Posted on 04/05/2003 1:17:00 PM PST by knighthawk
CHEEKTOWAGA, N.Y. (AP) - The price of war was evident Saturday in the grieving faces of Lance Cpl. Eric Orlowski's parents, his toddler daughter and in the clenched and quivering jaws of fellow Marines who gathered to bury him.
"War is grim and ugly and not without cost," said the Rev. Joseph Penkaul who presided over Orlowski's funeral in this Buffalo suburb.
One of the first U.S. servicemen to die in Iraq, Orlowski, 26, was killed March 22 in an accidental discharge of a .50-caliber machine gun. His body arrived home last week.
"May we never forget that behind each name there is a story of a life, a story of hope, dreams and loved ones, cut down by a bullet or bomb," Penkaul told the gathering of about 600 relatives, friends, servicemen and women and political leaders.
Stoic members of Orlowski's unit escorted his flag-draped casket in and out of St. Philip the Apostle Roman Catholic Church and to his grave while the rest saluted as it passed. Some said Orlowski's death made them more determined to join the fighting.
"I wanted to go from the beginning. It made me want to go even more," said Lance Cpl. Christopher Tobias, one of more than 40 members from the Syracuse-based Bravo Company, 8th Tank Battalion, who attended the funeral. "I'd rather be out there with them."
Penkaul, a retired Air Force general, said decisive action has been important throughout the country's history. "There are things worth fighting for," he said. "Security, peace, freedom."
At St. Matthew's cemetery in West Seneca, Marines presented Orlowski's parents, Kathleen Zdzinski and Phillip Orlowski, with American flags. Orlowski's 3-year-old daughter, CamerynLee, squirmed in the bitter wind on the lap of her mother, Nicole Kross.
"I will love you always and forever," Orlowski's mother said in a message read by Penkaul at the church.
At Orlowski's grave, mourners wept and veterans held a long salute as a bugler played Taps following a 21-gun salute. An Erie County Sheriff's deputy escorted a riderless horse.
When it was over, Philip Orlowski, one hand clutching his flag to his chest, placed his other hand on his son's gunmetal gray casket. His mother laid a red flower and the two embraced.
Orlowski had been a reservist about three years. He was assigned to the 2nd Tank Battalion of the 2nd Marine Division based at Camp Lejeune, N.C.
Three rifle volleys, not a 21-gun salute.
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