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Dan and Marla Uhles
DuQuoin, Illinois
Lance Corporal Drew Uhles, 20, left, wanted to join a long line of family members involved in the military. But he wanted to make his own footprints. Since no Uhles had yet joined the Marines, and since he wanted to be on the front lines where the action was, he joined the Marines right out of high school. He was deployed to Iraq twice (the first time, he and brother Neal were in Iraq at the same time). ] “When he departed on his second deployment, he said he couldn’t wait to get back and finish the job they didn’t get to finish the first time,” said his mother Marla. Drew died while patrolling the Syrian border for insurgents on September 15, 2004.
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News
- They keep two plastic ribbons tied to the flagpole in the front lawn: one black for mourning and the other yellow for a safe return.
Dan and Marla Uhles lost one son in Iraq already. Last month, another left to go to war.
Now, as they mourn the loss of one child, they struggle with the choice made by the other.
Drew, a quiet youngest boy who loved to while away summer afternoons fishing for bass and bluegill, died nine months ago--killed by a rocket-propelled grenade that hit his Humvee four days before his 21st birthday. Being a Marine had been his life's ambition since 8th grade, when he tacked a recruiting poster to his bedroom door. But it cost him his life.
The other son, Neil, 25, a stocky former high school football player, made it safely home from a yearlong deployment in Iraq with the Illinois National Guard. He did not have to go back. But against his parents' wishes, he volunteered... Despite Dan's misgivings, he has accepted the inevitable and tried to be supportive. He raised his children to be leaders and not followers, and is glad to be father to a son who shows the strength of will to accomplish what he sets out to do.Chicago Tribune, 6/13/05
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