Posted on 12/26/2003 3:20:35 PM PST by Shermy
SOMERS POINT - Two hundred years later and local historians are still trying to bring a fallen hero home.
The hero is Richard Somers, city founder John Somers' great-grandson, who died fighting in Libya in 1804. A local movement has been going on for years to have the Navy lieutenant's body brought home from Tripoli, where he was killed fighting pirates. As tension between Libya and the United States has begun to thaw in recent weeks, city officials think now might be the time to negotiate for Somers' remains.
"Now that the situation has changed dramatically, there's a window of opportunity," said William Kelly, a local historian who wrote the book "300 Years at the Point."
"We have to take advantage of it."
Last week, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi promised to abandon his country's weapons of mass destruction programs. In March, Gadhafi agreed to a $2.7 million settlement taking responsibility for the downing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland - a move that led the United States and Britain to push the United Nations to lift sanctions from the desert country in northwest Africa.
"It's an important issue that we can rally around as a community," said Kelly, who started a petition for the cause on www.richardsomers.org.
The petition has 29 signatures from local residents and people around the country. City Council is working with U.S. Rep. Frank LoBiondo, R-2nd, to urge the federal government to work on the return of Somers' remains.
"I want to bring him back and give him a proper burial," said Councilman Harvey Smith, a World War II veteran. "He's our town father."
Smith, 75, said he is meeting with LoBiondo next week and hopes to organize a trip to Libya to talk to Gadhafi about returning Somers' remains, now buried in the Old Protestant Cemetery in Tripoli.
"I want to talk to Gadhafi, he can be reasoned with, I think," Smith said. "He's trying to get in our good graces."
The city has a goal of securing Somers' return by Sept. 4, the day that he died and also the locally designated Richard Somers Day.
"Marines and Special Forces have a motto that we leave no one behind," Kelly said. "Here's someone we left behind."
To e-mail Alan Rappeport at The Press:
ARappeport@pressofac.com
I wonder if people will be interested in this drama until Tom Cruise makes a movie epic cast as Presley O'Bannon
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.