Free Republic

FORT HOOD, Texas — A pregnant soldier shot during a rampage at a Texas Army post last year cried out, "My baby! My baby!" as others crawled under desks, dodged bullets that pierced walls and rushed to help their bleeding comrades, a military court heard Monday. A soldier had just told Spc. Jonathan Sims that she was expecting a baby and was preparing to go home, when the first volley of gunfire rang out Nov. 5 in a Fort Hood building where soldiers get medical tests before and after deploying.

The body of slain soldier Francheska Velez heads home this morning. Velez was one of the 13 victims from the massacre at Fort Hood, when Maj. Nidal Hasan opened fire in a soldier readiness center at the base. Velez, 21, was pregnant at the time of her death. She had just returned from a tour in Iraq, from which she was released because of her pregnancy. She planned to come home to Chicago to prepare for her child’s birth. But instead of coming home to a celebration, Velez returns to mourners.

Maria Vitale at Life News.com makes an important correction to the death toll figure. It’s 14, not 13: *** It was beyond heartbreaking, seeing a young widow pausing before a picture of her beloved soldier, killed not on the battlefields of Iraq or Afghanistan, but on the presumably safe spot of Fort Hood, Texas. I had to turn away from the television screen, the pain on her face was so great. In the massive media coverage following Major Nidal Hasan’s killing spree at the military post, I have heard over and over again about the death toll from the tragedy....