The medals and the American flag were almost too much for Kiona Bryant to hold as she sat yesterday at the grave of her high school sweetheart.
So she bundled them together, the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star and the flag that once draped the coffin of her husband, Jack, and turned her head away from the scene.
Sens. Edward M. Kennedy and John F. Kerry attend the funeral at Arlington for Lance Cpl. Dimitrios Gavriel, a Massachusetts native.
(Andrea Bruce Woodall -- The Washington Post)
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One by one, the soldiers who conducted the service touched her arm, whispered condolences and marched off across an open field at Arlington National Cemetery.
It was a scene that would be repeated later in the day. Bryant's husband was one of two soldiers killed in Iraq who were laid to rest yesterday in the cemetery, hours apart, in nearby graves.
Army Sgt. Jack "Jay" Bryant Jr., 23, died Nov. 20 in Muqdadiyah, Iraq, about 60 miles north of Baghdad, when an improvised explosive device detonated near his military convoy, followed by a rocket-propelled grenade attack. Bryant, of Dale City, was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 6th Field Artillery Regiment, 1st Infantry Division, based in Vilseck, Germany.
Lance Cpl. Dimitrios Gavriel, 29, a native of Haverhill, Mass., was killed a day earlier a result of enemy action in the Anbar province. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, based at Camp Lejeune, N.C.
The men were the 98th and 99th service members killed in Iraq to be buried at Arlington. The long, slow sound of taps rang out for both men on the crisp, clear day.
Bryant had begged his parents not to worry when he was deployed to Iraq and promised them he would be fine. "He would often tell us that he's immortal," his father, Jack Bryant Sr., said in an interview shortly after his son's death.
Just before he was killed, Bryant had a two-week leave in Germany with his wife and their toddler son, Keshawn James. Together, they celebrated an early Thanksgiving, far from their home in Dale City, and far from the uncertain battlefields of Iraq. They took a seven-day tour of Paris, and then Bryant returned to combat.
Bryant graduated from Hylton High School just over five years ago and went straight into the Army with dreams of seeing the world -- which he did -- and taking some time off before coming home for college. Recently, he had taken some computer science courses through the University of Maryland.
Endlessly optimistic, quick with a smile or a joke, Bryant's real passion was music, his father said. He sang in the choir at Star Bethlehem Missionary Baptist Church in Triangle, where his father is an associate minister. Shortly before his death, Bryant had taken to writing rap songs.
At 10 a.m. yesterday, the soldier's friends and family gathered around his grave. There, before burying his son, Jack Bryant Sr. somberly received an American flag from Lt. Gen. Larry J. Dodgen, commanding general of the Army Space and Missile Defense Command. Kiona Bryant accepted one as well, along with her husband's medals.
An Army firing party fired into the air a final salute of three shots, sharp and quick.
Three hours later, Gavriel's family and friends arrived, as did Massachusetts Sens. Edward M. Kennedy (D) and John F. Kerry (D), both of whom carried small yellow flower arrangements to place on the casket. Gavriel's mother accepted a flag from Staff Sgt. Charles Dorsey of the Marine Corps Barracks in Washington. A Greek Orthodox chaplain, the Rev. Father Nicholas Manousalas, finished the ceremony.
