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Date: 2003-07-03 07:32:05

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Date: 6/26/03 4:11:42 PM Central Daylight Time
From: Vanharl
To: Vanharl




IN MEMORY OF:  WOMEN OF VALOR

Share your thoughts on military women who are no longer here,
but left behind a legacy.

Posted:  25 JUN 03
"The Handcart Boys"



Yesterday was a sad day.   I attended the funeral of 1LT. Tamara Long-Archuleta USAF.  She was the copilot of an Air Force HH-60G rescue helicopter that went down in Afhganistan during a rescue mission.  There were six aircrew members killed.  In this message is a poem "the handcart boys."  It was written a few days before 1Lt. Long-Archuleta was killed, but a lot of what happened on that mission is directly related in the body of the poem.  

I sent the poem to the minister that conducted the service for 1Lt. Long-Archuleta and asked him, if he felt the poem was appropreate, to please pass it on to the Long family.  Yesterday to my surprise the poem was used in the eulogy.  

It is becoming very apparent that we can no longer engage in conflict without special ops and helicopters.  The helicopter used in rescue, is the modern-day "handcart."  The handcart is how, down throught history the dead and wounded were removed from the battle field.  Look at the case of PFC. Jessica Lynch and her rescue. It was the "handcart boys" who went in and got her out safely.  

In the Army, artillery is known as the king of the battlefield, infantry is the queen of the battlefield but I would say that helicopter special ops and rescue are the Prince and in case of 1LT. Long-Archuleta the Princess of the battlefield.

We just cannot do it without helicopters.  Think about it, when Marine One lands on the White House lawn.

It was a sad day yesterday with the loss of 1Lt. Long-Archuleta but it was also a wonderful day because the very mission she believed in and gave her life for, "the handcart boys/girls" safely rescued a fellow military member.  There will be one less funeral this week because of the "handcart boys."

Major Van E. Harl USAF Ret.
vanharl@aol.com  


"The Handcart boys"

He's lying in the tree line, blood running down his arm.
Listening for the sound of the Handcart boys, to remove him from this harm.
He flew in on a modern jet that got shot down in this affray.
But he is no different than the wounded at Shiloh, trying to survive, till they safely take him away.


In the dark of the night she waits with so much pain to bear.
Injured in the crash of her aircraft and now this seemly endless nightmare.
Where is the chopper that will lift her from the smoke, the fire and the pain?
Where are the Handcart boys, hurry, her life is beginning to drain?


He was wounded when a round slammed onto the "cruiser's" deck.
Shards of metal are protruding from his arm, shoulder and the right side his neck.
The corpsman has stopped the bleeding; he's been prepared, to be extracted in the night.
The Handcart boys are racing his way, and will be there before first light.


Get in, get them out, and hurry back, inside the safety of our lines.
It has been this way since ancient wars, to the battles of modern times.
The two-wheel Handcart is the way the wounded were removed from battles in past wars.
Our modern Handcart has a rotor-blade and sliding doors.


Look at history, look at artwork, recent photos or at movies if you will.
When it came to removing the wounded and injured off of some war torn desolate hill.
It was a Handcart carrying the broken and the dying with their screams of pain.
It was a Handcart transporting at Normandy in the cold June rain.


Every branch of the service has its modern version of the Handcart boys who respond to the call.
They go out for the wounded and dead, bring them back, get them all.
Some times the Handcart boys are brought back in a Handcart not of their own.
Some times they become the wounded & the dying, and for their efforts, they never come home.


There are also women who work these, latter-day Handcarts and their lives too, are on the line.
It is a dangerous mission, but just as their predecessors they to make that recovery in time.
They move out over the desert, into the night as the sand blows and swirls.
These Handcart operators are our Handcart girls.


I have a two-wheeled wooden handcart with an old worn flag sitting out on my front lawn.
It is not a protest, it's a reminder of our dead, who returned by Handcart, lying there upon.
In order to defend this Nation, we will continue to send the brave & young, our freedom they earn.
And we will always have a need for the Handcarts, for our wounded and dead, they must return.


Major Van E. Harl, USAF Ret.   15 March 2003  
Vanharl@aol.com