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A woman made sure that there is one fewer forgotten soldier

By O.K. Carter
Star-Telegram Staff Writer

As tour guide Patricia Sowell listened to the tales of Marine veterans of the battle of Iwo Jima during a recent Metroplex reunion of 200 of the old veterans, she couldn't help but recall one of the most vivid memories of her childhood.

Summer 1945: A green military vehicle pulled up at her father's home, and two soldiers stepped out.

"For some reason they stopped at our house first," Sowell said. "What they told my father was that my cousin Ralph A. Barton Jr. -- the son of my dad's brother, dubbed Junior -- had been killed at sea on June 30 of 1945."

Barton, an Army Air Forces corporal, was 22. The end of World War II was only six weeks away.

The details of Barton's death are sketchy, but according to a letter from the ship's chaplain, Barton was killed instantly when a lifeboat came loose from its lashings and fell to the deck on the troop carrier USS Herald of the Morning.

"The soldiers told us that they had to bury him at sea," Sowell said.

"At the time he'd been married all of three months. I was a little flower girl at his wedding. He was just doing his job and his duty, nothing heroic, but he died serving his country just as surely as if he'd been killed at Iwo Jima or Leyte."

Sowell was young. Over the years she had a few military connections -- she was once ROTC Sweetheart at what was then Arlington State College -- and the recollection of her cousin and his death slowly faded. His widow eventually remarried but is now deceased, as are many other relatives, including his only sister.

"I'm all that's left," Sowell said.

But then came the reunion of Iwo Jima Marine veterans whom Sowell spent the day with.

"They were old guys, ages 78 to 100, and some in wheelchairs, but they all talked about men they had served with -- about men whose bodies were never recovered, about their friends whose bodies were never found," she said.

"It made me remember that day they told us about Junior, and I asked myself, 'What is there to mark his service, to at least provide some clue that he was here?'"

There was nothing but yellowing paper records.

So Sowell began checking, starting with suggestions from the ROTC unit at the University of Texas at Arlington.

The research was circuitous, from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to Social Security offices. It turns out that Barton was entitled to not only a memorial marker at a military cemetery but also a color guard, a rifle salute and a bugler playing taps -- the full military honors. Sowell applied for that.

The marker bearing Barton's name and the inscription "Proudly served" was finally installed this month in the Memorial Garden section of the Dallas-Fort Worth National Cemetery in Grand Prairie.

That's why Saturday, Veterans Day, found Sowell standing alone beside the new marker for her cousin, 61 years, four months and 11 days after his body was surrendered to the seas off Eniwetok Island.

She forwent taps and other ceremonies, favoring a few moments of quiet reflection instead.

"It's really about him, not me," she said.

There are, of course, many forgotten soldiers. Far too many. But now at last there's one fewer.
O.K. Carter's column appears Sundays, Mondays and Thursdays. Carter also co-hosts P3: People, Politics and Possibilities at 9:30 nightly on Time Warner cable Channel 95. 817- 548-5428, okc@star-telegram.com