FReeper Canteen ~ Hall of Heroes: Kendra Coleman ~ April 15, 2013

Serving The Best Troops and Veterans In The World !! | StarCMC

[Kathy in Alaska]

 

Our Troops Rock!  Thank you for all you do!

For the freedom you enjoyed yesterday...
Thank the Veterans who served
in The United States Armed Forces.

Looking forward to tomorrow's freedom? Support The United States
Armed Forces Today!

---

~ Hall of Heroes ~

Kendra Coleman
Info from here.

(Thank you to mountainlion for bringing this hero to our attention!)

           

The Story Behind the Photo, CPL Kendra Coleman

“I want to give back to the Soldiers who fight for my freedom and sacrifice their life for me,” said AW2 Soldier CPL Kendra Coleman about her future.

At 20-years-old, she knew she wanted to fight in the war on terrorism and joined the Army on July 25, 2007. She served with the 173D Special Troops Battalion, part of the 173D Airborne Brigade Combat Team as a military police (MP) officer and paratrooper. She deployed to Afghanistan on November 19, 2009, and her job was to train Afghan police and keep the local village of Charkh safe.

On May 11, 2010, she was clearing a village, she recalled, “I was hugging a wall to clear a corner, and after I cleared the corner I looked down. That’s when I saw a randomly placed pile of tires. I could feel the evil in the air.”

An improvised explosive device (IED) immediately exploded and she was knocked to the ground. “I knew I was hit,” she said. “I reached down to my left leg pocket to grab my tourniquet. My pocket wasn’t there, just the remaining pieces of what was my left leg.”

She is currently assigned to a Warrior Transition Unit and receives care at Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC) and Brooke Army Medical Center. “WRAMC has given me my life back,” she said. “The medical care I have received here at WRAMC has been phenomenal.” Now using a prosthetic leg, she said, “I almost feel like me again.”

One of the highlights of her recovery was participating in a snowboarding program. “I never thought I would snowboard again, but I did it,” she said. “I got back up on my board—it was an amazing feeling of achievement.”

With the assistance of AW2 Community Support Network member Sentinels of Freedom, she plans to attend college. “They provided me a four-year scholarship to the school of my choice, all expenses paid including living expenses,” she said.

Coleman wants to attend Georgia Institute of Technology to earn a master’s in prosthetics and work with other wounded warriors at an Army Military Treatment Facility. She hopes to motivate other wounded warriors to never give up, stating, “Don’t let the enemy determine your future—improvise and overcome.”

By Tania Meireles, WTC Stratcom

Please remember the Canteen is here to honor, support and entertain our troops and their families.  This is a politics-free zone!  Thanks for helping us in our mission! 

[Kathy in Alaska]

And rounding out the top 3....HJ bags the bronze!!

[Kathy in Alaska]

You are forgiven...it must be the post taxes blues.

[Kathy in Alaska]

TAPS

RIP

Lt Col Don C Faith Jr, USA
Medal of Honor Recipient
31st Regimental Combat Team (RCT)

Amazing Grace

[ConorMacNessa]

"...it must be the post taxes blues."

GRRR!!!!

A story for another time. :)



"Riamh nár dhruid ó sbairn lann!"

Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

[Kathy in Alaska]

Good evening, Stonewall.....what a great idea for these wounded warriors. Thanks for the story.

Arctic Challenge 2013!! - click

[ConorMacNessa]

Lt. Col. Faith's Medal of Honor Citation



"Riamh nár dhruid ó sbairn lann!"

Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

[RedMDer]

Excellent!

[luvie]

They’re a tough bunch and up to any and all challenges! No sitting at home whining for these heroes! :)

[ConorMacNessa]

IN MEMORIAM
Flight Lieutenant Leslie Brodrick
Royal Air Force



Flight Lieutenant Leslie Brodrick,
Royal Air Force, Squadron No. 106,
Died 8Apr2013.

Flight Lieutenant Brodrick was one of the seventy-six men who escaped from Stalag Luft III the evening of 24March1944 in the daring breakout chronicled in the 1950 book "The Great Escape" by Paul Brickhill. Of the seventy-six, three made it all the way back to Great Britain. Of the remaining seventy-three, who were recaptured, fifty were cravenly murdered by the Nazis under direct orders from Hitler.





