines on foot patrol April 2.
Cal Wagner said Marine Corps officials told him his son was being treated at a medical facility at Ar Ramadi, Iraq, and that he was doing fine.
Wagner said he told Robbie he wished he could come home, but his son said, "No Dad, our mission isn't complete over here. I need to be here yet."
Cal Wagner said a Marine spokesman at Camp Pendleton, Calif., told him his son had three small grenade fragments hit his right cheek, and he took three in the hip and 12 in the right shoulder and forearm.
"Everything was removed and there probably won't even be any scarring, except maybe the three on his hip," Wagner said.
"The only thing the Marine Corps spokesman told me is with this type of wound they watch for infection, and if there's no type of infection, he's probably back out with his unit already," Wagner said.
(End Article)
Heroes all. Semper Fidelis.
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