Lavinia Onitiu-Gelineau, center, and Vicki Chicoine, left, are comforted Saturday by USM faculty members after accepting a posthumous degree for Gelineau's husband and Chicoine's son, Christopher, the Guardsman who was killed April 20 in Iraq.
Posted on 05/06/2004 11:32:19 PM PDT by churchillbuff
Lavinia Onitiu-Gelineau, center, and Vicki Chicoine, left, are comforted Saturday by USM faculty members after accepting a posthumous degree for Gelineau's husband and Chicoine's son, Christopher, the Guardsman who was killed April 20 in Iraq.
Vermont soldier dies in Iraq ambush
MONTPELIER, Vt. — Christopher D. Gelineau, a Vermont high school graduate who was in Iraq with the Maine National Guard, died Tuesday after enemy fighters ambushed his convoy.
Gelineau, 23, is the seventh soldier with Vermont roots to be killed in combat since the war began more than a year ago.
A 1999 graduate of Mount Abraham Union High School in Bristol, Gelineau was a specialist with the 133rd Engineer Battalion. Before being deployed to Iraq in March he lived in Portland, Maine, where he attended the University of Southern Maine.
“He was a very nice boy. He was patient and quiet,” said an aunt, Pam Gelineau of Eden, Wednesday night. “I don’t know what else to say.”
Gelineau’s mother and stepfather, Victoria and Jesse Chicoine, live in Starksboro, and his father, John, lives in Eden.
The families left early Wednesday for Maine to be with Gelineau’s wife of one year, Lavinia, Pam Gelineau said.
Those who knew Gelineau described him as a quiet, friendly, reliable young man who loved working with computers.
Gelineau was one of about 500 members of the 133rd Engineer Battalion sent for a one-year tour of duty in Iraq, based in the northern city of Mosul.
Several members of the 133rd, including Gelineau, were driving in a convoy Tuesday in Mosul, serving as a protective escort to military firefighters from South Carolina, Maine National Guard officials said.
Gelineau was in the lead Humvee when a roadside bomb exploded and heavily damaged the vehicle. Enemy fighters then began shooting at the soldiers.
Gelineau and three others were injured in the explosion and battle. Gelineau and the others were taken to a nearby military hospital, officials said. They said they were unsure whether Gelineau died of his wounds en route or at the aid station.
Gelineau is the first member of the Maine National Guard to be killed in Iraq.
Funeral held for Guardsman killed in Mosul explosion
By Sara Leitch
Associated Press
PORTLAND, Maine — Spc. Christopher Gelineau, a 1999 graduate of Mount Abraham Union High School in Bristol who served with the Maine Army National Guard, was laid to rest with full military honors Saturday.
Gelineau, 23, died April 20 in an ambush in northern Iraq. He is the seventh soldier with Vermont roots to be killed in combat since the war began over a year ago.
Gelineau was posthumously awarded Purple Heart and Bronze Star medals and promoted to sergeant. Brig. Gen. John W. “Bill” Libby, the head of Maine’s Army National Guard, presented the medals.
Gelineau, a member of the Maine National Guard’s 133rd Engineering Battalion, was killed when a convoy he was traveling in was attacked outside Mosul.
“There are those who are not willing to accept the minimum standards, those willing to give far more to their fellows” in the military, said Maj. Andrew Gibson, a Guard chaplain. “Let that be Chris’ lesson to us — that we might be willing to do a little bit more.”
He spoke after a Greek Orthodox funeral held in the University of Southern Maine’s gymnasium. About 400 people attended the service, including about 100 members of the Maine Army and Air National Guards.
The Rev. Constantine Sarantidis of Portland’s Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church performed the funeral, singing and chanting above the hum of ceiling fans that filled the gym with incense.
“The quality of life is not measured by length of years but by selfless service,” Sarantidis said. “By this measure, we can say Christopher Gelineau lived a full life.”
Gov. John Baldacci and U.S. Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe attended the funeral. Baldacci presented widow Lavinia Gelineau, 24, with a Maine flag flown over the State House.
Although the couple was married for just two years, “you showed me what perfect love was,” she said, clutching a fuzzy pink teddy bear. “You will always be my hero.”
She spoke for several minutes about the couple’s life together, then picked up a guitar to perform “Right Here Waiting” by Richard Marx.
It was the couple’s favorite song, she said, in part because it was the only one Christopher Gelineau could play.
“It’s not going to sound the same because my heart is broken,” she said.
The service was followed by a burial in Portland’s Evergreen Cemetery, where members of the Maine Army National Guard fired a 21-gun salute.
Creepy as usual.
Get a clue, buddy! I fought your type on the campus of the University of Wisconsin in the 60's and you and your rants are as obtuse now as they were then.
Sorry, fella...no sale then...no sale now!
Get lost. We are in a global struggle against Islamic Fascism and you Lindbergh types are trying to tell us that we should defend ourselves here, and not over there where it would do the most good.
For a Churchill buff, you appear to have lost any grasp of the man's work:
One ought never to turn one's back on a threatened danger and try to run away from it. If you do that, you will double the danger. But if you meet it promptly and without flinching, you will reduce the danger by half.
Be Seeing You,
Chris
Families are being used by the likes of people they would normally never be comfortable being associated with. Families are being contacted after loosing a loved one by MFSO and BTHN. Check out the links on their website. Check out Media Benjamin and her lovely crew who use these families. Check out their ties to Cuba. The left in embracing radical Islam because they both have the same agenda. Demoralize the our troops, their families and bring down our country.
ANSWER has quoted on their website that they fully support the insurgency in Iraq. Do you realize that they are fully supporting the death of our troops? The majority of the families cringe and recoil when families speak out like this. We disagree but there for the grace of God goes ourselves. This all goes much further than freedom of speech. This goes straight to the matter of war against our freedom and our republic. Enough is enough.
So sorry for posting an opinion that doesn't agree with yours (it's a war widow's opinion, but I guess she's not supposed to have an independent mind, either).
As usual, you pretend to miss the point, the usual tactic of the leftist elites.
Source and in-context quote please.
I quit reading when I saw the hyphenated name. Tell me, is this like the Michael S Berg scenario where the family member takes a leak on the family plot.
Castro is killing opponents. You haven't called for us to invade Cuba. Does that make you pro-Castro, or indifferent to dictators? I don't accuse you of that, because it's never been U.S. policy to send American young people to die in countries that haven't attacked us or are on the verge of doing so.
Does the fact that you're not calling for invasions of Sudan, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Cuba, China, North Korea -- in all of which people are being oppressed and killed by dicatators -- mean that you "aren't willing to fight" for a noble cause? I don't think so. I just think (whether you admit it or not) you don't support the idea of America invading countries just because they have tyrannical, murderous rulers. You make an exception to that rule, when it comes to Iraq. I don't. That's the only difference between us. Do you know that more than 2 million people have died in Congo's civil war since 1998 (instigated by guys of Saddam-like evil) since 1998? Why aren't you calling for intervention of tens of thousands of American troops? Until you do, please stop accusing me of moral indifference because I don't believe in invading other countries that haven't attacked us or pose imminent dangers to us.
Sorry for your loss. I am also sorry that you cheapened his sacrifice.
Linked thread reporting the death of the soldier's widow.
I bet those free elections are just killing you aren't they.
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