"I have fought a good fight,
I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith."
2 Timothy 4:7 (KJV)

"Arm yourselves, and be ye men of valour, and be in readiness for the conflict; for it is better for us to perish in battle than to look upon the outrage of our nation and our altar. As the Will of God is in Heaven, even so let it be."
(1 Maccabees 3:58–60)

Flowers of the Forest
(Click)



Black Watch Piper

THE SOLDIER

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam;
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.
And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

Rupert Brooke



Last Post
(Click)

Thanks very much to Covenantor for notifying me of the passing of this Hero.

Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

[Kathy in Alaska]

Good evening, Luv....another great accounting of another of our heroes.

[luvie]

God rest the soul of the fallen hero!

[luvie]

Hi, Kathy! She certainly is something else! Our heroes never give up! :)

[Kathy in Alaska]

Thanks, Families, for your service to our country.

Thanks, unique, for the perfect woohoo.

John Conlee ~ They Also Serve

[ConorMacNessa]

An article regarding Flt.Lt. Leslie Brodrick 106 Squadron by Shelly Lawrie:


"I'm a journalist for a community paper in South Africa and did an article on Les Brodrick. I am posting it on this website as it helped me piece together the chain of events during the long march, as Les's memory was a little vague.

Les recalls his Stalag Luft III escape -By Shelly Lawrie

Sixty-six years ago, in one of the most daring and bold escapes from a Prisoner of War camp, Scottburgh¹s Leslie Brodrick, (now 88), one of 15 survivors, recalls the event and consequences. A Royal Air Force, Flight Lieutenant for 106 squadron, Brodrick, 22-years-old, was shot down. He crash landed near Amiens on his Stuttgart raid return flight. He was taken to Dulag Luft for interrogation, then to Stalag Luft III in Sagan, an airforce Prisoner of War camp run by the Luftwaffe.

South African born Squadron Leader, Roger Bushell was the master-mind behind the audacious escape plan at the camp, and Brodrick was recruited immediately. Numerous tunnels had been dug but were found by the Germans. Bushell’s plan consisted of three tunnels, ‘Tom’, ‘Dick’ and ‘Harry’ being dug simultaneously. His aim was to have 250 men escape and spread chaos in Germany. Of all three tunnels, ‘Dick’ had the most ingenious trapdoor. Situated in block 122, the washroom, the tunnel entry was concealed in the sump. Water had to be removed, and the modified concrete slab put in place and sealed with a mixture of clay, soap and cement. Broderick was appointed ’trapfuhrer’, meaning he was responsible for the entrance to ‘Dick’. He had to unseal the slab for the ‘diggers’ then seal them in again and keep watch. After ‘Tom’ was discovered and ‘Dick’ abandoned after a prison compound was constructed in its path, all efforts were concentrated on ‘Harry’. ‘Dick’ was used as storage for all contraband.

On the evening of March 24, 1944, 200 men hoped to escape through ‘Harry’. The tunnel, 8.5m down, to hide any tunnelling sounds that buried microphones might pick up, and about 102m long, had electrical light, a ventilation system and a railway track with three haulage points and carts. Things did not go according to plan. Firstly, the exit trapdoor was frozen shut. After opening it, it was discovered the tunnel was well short of the pine-forest tree line. Due to an air-raid on Berlin, all camp electricity was turned off. With the tunnel exit only 27m from the nearest guard tower, a plan was hatched. A length of rope was strung from inside the tunnel to a person just behind the tree line. A series of tugs were used to signal “the coast is clear”.

