Subscribe
Community
Crowd gathers to mourn fallen soldier
Baumann remembered for his dedication to duty in war on terrorism
Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2008
 Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photos by JESSE YEATMAN
A sheriff’s police car helps control traffic during a funeral service Monday for Sgt. Ryan Patrick Baumann, who died in Afghanistan on Aug. 1. Hundreds of sailors and other residents lined roads in Leonardtown, Loveville, Charlotte Hall and parts of Charles and Prince George’s counties as a funeral procession made its way to Arlington National Cemetery, where he was buried.
|
E-Mail This Article
Halfway through the service at the Brinsfield Funeral Home, Hollywood Road already was lined with people holding small U.S. flags for the procession that would follow, up Route 5 through northern St. Mary’s and eventually to Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.
Baumann, a 24-year-old sergeant with the U.S. Army, died Aug. 1 when the Humvee he was traveling in struck an improvised explosive device near the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan. A 2003 graduate of Great Mills High School, Baumann was stationed at Fort Campbell, Ky., when not deployed overseas or visiting family members, his fiancee and friends in St. Mary’s.
On Monday morning, color guards from the St. Mary’s Sheriff’s Office and motorcyclist groups including the Patriot Guard and Blue Knights stood in place along a lane during the service led by Monsignor Maurice O’Connell, where attendees said speakers included Baumann’s mother, Cindy Lohman, his longtime friend Josh Stevenson, Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-5th, Md.) and a gunner who had traveled with Baumann in the Humvee he drove.
Hoyer’s remarks included references to the county’s earlier losses thus far in the war on terror, including Raymond J. Faulstich Jr. in 2004 and Matthew P. Wallace in 2006, according to Del. John Bohanan (D-St. Mary’s).
‘‘We hope to break that [cycle] in 2010, and not have any more to go through,” Bohanan said after Baumann’s service. ‘‘This is a guy who believed in what he was doing, and served with great compassion and leadership.”
Capt. Andrew Macyko, the commanding officer at Patuxent River Naval Air Station, said the service for Baumann was very moving.
‘‘It brings the reality, or the gravitas, of the situation a little more to the forefront” when someone in the community is killed in war, Macyko said. ‘‘We are a nation at war and we are making sacrifices.”
The captain added, ‘‘His friends from childhood and then his friends in the Army spoke so highly of him and how he was so generous and cared very much for his junior soldiers.” Many described him as a hero and a leader among his fellow soldiers, the captain said.
Baumann’s family was presented with a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart by an Army general at the service. ‘‘That was a touching moment,” Macyko said.
A Maryland State Police motorcade escorted the procession to Virginia, accompanied by the Bay District Volunteer Fire Department.
About 20 minutes before the funeral service, about 75 motorcycles brought by riders from the Patriot Guard, Blue Knights and other groups already sat in pairs in a parking lot across the road from the funeral home.
Jim Sotiropoulos, a captain with the All-American Harley Davidson owners’ group in Hughesville, said its members and other motorcyclists including the Southern Maryland Cruisers discussed in advance their show of support.
‘‘They have a blog, they have a [Web] site, where we communicate during the week,” Sotiropoulos said, noting that the groups’ response followed anti-gay protests by a small religious organization at earlier services.
‘‘That’s why the Patriot Guard formed,” he said. ‘‘When they know the Patriot Guard’s coming, they pretty much stay away.”
No disturbances occurred at Monday’s service.
As the service ended, 17 white doves were released from a cage by John and Dawn Tierney, who operate Southern Doves for Love in Mechanicsville. Dawn Tierney works with Baumann’s mother at the Calvert County Health Department. ‘‘We called her and told her we’d like to be here,” Dawn Tierney said. John Tierney added, ‘‘It was the least I could do for the young man.”
Among the mourners outside paying tribute, Misty Frantz stood along the road in Leonardtown with her three children. Her husband, Jay Frantz, just returned in July from a mission in Iraq as the pilot of an unmanned aerial vehicle.
‘‘I feel blessed that my husband made it home. It breaks my heart” to know others are not making it home alive from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Frantz said, tearing up.
‘‘It’s really hard. It makes us be even more thankful to have him home safe,” said Paula Bonilla, whose husband, Evaristo Bonilla, also just recently returned from Iraq. ‘‘Our hearts go out to them.”
A hundred or more enlisted men and officers from the Navy lined both sides of Route 245 for the procession. Many other veterans took to their motorcycles as part of the procession. A Patriot Guard member later wrote of concerns that law enforcement authorities limited the number of motorcyclists who could participate in the formal procession, forcing the rest to trail behind unescorted.
Baumann’s mother later wrote that the outpouring of patriotic expression in tribute to her son was ‘‘phenomenal.”
‘‘He was our hero,” Sen. Roy Dyson (D-St. Mary’s, Calvert, Charles) said as he arrived at the funeral home. ‘‘It’s always a shock to see a young man struck down in the prime of life.”