Experienced escapees, German speakers and those that contributed the most to the operation, were first on the list. The rest of the men drew lots, Brodrick was drawn at number 52. In complete darkness, Brodrick made his way to the tunnel exit, he hit a snag at the exit ladder as his legs could not bend to climb up. He got out by hauling himself, hand-over-hand for the last 8.5m. Once free of the camp, Brodrick and two others, Henry Birkland and Denys Street, did not progress very far. For three days, travelling at night only, soaked and freezing, Brodrick and Street decided to find shelter as Birkland was ³in a bad way². Spotting a cottage, the three, street-fluent in German, decided to try their luck by “spinning a yarn” to the occupants of the cottage. Unfortunately, the occupants were German soldiers. The three were arrested, taken to a local police station and then to Gestapo head quarters at Gorlitz for interrogation. Brodrick said he recognised the Gestapo as they “dress in leather coats just like in the movies”.

He was then returned to Stalag Luft III. On arrival he discovered Hitler had ordered 50 of the escaped 76 to been shot, Street was one of them. The men under pretence, individually or in pairs, were told they were being moved to another location. On the “trip”, German soldiers would stop the vehicle, either for the men to relieve themselves or ‘stretch their legs’, and when their backs were turned they were shot. The excuse given for their ’execution’ was that they had been trying to escape. Of the 76 escapees, three evaded recapture.

On January 27, 1945, Stalag Luft III was evacuated due to Russian forces approaching. Broderick and many others were marched in sub-zero temperatures, westwards to Spremberg. Once there they were loaded into cattle trains, destination Marlag Nord in Tarmstedt. The British corporal in charge of the prisoners refused to stay at the Marlag camp, condemned by the Red Cross as unfit and unsanitary.

Eventually Brodrick and the others ended up on a tobacco plantation near Lubeck. Here they were liberated on May 2, 1945, by British troops in open trucks shouting, “you’re free!”.

During the march they were shot at by a Royal Air Force spitfire, until the pilot realised they were not the enemy. Broderick also witnessed concentration camps with “skeletal Jews and the systematic slaughter of them”. At one location the prisoners were given a shower, and they thought they were to be gassed.

Brodrick was flown home to Canvey Island, England in a Lancaster, one from his old squadron. After tidal wave flooded Canvey Island in 1953, Brodrick and family came to South Africa in 1956, and moved to Scottburgh in 1963."

Shelly Lawrie





"Riamh nár dhruid ó sbairn lann!"

Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

[ConorMacNessa]

Good evening, Luv!

*HUGS*

The night is heavy with the presence of our Heroes - those who went before and those who remain! God Bless them all!



"Riamh nár dhruid ó sbairn lann!"

Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

[SkyDancer]

Hi Conor!

[The Mayor]

Freep mail me to be on or off the Daily Bread ping list

Money Talk
April 15, 2013

Marilyn and Steven had been married just a few years, and money was tight. But as she looked at their threadbare bedspread, she wanted to replace it. So she decided she would buy a new one with a credit card—hoping to somehow find the money to pay it off.

Her devotional reading for the day surprised her when it pointed her to Proverbs 22:27, “If you lack the means to pay, your very bed will be snatched from under you” (niv). Marilyn decided not to go into debt for a new bedspread that day.

Decisions about the way we spend our money are a personal matter between us and the Lord and can be difficult to make. But God hasn’t left us without help. He tells us: “Honor the Lord with your possessions” (Prov. 3:9), and “You cannot serve both God and Money” (Matt. 6:24 niv).

With such truths in mind, we look further in His Word for help to use money wisely. We find this: “Beware of covetousness” (Luke 12:15). Another says, “The borrower is servant to the lender” (Prov. 22:7). And in 1 Timothy we read, be “ready to give, willing to share” (6:18).

Money is a big issue. God, who provides for all our needs, can show us how to use it to bring Him honor.

Lord, sometimes money and finances are
overwhelming. It’s hard to know what decisions
to make, so please lead me and give the wisdom
to use my finances in a way that pleases You.

Never let gold become your god.

Read: 1 Timothy 6:6-12

Command those who are rich in this present age not to be haughty, nor to trust in uncertain riches but in the living God. —1 Timothy 6:17

Bible in a Year:
1 Samuel 27-29; Luke 13:1-22

[SkyDancer]

Some how, some way, I would like to meet her.

[SkyDancer]

Hi Conor!

[SkyDancer]

I’d give up Australia to come back and mentor her in whatever she’d like to do. Send her my blessings. Janey